Chapter 4: Lucky Hallion
“It’s my pleasure to offer hot death in a variety of exciting flavors. Take your pick.”
My eyes opened to behold a pile of yellowish sauce in a clean, white bowl…… what?
The events that had unfolded in the past two days had allowed me to sleep without interruption, and though I didn’t know how long I had been asleep for, I felt rather well rested. Around me, I could see as ponies were already up and stirring. Some were settling in and unpacking their things that they had brought with them from the Stable. Others still were eating from their supplies and drinking water. But as my senses continued to come back to me after my slumber I swear I heard voices outside our shelter, as if some of our survivors were actually walking about outside without any kind of hesitation.
“Are you hungry, big sister?” I heard the cheery voice of Blake beside me. He was still tucked under my wing, looking cozy with an empty tin can nearby. “I left you a can of food so that we can save the fresh fruit for later.”
I blinked. “A can of food?” I asked.
“Yeah, that can right in front of your nose. I set it there for a reason.” Blake said, reaching up to my face with a hoof to guide my eyes back to the bowl of sauce I had seen when I woke. Now that I was more awake than before, I saw that the bowl of sauce was actually part of a label that wrapped around a tin can.
“Canned applesauce… technologically preserved and ready to eat.” I read aloud, looking along the line of text at the bottom of the label. “Where did you find this?” I inquired to my brother, looking back to him.
“Security ponies found it under the floor. They said that there was a huge storage of food and water behind that big table. Then they brought some of it to Shore and his parents so that they could make sure it was safe to eat. They said it was okay, so now we’re all eating it! I split a can of diced carrots with Grace earlier in the morning. They were actually really good, and the water was okay too, even if it was a little warm.”
Food and water… stashed under the building? That sounded almost too good to be true. But for now, I would save my questions for later. I was quite hungry right now, more than likely an after-effect of loosing my dinner the previous night, and so I turned my attention back to the non-perishable before me. The top of the can had already been opened for me, and I could see the sauce inside. It looked a bit darker than what the remains of the label had advertised, but as I took the can in my teeth and tilted my head back to eat, the applesauce actually tasted quite good. I set the can back down for a moment, looking up at the ceiling as I analyzed the aftertaste. To my growing surprise, the preserved food didn’t leave any unpleasantness on my tongue. It had to have been here for at least one hundred years, and yet it almost tasted like it came with us from the Stable.
*tick tick tick tick*
I pricked my ears, hearing the ticking noise nearby. It was brief, the sound dieing away almost as soon as it came, leaving me rather baffled. “Did you hear that?” I asked my brother.
“Hear what?” he asked back.
Dang it… “Never mind. I’m just being silly.” I said back, instead turning back to my breakfast. I was hungry enough to forget about the noise, and I finished up my applesauce before setting the now empty tin can aside.
*tick tick tick*
I heard it again, now kind of irritating. The soft noise was brief again, coming and going in about a second., and it sounded in the same place… I was sure of that. But then as I begun looking all around, I could see that my Pipbuck’s medical screen was active, replacing whatever screen I had left on overnight. There was a strand of letters and numbers showing red on the top right corner of the screen: +2RAD/SEC. According to the medical screen, I had consumed a total of four RADS by eating that applesauce. I could also see that the small black gauge on my Pipbuck’s geiger counter had moved accordingly, rising just slightly from the zero at the bottom of the sensor. So that was the catch…
“Ah you’re awake.” I heard a pony call from up ahead of me. “Good morning.”
When I saw Shore, wearing his battle saddle and a pair of saddlebags, as the origin of the voice, I had to immediately ask him about the food. Even though I wasn’t very concerned about it, I still had eaten irradiated food, and I wanted some answers before I became overly worried. “Shore. This food that was found is irradiated. Did you know that?” I asked.
“Oh yes.” Shore answered with perfect ignorance to my concern. “In fact, every food item down in the storage is slightly irradiated. However, the radiation levels we discovered last night were very low and non-lethal. You see, the food was in fact preserved in terms of its texture, flavor, and nutritional value. Pre-war technology saw to that. However the mega spell detonations still had its effects on the preserved food, dosing canned and boxed pre-war foods with traces of radiation. It isn’t dangerous to consume this food, but the radiation dosage will add up over time.”
“So how long has this food been here?” I asked.
Adjusting his reading glasses with a hoof, Shore answered, “This is all original pre-war packaging, the boxes, the tin cans. It’s been around for one hundred and seventy-five years, preserved through arcane science. As for how long it’s been in Hopeville, I would have to say that it’s been stored here for at least five years. I could be wrong, but that is my best estimate after what little analyzing we did.”
“That’s quite something considering the age of the food and the technology behind it.” I said, finding myself rather drawn in by this morning learning seminar.
“I agree.” Shore said, looking over at the large receptionist desk. “It’s my hypothesis that there is still a weakness in the technology that preserves the food. While the ponies responsible for creating it were very intelligent, not even their ingenuity could hold back the effects of megaspells. It holds fair to conclude that radiation can still get through the preservation technology of the pre-war era, but in much smaller amounts. Therefore, these preserved foods take much longer to become too poisonous to digest, years upon years. There may be some food items that have laid in the wastes for a hundred years or more and can still be eaten. As for the food here, it’s still quite safe to eat and it actually tastes good. I’ll be honest when I say that I wasn’t expecting that. Ha, the marvels of pre-war technology.”
I smiled with him. But I wasn’t happy for the fact that pre-war tech had preserved the food we now had. I was happy knowing that we actually had decent food to eat. But still, radiation was a problem, no matter how long-term. “How long would we have until we start feeling the effects of radiation?” I asked him.
“Well, I’m no medical pony, but if I had to guess, I’d say that radiation poisoning would start going around after about three to four weeks of living off of the store we found. And unfortunately, we don’t have a large supply of medicine to combat the effects of radiation. At least this is what I heard from Gracie.”
“Do we really have enough food to live off of for that long?” I inquired.
“Yes. There’s enough down there to live off of for at least another two months. But regardless, we are going to have to be doing a bit of scavenging. This is actually why I came to find you.” he explained. “I came to talk to you earlier this morning, but you and your brother were still sleeping. But now that you are awake, I’d like to ask for you to accompany myself and Gunny on a quick scavenging trip around Hopeville’s north side. Captain Saber has already sent out one party to check on the ruined foundations and rubble of the pre-war housing district beyond the north side of town. He wanted me to investigate the Ministry of Peace recruiting center here because it had a terminal inside that is still running. I’m actually also surprised at that. A computer terminal, still running out here in this isolated town, is actually quite remarkable. But anyway, Gunny chose to venture with me to give me some security. I could use your help as another set of eyes, and you could also help carry useful items back to the City Hall. Are you interested in helping out?”
“Of course I’ll help.” I said, only helping because Shore was my good friend. I wasn’t very sure of how I would react if the captain gave me another assignment. The memory of my panic during the clearing of Hopeville stayed with me, even after a good night’s sleep, and it didn’t help that the guard who had been injured because of my lack of courage was resting nearby, sleeping on his side within Gracie’s makeshift clinic. What I would do to go back and relive that moment so that I could correct my mistake… “So we’re just scavenging through the recruiting center?” I asked as I rose up and stretched out my wings and my legs.
“That and the Hopeville Press.” Shore answered. “I’m certain that Captain Saber would’ve informed me if there was a terminal there, so we’re just going to rummage through it and see if there’s anything else we might be able to add to our supplies.”
Turning to Blake, I lowered my head down to meet his eyes. “Could you stay here and help Gracie if she needs it?” I asked him, and to his vigorous nodding, I kissed him on the forehead. “Thank you. I’ll be back soon.” I promised him, before I joined Shore.
Together we trotted out of the lobby and out into the streets of Hopeville. The sky was still completely grey with puffy clouds, but the transition from last night to today was very obvious, and now it was around midmorning. However, unlike the past two days, my mood was not dampened by this at all. Now there were buildings around me, a town, a place to call home in post-apocalyptic Equestria. To be living in a place like this, an actual town with an open sky around us, was strange… but good. I actually felt good while being in Hopeville, safe, and I had no doubt that the town would live up to its name so long as we did our part to preserve it. While most of the guards, as well as a large number of volunteers, were going through the grotesque work of clearing away the dead zombies from the streets, other guards and volunteers were moving in and out of buildings as they scavenged, searching for any useable items; in its own unique way, the town looked alive.
“Shore, Nova, good to see you.” I heard from my right. Gunny was trotting toward us from the eastern street, having been helping in the cleanup effort. He wasn’t wearing armor or a battle saddle anymore, but only a pair of saddlebags and his Stable issued barding which he had a single assault rifle strapped to. “It smells damned terrible over there. I’m glad to get away from that mess for a bit… but don’t tell the captain that I said that.”
Even from where I stood, I could smell what he had been smelling… oh what an improvement it would be when the bodies were gone, and their stink gone with them. “Have you been working out there all morning?” I asked, expecting an affirmative answer even before he said it.
“Basically.” he answered. “Captain Saber aims to have the streets cleared of corpses by the end of the day. It’s a lot of work, and it’s messy, but the sooner we can get ponies out into the streets and living life again the better. We already cleaned out City Hall while everypony was asleep overnight, so security’s really pushing themselves.”
“What exactly was up there on the second floor?” I inquired to him. I had remembered Saber saying that they had found something terrible, and that that had been the reason why ponies weren’t allowed to stay up there.
“Trust me, you don’t want to know the full details.” Gunny stated. “I’ll say anyway that Saber’s got a mind to declare that ponies had lived here not too long ago. A lot of us on the security team are thinking right alongside him when he says that the bodies we found up there were what was left of the previous residents. I’m not going to explain anymore details about it, but we cleared out the rooms so that ponies could live up there if they wished. All in all, City Hall’s turning into a cozy little fortification for us until we get the rest of the town cleared out and cleaned up.”
Well that was a bit depressing to hear. To know that other ponies had actually lived here who weren’t invaders, and to know that they had all been wiped out, made me hate the wasteland all the more. “That’s terrible.” I said, respectfully solemn.
“All we can do to honor them is to bury them and take care of their town for them. They’re in Celestia’s hooves now.” Gunny replied, nodding before turning to Shore. “Are we ready for this little scavenging trip?”
“Absolutely.” Shore confirmed. “I’m rather anxious to see how this pre-war terminal works. We might be able to find some valuable information on it.”
As we begun to walk, we turned away from the subject of the dead and engaged in a brighter topic of conversation that included the pondering of what we might find within the buildings. “Any pre-war technology would provide an advantage to us.” Shore explained. “I read that terminals were perhaps the greatest technological advancement for pre-war ponies. They allowed networked communication, data storage, and even brought about the construction of advanced security. It all just depended on what these terminals were used for. I’m hoping that with this terminal that the captain spoke of, I might be able to learn a bit more about what transpired during the pre-war era. Every bit of historical information would be valuable in that case.”
“I doubt that there would be much else besides stuff like that.” Gunny added. “After all, we’re just looking through a newspaper joint and a Ministry of Peace recruiting center. So far as I understand, newspapers didn’t need guns, and I’m sure that Fluttershy avoided firearms more than Gracie does now.”
“I think Hopeville was a little too peaceful in the pre-war era to be housing weapons.” I pointed out. “We’ll just have to try our luck elsewhere when the time comes to find extra weapons.” As much as I hated to admit it, I knew that we’d have to go out there and scavenge if we wanted to stay here. Every item, weapons, food, water, medicine, were all necessities that we would have to find elsewhere.
“That might be sooner than you realize.” Gunny said. “Captain Saber already sent one security team out to explore a bit. He sent them down that eastern road nearby. That was only a few minutes ago, and I know he’s already planning on sending another team or two out later. With you being a Pegasus and all, I would imagine he’d want your abilities for that job too, if you’re up for it that is.”
Just when I had been worrying about being called up for another assignment, the possibility had to happen. “We’ll see…” I said, trying to drop the subject before either of the stallions could inquire into the matter. “For now, let’s just do this first.”
We were coming up on the Ministry of Peace recruiting center. The entrance had been closed up again once the all clear was given the previous night, and the building remained untouched ever since. The Ministry of Peace poster was still in its place by the door, Fluttershy still looking forward with those sad blue eyes, making me stop and stare with sympathy again. War? Fear? Death? We must do better! Ministry of Peace. “You coming Nova?” Gunny asked. He and Shore were standing on either side of the door, waiting for me to stop looking at the poster.
“Sorry.” I stepped up against the wall behind Gunny as he levitated out his assault rifle. Even if the building had been secured once, it was understandable that Gunny would be cautious in entering. While City Hall was fully secured, there was always the possibility that somepony or something would’ve snuck into the building from outside of town. Until security ponies could establish a secure perimeter around Hopeville, we still had to be careful. Using his magic to open the door, Gunny pushed the door open with a creak and stepped inside. Shore and I waited outside the door until Gunny gave the all clear. The room was dark when I entered, mostly due to the windows being boarded up from the inside. Along one wall was a row of rusted benches, some still with moldy and dirty cushions showing where ponies would wait before conducting their business with the Ministry of Peace. On that same wall, posted above the benches, was another poster advertising the Ministry of Peace. You don’t have to be a Steel Ranger to be a hero. Join the Ministry of Peace today! It was the only poster within the rectangular room, the cracked and crumbling walls otherwise entirely grey.
At the far end of the room was a large desk filled with holes and discolored metal, showing where rust was breaking the desk down. At the top of the desk, amidst a scattered pile of ruined papers, was a white box of sorts. The back wall was glowing a monochrome green, flickering as the white box buzzed with life. “Ah there it is.” Shore said, prancing ahead of me and up to the desk. “It’s still in remarkable condition.” he commented as he examined the terminal with a critical eye. “And to think that it’s been sitting here and running for the past one hundred and seventy-five years.”
“I’ll go ahead and check out this side room, see if there’s anything worth taking.” Gunny said as he peered into the entrance to another room on the left side of the main lobby. “Look’s like an old office area of some kind. There’s lots of desks and chairs… a few papers… shouldn’t take me too long.”
When he disappeared into the next room, a resonating crash sounding as he looked through a desk, I begun looking about on the floor and along the walls, gradually making my way to Shore. The main lobby was rather empty aside from what I saw at first glance, only an occasional chunk of stone that had chipped from the walls or the ceiling resting on the tattered floor mat that led from the entrance up to the desk that Shore was now occupying. He was staring into the screen as he typed away on the large keyboard attached to the terminal from below the display monitor. “This is most curious. This terminal’s security programming shows similar characteristics to some of the Stable terminals I worked with.” Shore said as I stepped up beside him to watch him work. “Actually, it is quite identical to what I remember. It almost makes me wonder if Stable-Tec built these pre-war terminals.” I saw as the glowing green monitor changed from displaying a series of instruction to displaying lines of code which were lined up into two columns down the length of the screen. Within the code of numbers and symbols, I could see an occasional seven-letter word. “Oh I know this.” Shore said, a broad smile on his face.
“Um… what is it?” I asked. Unlike him, I was rather incredibly… clueless.
“This is a security program.” Shore explained as he begun looking amongst the lines of code. “It’s a puzzle of sorts… or a guessing game, if you will. With this, I have to find the password to the terminal. I have four chances to find it or else the terminal will lock down. Let’s see… here.” I leaned in closer to see as Shore guided a blinking green box down to one of the seven-letter words, highlighting it. Pressing a button on the keyboard, another display showed on the lower right of the screen. Out of his chosen word, herding, three of the seven letters were correct. “So you see,” he continued to explain. “I have three correct letter within this word which means that the terminal’s password has three of these letters in it. It’s very likely that the I, N, and G, are the correct letters… so if I pick… this word,” I listened while watching the screen, and he guided his cursor down to the word looking. According to the terminal, this word had six correct letters out of seven, and Shore nodded with an even wider smile. “now I have a mostly correct password. I just need to find another word that matches this one, minus one letter. I also still have two chances to find the correct word, so I have some room to guess if the occasion calls for it.”
“I’m glad you know how to do this, because I would have no idea.” I commented, looking away from the screen and blinking; the bright green was a bit of a stinger on the eyes, and I really didn’t know how Shore could stare at it for so long.
“Oh there’s nothing to it really.” Shore replied, not taking his eyes off of the screen. “Practice makes perfect with these kinds of things. Once you’ve been around the same programming for a few years, you tend to be able to recognize how it works right off the bat… AH HA! Success!” The sudden triumphal tone of his voice made me turn back to the glowing screen, and I saw that he had picked a third word. The display showed that the word cooking was the correct password, and the strands of code disappeared to show a menu of items. “And so this is what the terminal holds…” Shore said aloud, looking over the menu. There were three items on the screen, the first on the list being some sort of report titled, Recruiting Center opening. The second item on the menu was another document listed as Volunteer numbers on the rise. The final item, however, was what had caught my eye. The last item on the menu was listed as an audio recording, lacking a title or description to show what the audio recording related to. Either way, I remembered what Captain Saber had told me about my Pipbuck’s ability to make a copy of an audio log and then play it again from my own speaker; I was rather curious to hear the message on that log.
Raising my right foreleg, I asked Shore, “Shore, do you know how to get this terminal to connect to my Pipbuck?”
Shore had already opened the first file and had begun to read it when I asked. But looking away from the screen, he eyed my Pipbuck and smiled. “I do actually. If I recall correctly, these terminals should have a wire that connects to the exterior of your Pipbuck.” he explained as he begun searching around the body of the terminal. “It should be on the right side… there it is.” I saw as he searched the right side of the terminal’s exterior before finding what looked to be a small door near the bottom of the right side. There was a button above it, and when Shore pressed it with a hoof, the door fell open to reveal a short black cord tucked away inside a small compartment built into the terminal’s body. “That plug at the end of this cord will connect to your Pipbuck’s terminal interface port. That should be at the bottom left of the frame.”
“Found everything in there worth taking.” I heard from my right as Gunny returned from the second room. “I’m afraid it wasn’t much however. The place was mostly full of papers and junk, but I did find a rather large amount of bottle caps stored in the desks and trash cans though.”
Bottle caps? That seemed like something that would be an uncommon find in any ruin. Aside from that, they seemed like an item that would be quite out of place in a desk or cabinet. “Bottle caps, Gunny?” I asked, freely expressing my doubts.
“Sixty of the damn things, if you can believe that.” Gunny confirmed, looking rather baffled himself. “My gut tells me to keep them, so that’s what I’m going to do.”
Sixty bottle caps in a recruiting center? The pre-war ponies who worked here must’ve drank a lot of Sparkle Cola, or whatever that pre-war drink was called. “What else did you find?” Shore asked him.
“Just an extra couple cans of preserved food, three in all. The rest of it was stuff that was irrelevant to the task of surviving.” Gunny answered. “Are you two about done here so we can move on to the Hopeville Press?”
“Almost, my friend.” Shore answered, looking back at the terminal. “I just want to be able to get this audio recording and the two reports here downloaded to Nova’s Pipbuck. Could you give us some magic to plug in this cable to Nova’s Pipbuck please?”
Gunny obliged, using his horn to remove the cord from its hiding place within the terminal’s frame, and as it hovered there, Shore pressed a button on the lower left part of my Pipbuck’s frame. A small piece of the frame slid open to reveal the port where the cable could be plugged into my Pipbuck, and when Gunny did this, I brought up my terminal notes screen. It only took a matter of seconds before the technology behind the Pipbuck recognized the computer data, and the three files were copied to my device. As I looked over the display, I inquired, “Shore, do you know if these files stay on my Pipbuck permanently or for only a limited time?”
“I believe they stay permanently.” Shore replied as he finally stepped back from the terminal. “If I recall, Pipbucks can store a tremendous amount of data. This would be an accurate statement if what I had been thinking earlier was true. Part of me thinks that Stable-Tec also made these terminals, in which case it would not be surprising if Pipbuck’s had this relationship to terminals and the data they store.” As I set my Pipbuck foreleg down on the table, pulling the terminal cord out of the device, Shore added, “When we are done with our scavenging of the Hopeville Press, I would very much like to read those files.”
“I actually want to play that audio recording as well. It’ll be interesting to hear some pre-war ponies speak about things that happened before the end of the war, so we’ll look over those records when we’re done.” I assured him before Gunny led us out back into Hopeville.
We walked along the broken sidewalk up to the entrance of the Hopeville Press. Copying the same tactic he used to enter the recruiting center, Gunny levitated out his assault rifle and pushed open the door. He entered first and gave a quick all clear before Shore and I followed after him. The press office’s main lobby was a narrow hallway that led to a registration desk. In front of the desk, on both sides of the hallway, were two entrances leading into other rooms of the press. However, there were no signs or other directories to tell what purpose the other rooms served.
We stopped at the end of the hall, Gunny looking cautiously into one of the rooms while Shore walked around the registration counter. Along the floor was a mess of old papers and bits of metal, and at intervals on the walls I could see divots where machinery may have once been fastened into the stone; up above, empty fixtures showed where light bulbs would’ve been. “This looks like the room where the papers were made and distributed.” I heard Gunny comment from my left. “There’s a bunch of old machines in here, and a lot of papers.”
“Hold on Gunny.” Shore called from behind the registration desk. “I believe I’ve found a safe of sorts. Come look at this would you? It’s locked and I don’t have the tools or the know-how to get it open.”
“Well now we’re talking.” Gunny said, rearing around to step up behind the registration desk. “Oh yeah, that’s a safe. And where there’s a safe, there’s loot. I’ll take a peek and see if I can get this thing open.”
“I might as well make myself useful and check that room you were peering into.” Shore replied, walking out from behind the desk.
“Take these.” Gunny called quickly, using his magic to lift his saddlebags off of him and set them over Shore’s back. “Find anything, just put it in the saddlebags and I’ll sort out the stuff you find when we’re done.”
With Shore leaving into the next room, and Gunny crouching behind the registration counter to focus on the safe, I was left alone and feeling rather awkward. Behind the desk I could hear Gunny’s magic as he begun to work on the safe, and when I came around to watch, I saw that he was levitating a pair of tools up to the lock. Upon inquiry, he explained that these tools included a screwdriver and a bobby pin. “The flat tip of this screwdriver can fit into the lock, and that’s what I turn the lock with.” he said as he worked. “The bobby pin allows me to pick at the lock which lets me turn the lock with the screwdriver until it opens.” I could see partly what he was explaining, as I saw the magic-coated bobby pin rotate left. The screwdriver begun to rotate the lock until it snagged upon the bobby pin. Gunny had to then move the bobby pin further left and try again. But when he did, the bobby pin snagged and the pin snapped, and Gunny lost focus of his magic, dropping the screwdriver and the two halves of the bobby pin. “Damn it.” he said, hitting the floor with a fore hoof. “I’m really out of practice.”
“Out of practice?” I asked him, unable to suppress a smirk. “Were you ever in practice?”
“Heh, yeah I was.” he answered, looking back at me with his own small smile. “Do you remember how many times Old Abernathy locked himself inside his room? I was the only one on the security team that knew how to open a metal lock without a key or a computer.” We laughed together at that memory of the Stable, a good memory to remember, before Gunny used magic to pull another bobby pin from a pocket in his barding. Returning his focus to the lock, I watched as he followed the same steps as before. This time, he rotated the bobby pin to the right, and he turned the lock with his screwdriver. The lock turned smoothly until it reached a ninety-degree angle from its starting vertical position, and it opened with a distinguished click. “That did it… open up.” Gunny said, setting his tools down as he nudged the safe door open.
Crouching down beside him, I could see the contents of the safe. Though it was a smaller safe, there was a variety of items inside, including a pouch full of jangling metal, (which Gunny identified as more bottle caps) a small box of preserved carrots, a newspaper with readable text, and a firearm that Gunny identified as a ten millimeter pistol. The pistol came with its own holster, and when Gunny checked the weapon, it was loaded with twelve rounds in its magazine. “Finally, some worthwhile treasure.” Gunny commented, looking over the weapon’s condition by rotating it with his magic. “It’s not in too bad of shape, but it could use some cleaning.”
By now, Shore had arrived after searching through the first room. The saddlebags he wore looked a bit bigger now, and Shore explained, “I picked up everything that looked useable. Most of it was just junk I found, but if nopony can get any use of it, then we can throw it away.”
“Sounds good.” Gunny replied, levitating up the food, bottle caps, and pistol. “This is what we found in the safe. It’s a good find overall.” He brought them to Shore’s saddlebags and set the items inside. “Let’s go look through this other room and then we’ll be done here.”
“You two go on ahead.” I said, half-mindedly paying attention to them. My eyes were drawn to the newspaper that Gunny had left behind in the safe. There was no chance that this paper was made post-war, and knowing this left me quite amazed at the fact that a pre-war newspaper had survived through the years in decent shape. This was another sliver of pre-war history, and I was very curious about what it said. I didn’t look to see if the two had left, but immediately reached a hoof inside the safe and carefully slid the newspaper out and onto the floor. The paper was crisply folded up so that what I assumed to be the title page was already facing me. Only the edges of the paper seemed to be wearing away, as everything on the title page was legible, including the cover photo of the issue. I never knew much about what megaspells were, but that limited knowledge didn’t stop the knot that formed in my stomach when I saw that cover photo. Though the color had mostly faded, I could see the distinguished shapes of three mushroom-shaped clouds that towered up into the sky. Whoever had taken this photo had been far away from the blasts, but close enough to be able to fully distinguish three separate clouds. Above the photo, the headline at the top-center of the page read in large and bold letters,
WAR TAKES HIDEOUS TURN: MEGASPELL CLOUDS SIGHTED IN SOUTHEASTERN EQUESTRIA
A section of the page underneath was dedicated to explaining the story behind the caption, and I read aloud, “During late evening today, field photographer Sunflower Flash of the Hopeville Press was returning to Hopeville from photographing the entrance of Stable-Tec’s newest revealed southeast Stable, Stable two-o-three, when she felt trembling in the earth. When Flash turned to search for the cause of the shaking, she beheld a balefire pillar towering into the sky on the southeast horizon. Even before she could take her first photo, a second pillar of balefire appeared beyond the first. Shortly after, a third balefire blast occurred near those. Sunflower Flash took pictures and then returned to the Hopeville Press, saying, quote, I don’t know what they were targeting, but the zebras have done the worst possible thing that they could have done, and have hit Equestria with amplified balefire spells. This war is turning for the worst. Unquote. The reason behind this attack is unknown and has left the staff of the press rather puzzled. Southeastern Equestria is mostly grassland, forest, and mountain, with only a few populated areas. So this brings up the question of what? Upon discussion amongst the crew of the Hopeville Press, only educated guesses can be made about possible targets of these megaspell detonations. These targets include locations such as Buckley Air Force Base or the town of Ashton. Investigations will continue from both the press and the respective authorities as to where these megaspells struck and why the zebras targeted the southeast. Because of this event, the press will be delivering new issues to the Equestrian heartland whenever a new update on this attack is received by our staff.”
I stopped reading, exhaling as I looked away from the words. I couldn’t begin to imagine how horrible that would’ve been to read this issue before the end of the world. Judging by the writing, the entailed attack must’ve been the first time that megaspells had been used as an offensive measure against Equestria. It must’ve been scary for everypony in Equestria to know that their enemies had gone so far as to use such a destructive method like the megaspell to attack. There would’ve been disorder across the land, rioting, panic, and then the heartland would be hit. Something about it didn’t add up though. Surely if this paper was kept locked away, other issues of the paper that included the promised updates would’ve been stored away as well. But of course, there was a multitude of possible reasons why this paper would’ve been stored while later issues were not. Still, this title page was a powerful, if small, piece of pre-war history and I wanted to keep it with me.
Gunny and Shore returned from the second room, their scavenging now complete. The title page easily tore from the rest of it, and though I did want to read the rest of it, I put it back in the safe and took the cover page delicately in my mouth. “What’s that you got there?” Gunny asked curiously.
I stepped up to Shore and carefully slid the page into his left saddlebag. “I found a page of that newspaper to be quite the read. I want to keep it with me.” I said, adding a smile for effect.
“A newspaper?” Gunny said, doubtful towards its value. “That doesn’t exactly match up with the word valuable does it?”
“No, but I want to keep it anyway.” I insisted, narrowing my eyes to replace my smile. “Do you really want to argue about something so unimportant?”
“Alright alright, keep it. It’s your choice.” Gunny said. Even though he rolled his eyes, I was glad he saw the pointlessness in the argument.
“Thanks. Shall we go?” I asked, receiving both their nods as an affirmative answer. Upon stepping outside of the Hopeville Press, I stopped to bring up my Pipbuck, remembering my promise to Shore. Gunny stopped ahead of me, looking back, and Shore stepped up beside me to look as I selected the audio file and played it.
---“This is Skip, pony-in-charge of the Ministry of Peace recruiting station in Hopeville. This is my first report. Of all the things to happen, I had never expected Fluttershy to visit us in person. We were a group of employees that had suggested that we move out of the heartland and set up shop out here. Any way to bring up more recruits for the Ministry of Peace is a plus for our cause, and so Fluttershy supported our idea and sent us to Hopeville. It’s a nice enough little town, very peaceful, and when the ponies here saw us come in from the northwest, they immediately asked us a lot of questions. I told them why we were here and who we were, and then the next day, we ended up with twenty names on the volunteer list.”---
The stallion who was speaking sounded very pleased with these results, happy even. I couldn’t blame him for that because hell, it made me smile too.
---“The next couple of days had gone roughly the same while we finished setting up. We got ten more on the second day, and twelve more names written on the list on the third day. And then on the fourth day, yesterday, Fluttershy herself stopped by for a brief visit. Upon inquiry of her visit, she explained that she was curious to see how things were going outside of the heartland, with us and the station, and when we gave her the numbers, she gave the biggest smile. After a hearty congratulations, she explained how proud she was and that this was a good achievement for the ministry. This was coupled by the mentioning that she was on the brink of creating something big and that she would be grateful for every volunteer that the ministry could receive. I had asked her myself what this creation of hers was, but she wouldn’t say. She only said that it would hopefully be something that would put an end to this war. Hey, I like the mare. She’s the most respectable and caring pony I’ve ever worked with, so her word was good enough for me. But all in all, I’d say that this warrants a celebration. If the head of the ministry thinks we’re doing a good job, then we know we’re doing something right. Great work everypony!”---
“Well that was an interesting recording.” Shore said as the audio tape ended. “It wasn’t as defining as I had hoped it would’ve been, but it was definitely a curious bit of information to listen to.”
“Apparently, the Ministry of Peace really knew what it was doing.” I commented, lowering my Pipbuck leg.
“I see Captain Saber up ahead.” Gunny said, cutting through our praise to the audio recording. “Let’s go drop off these supplies we found and see what he wants us to do next.”
Between the time of our scavenging and now, the streets looked much improved. There were still bodies left from the herd of zombie ponies, but more and more were being moved away by magic. Unicorns were moving the bodies past the east side of town and piling them far away from the pre-war houses and shops. On the opposite side of town, my heart sank as I saw a small group of ponies gathered around two sticks that had been thrust into the dirt. They were the families and friends of the two ponies who had died yesterday, laying their lost loved ones to rest. I remembered that mare who had died last night… the way she died… I shook my head to get the thoughts out before I could dwell on them, just in time to hear as Gunny called to the captain.
“Captain! We’re done sir.”
“Excellent. Any luck on the north side?” Saber asked as he approached the three of us.
Using his magic, Gunny levitated the saddlebags off of Shore’s back and set them before the captain. “We found a couple of things that we could use. A bit of extra food, a pistol, lots of bottle caps. Other than that, we just found a lot of junk and scrap.”
Before the captain could take the saddlebags, I reached out and snagged my souvenir with my teeth. Again, the question came. “A newspaper?” Saber asked, puzzled.
“Yes.” I said, spitting out the cover page onto the ground. “It’s just something I found that I want to keep with me for awhile.”
“I don’t see why not.” Saber replied with swift understanding. Turning to the saddlebags, he peered through them. “This sidearm and this food will help out with our supplies. But what about these bottle caps? Any particular reason why you decided to gather these up Gunny?”
“Sir, the fact that we found over seventy of these things within two buildings is enough to make me think that they must be important somehow. I’d like to hang onto them myself, see if I can find something productive to make from them.” Gunny explained. “If nothing else, then I’m wrong, and I throw them away.”
“Sounds reasonable to me.” Saber said, nodding in approval. “Good work. I’ve got something else I’d like done, and I expect that it’ll take most of the day today. This morning, I sent a team out east to search for any other signs of life and they’ll be back this afternoon. The next task I have for you is a similar job. I’d like the three of you to find Rosemary Grace and head east as a scouting party. Gracie told me that her patients are recovering nicely and that her new assistants can care for them while she’s out. So I’d like you four to take the road east, keep an eye out for any pony or any place, and check in on the other team as well. One of them has a Pipbuck with him, so you should be able to contact the team through the security channel when you’re close enough. Just keep in mind that I want eyes and ears only. If you find trouble out there, then do your best to stay out of it. But of course, stay alert and don’t be afraid to use your weapons. Before you leave, I’d like to talk to you in person for a moment.” He finished, addressing me directly and waving the others away. When we were alone, he looked back at the cleanup effort. I looked with him, seeing the progress from a much closer view. Now that there were nowhere near as many bodies on the streets, the sight was much more tolerable. “So Nova, how are you this morning?” the captain asked.
“Better.” I said instinctively, even though I was a bit nervous about this assignment. The fear of making another mistake like last night was sticking with me like glue.
“Do you think you’re ready for this assignment I’m giving you?” he asked, not doubtful but genuinely curious.
“So long as I don’t screw up again.” I said after a long moment of silence.
“Still thinking about yesterday?” he asked, nodding expectantly. “I’ll be honest, I was kind of hoping you would say that. It gives me the chance to explain something to you… explain what I’m seeing in you.” He paused to look back at me, and fixing me with a firm stare, he said, “You’ve got a lot of determination that’s being covered by this cloud of yours, and I want you to break out of that cloud and focus. If you can’t focus on the present, then that puts you in danger of getting hurt and possibly killed. I don’t want to lose you out there. I’ve lost enough ponies under my command to know that I don’t want you or anypony else becoming part of that statistic. You’ve done a lot for me already, even after what you went through in the Stable, but I need you to do this for me too. Spare me from having to dig you a grave. Do I make myself clear?”
I took in his words with surprise. There was strength in his words, a resolve to see that everypony here would be able to find comfort in Hopeville and start fresh. Now that Hopeville was becoming more secure, his determination was stronger than ever. “Yes.” I said, looking him in the eyes. “I’m just nervous still, that’s all.”
“I understand,” he replied with sympathy. “but remember what and who you still have left because that’ll be what will help you the most within the wasteland. It’s what is helping most of us out right now.”
I stared at him a moment, letting those two sentences ring in my mind. He was right of course, and I realized just how powerful the words behind his thoughts were. It was something that was taught in the Stable, to always remember what you have left, and to help get over my fear of making a mistake again, I’d have to draw strength from my friends. They had never let me down before, and I was optimistic enough to believe that the wasteland wouldn’t change that either, no matter how hard it tried. “Thanks captain.”
“Anytime. So,” Saber said, changing the subject. “I’m glad that you’ll do this task. I had your old saddlebags returned to Blake, the saddlebags you brought out from the Stable. So far as I remember, Blake was still in the City Hall lobby, so you can retrieve those before you leave. Gunny can show you how to equip saddlebags along with your battle saddle. I’ve got to get back to work on the streets. Good luck out there, and be careful.”
With that, he returned to his team to continue the effort of disposing the corpses on the streets. I found my cover page on the ground and picked it up in my teeth again before trotting back into the City Hall. The lobby was about as full as it had been when I had woken up this morning, some ponies casually conversing with each other while others trotted from room to room running errands and setting up living areas for ponies to settle into. At the far end of the lobby, I could see my baby brother standing with Grace as she levitated her saddlebags over her back and secured them. Also inside the makeshift clinic was Shore, waiting patiently with his battle saddle and saddlebags equipped.
I trotted over to where Blake had set his saddlebags, and found my own empty saddlebags laying on the carpet nearby. The first thing I had to do was reclaim my items and return them to my own saddlebags. The healing potion and the portrait I had kept from the Stable were still at the top of the provisions that were left, and so I took them and returned them to my own saddlebags. The cover page was the last item of my possession outside of my weapons, and I set that page inside just in time to see Blake scurrying up to me. “I heard that you’re going outside of town.” he piped up. “I want to come with you!”
That was something that I had feared he would say. Whether it was sooner or later, I had gotten the feeling that he’d want to stay by my side. While I did admire Blake’s helpful nature, there was no way in hell that I was going to let him risk his neck out there. “No Blake.” I said, firmly, but as gently as I could. “The wasteland isn’t a place for young colts to be traveling in. You’re staying here and helping out around town when anypony needs you.” He looked ready to protest on the spot, but I interrupted swiftly, adding, “We just don’t know enough about the wasteland right now to determine how safe it is out there. And right now, I’m under the firm belief that any part of the wasteland outside of Hopeville is dangerous.”
“But I want to go with you.” he insisted anyway. “We’re family and we should stick together.”
“I understand that Blake… but this is different.” I asserted gently.
“I don’t see the harm in it.” I heard from my left; Rosemary Grace was standing beside me. “Besides, Gunny and Shore will be there to protect him, and so will you. With all of us together, I know I feel safe. You should let him come with you.”
“This isn’t the same kind of environment.” I insisted. “I don’t trust it to be bringing him along with us.”
“You’re worried about him, and I understand that. But really, you two need to be together whenever possible. If you go without him now, you’ll start going without him every time you might be called out of Hopeville.” Grace said, more an assumption than a fact. But still, the possibility was a disheartening one… and one that I also didn’t want to allow the chance of coming to fruition. “Besides, I have faith in him, and I know that you do to. If he wants to help us, then let him. We’ll all watch out for each other out there.”
I sighed, irritated at her persistence. She was optimistic yes, but this optimism wasn’t helping me like it usually did. “If nothing else, letting Blake accompany us would show any peaceful ponies out there that we weren’t looking for a fight.” Shore put in as he joined us, bringing up another good point. Both of them seemed rather confident with themselves and with these proposals… so why couldn’t I be confident like them? Still worried, still adapting, that was no excuse.
Draw strength from each other…
“Alright Blake, you can come with us.” I said, giving in to see him smile a big smile. “But when we get out onto the road, you’re to stay no more than one pony-length away from me, and that is non-negotiable.”
“You bet!” Blake said, racing immediately to his saddlebags and ducking down underneath them to set them over his back. Again, the saddlebags looked to nearly drag on the floor because of Blake’s small size; only his hooves, his head, and his tail were visible. Scurrying back with cheerful energy, he declared himself ready for travel.
Shortly after, Gunny descended the staircase from the second floor to join us, wearing his security armor with his assault rifle strapped to it. His armor had been repaired, restoring it to far better condition than the skirmish with the five invaders had left it. He was the only one of us not bringing any saddlebags, joining us simply for the need of security on uncharted territory. “We about ready?” he asked us, looking among our makeshift exploration team.
“Yes.” Grace confirmed wholeheartedly. “This will be interesting to say the least. Our first task together…”
“I feel good about working with you three… er… four.” Gunny remarked, correcting himself and smirking at Blake. The little colt proceeded to smile wide and hop across the lobby to exit the City Hall.
“He’s all fired up and ready isn’t he?” I commented, unable to suppress the concern in my voice, even when I tried to smile.
“We can all look out for each other out there,” Shore assured confidently. “just like Gracie said. Have some faith my friend. Faith has won us Hopeville, I’m sure it can do more for us down the road.”
He and Grace proceeded down the lobby and out the door, and I felt as Gunny set my saddlebags over my flanks. “When you put these on, they’ll rest on your flanks so they don’t get in the way of your battle saddle.” he explained to me. “Each saddlebag has a secondary strap that can be attached to your battle saddle so that the bags don’t fall off when you move.” The saddlebags clicked into place, secured against the battle saddle’s main strap, and when he finished, he added, “I don’t think you would normally be wearing these, but so far as I understand, there’s an item or two you want to keep around. So I’ll leave it be.”
“Thanks Gunny.” I said with a more honest smile. “I guess I’m ready to go.”
“Hey Nova!” I heard a stallion call. When I searched for the origin of the voice, I found a pony sitting up on his blanket within the clinic. Marked with an array of bandages on his neck and shoulders, I recognized him as the security pony who had been injured last night; I winced on instinct.
“Are you feeling better?” I asked, feeling a bit awkward and still feeling a bit ashamed.
“Yeah.” the stallion answered with a nod. “The bastards bit hard, but I’ll push on through.”
“That’s good to hear. Um… will you be back out and helping soon?” I inquired carefully.
“You bet.” the stallion said with a smile. “I want to get out of this clinic as fast as I can.” I smiled at him… but I found myself shifting nervously. On my left, I could see Gunny, watching just incase the security stallion in the clinic wanted to say something nasty to me again. “Hey, look…” the stallion began, finally breaking the silence. “I uh, want to apologize for the way I acted to you last night.” An apology was the last thing I expected to hear from the security pony. What did he want to apologize for? He was the one who got hurt. “I know we’re all trying to adjust to this wasteland… to our new home here in Hopeville, and I just overreacted. I ain’t dumb… I know what you’ve gone through, and I’ve gone through a bit myself. A lot of us have… so I just wanted to apologize for my overreaction and I wanted to wish you luck before you headed out there.”
Wow. One thing’s for certain, that took a load off of my shoulders, and I was grateful for his forgiveness. I didn’t think that he’d be in the mood to forgive, and I hadn’t expected him to, but he did, and that gave me strength. “Thanks.” I said, smiling. “There was no need to apologize… I’m still learning my new place… but I’ll do my best out there.” Turning back to Gunny now, I gave a nod. “Okay, now I’m ready.”
“Alright, let’s move.” Gunny and I trotted out of the lobby and entered the streets of Hopeville. Passing along the City Hall’s eastern wall, we found Blake, Gracie, and Shore waiting together by the cracked remains of the street leading east, and together we left behind our new home on our first mission into the wasteland.
*** *** ***
Surprisingly, even after traveling through the rest of the morning, the ruins of the pre-war road still provided us a landmark path stretching east. According to my E.F.S. compass, we had gradually changed our course, moving southeast by the time the morning ended. It was early afternoon now, and we had been following the cracked road for about two to three hours. Hopeville had disappeared into the western horizon, and now there was only the great expanse of dead earth to make the landscape. Between the lack of scenery and the lack of wasteland life, my three friends and I had seen this assignment as a good time to bring back a little bit of our old selves. Being able to walk together and talk together again felt good, our duties no longer separating us. Hopeville was the subject of conversation, and now that our two hundred or so survivors had secured the town, we all had plans for what we wanted to do in our new home… except me of course.
“Saber told the ponies on the cleanup crew that once the rest of the bodies are cleared from the streets, we’re going to go through each building one after another and completely gut them out and clean them best we can.” Gunny began. “Saber’s hoping to be able to put ponies in each building, get some unique use out of each one and establish a community of sorts. But there’s still a lot of work that needs to be done outside of Hopeville. Mainly we just need to find more supplies, so I’ll be sticking with the captain and carrying out whatever orders he gives me.”
“Who would be in charge of Hopeville?” Blake piped up from beside me.
“Well, I imagine the captain would.” Gunny answered. “He really looked up to Crystal Sunset, so I’d suspect that he’d want to follow the organization of the Stable in her stead.”
“I think a lot of ponies would be willing to work with that now that they have a home to live in again.” I voiced optimistically.
“Hopeville is turning into a good place to live in already.” Rosemary Grace commented, smiling. “Once the buildings around town get cleaned up, I want to reestablish my clinic in the recruiting center that I’ve heard about. I haven’t seen it myself, but I figure that putting up a clinic in a place that once belonged to the Ministry of Peace would put a lot of meaning into the purpose of a clinic, and that’s to help and heal. For now though, I’m glad to say that most of my patients are back up and moving. The recovery’s been hard for them, but they’re getting through it. It just takes a lot of rest, a lot of help, and a lot of hope.”
“Well, Hopeville’s been living up to its name quite exceptionally.” Shore added. “I’m afraid that there’s not much for me to be doing that require my talents. A personal terminal isn’t something that I can get a lot of use out of, and there aren’t any other such terminals in Hopeville. So I figure that whenever the captain organizes an exploration team, I go out and scavenge. Exploration in the wasteland is a good alternative to my field until the time might come when I find something out there like a lab… oh how I miss my lab.”
The reminiscing science pony made me wonder all the more just how well my three friends were adapting. Of course, we were talking about Hopeville. But none of us had really said how we were fairing ourselves. This new lifestyle was forcing everypony to change, to battle through loss of home and family and survive in the wasteland. Time hadn’t allowed for me to think much about the state of my closest friends, but now I was beginning to wonder. “How are you doing other than that?” I asked gently.
“Oh, don’t worry about me.” Shore insisted confidently. “I may not have a laboratory anymore, but I’m ready to do my part to help. Life in the wasteland is different, being outside and all that, but I can get used to it quick enough. My parents have, and so can I.”
“It is hard.” Gracie agreed. “I’ve found myself thinking of home all three nights that we’ve been out here. I miss it, but there are ponies here who need me to be the medical pony I am. My profession is what keeps me going through.”
“I just do my job.” Gunny said, rather abrupt; that surprised me a bit.
*pop*
I heard something far away, a distant and very brief sound on the horizon that had a very slight echo to it. The sound had come and gone too quickly for me to try and get a fix on it, and looking around, I didn’t see anything out of the ordinary. “Did any of you hear that?” I asked, all of us coming to a gradual stop on the road to listen.
“Hear what?” Gracie asked, a whisper.
“I heard it too.” Gunny said, stepping up to my right side and following my searching gaze; the same noise sounded again, slightly louder.
“There it is again.” I heard Shore say from my left.
“Let me fly up and get a better view.” I told them, stepping away to get a clear space to takeoff from.
“I’ll keep my Pipbuck tuned to the security channel so that you can talk to us from up there.” Grace said, raising her foreleg and using her magic to tune the Pipbuck to the right setting.
I nodded, sitting down and bringing up the radio menu on my Pipbuck’s display screen. “I’ll let you know what I find.” I said. “If the source is close, I should be able to see it from a high altitude.” Snapping my wings open, I pulled them up and flapped them down to rise into the air, and then I took off ahead of the ground, following the ground before arcing upward to climb through the air. Counting twenty wing beats, I stopped my ascension and hovered, scanning over the ground far below me. There were four dots that I recognized right away as my friends, but then there was nothing else. Slowly rotating as I hovered, I scanned the terrain to look for anything that was out of the ordinary, something contrasting against the expanse of grey earth.
“Nova.” I heard Gracie through my Pipbuck’s speaker. “If you can hear me, it sounded like it came from ahead of us. Southeast.”
“I don’t see anything.” I replied into the speaker, hearing a third popping noise echo through the sky. I looked due southeast, keeping an eye on my E.F.S. compass for directions, and I squinted to try and find a way to help me see better. Still nothing… but then a light. I swear I saw it, a tiny pinpoint of light that had flickered to life for a split second; it was proceeded by another popping sound. Though I wasn’t certain, my curiosity bump was enormous… I wanted to check this out. “I’m going to scout ahead due southeast.” I spoke into my Pipbuck. “Just follow that direction and I’ll meet back up with you.”
“Are you sure that’s a good idea Nova?” Grace asked in reply.
“I know what I’m doing.” I insisted, already moving towards where I had thought I saw that flicker of light. “Trust me.”
“Just be careful up there. We’ll catch up with you later.” Gracie said, and I picked up speed to wing in towards my mostly unknown destination.
I beat my wings faster, trying to gain more speed to reach my target. Even through the whistling of the wind, I could hear the same popping noise as it gradually grew in volume and intensity, and it wasn’t long before those noises distinguished themselves; gunshots. I had no doubt that that was what I was hearing, the pops turning into bangs that resonated across the skies. There was somepony down there, and they were fighting something or somepony else. I searched the land again, doing my best to search quickly but accurately. But it didn’t take accuracy to see the flashing dots of light on the surface below me and right. The flashes of light appeared and died, and then the gunshots echoed afterwards; that was the place. Focusing, I turned to my radio. “This is Nova from Hopeville, broadcasting to any security ponies on the surface. If you can hear me, please acknowledge.” I announced into the speaker, and I hovered as I waited for a reply. Five seconds… ten seconds… no answer. If I was going to go check this out, it would have to be now. And even if the captain had warned me against finding trouble, somepony might need help down there.
Biting down onto my firing bit, I flipped the battle saddle’s safety off, and then I shot downward, ready as I thought I could be to fight whatever or whoever was down there. The ground raced up to meet me, and it only took seconds for me to be able to pick out the shapes of ponies on the ground. Around a cluster of rocky cover and half-a-dozen unmoving figures, seven ponies were all facing one way, firing onto another group opposite of them. This second group looked in bad shape. Three of them were already dead on their side of the battleground, and a fourth pony looked injured, hiding behind cover. Only two were firing back at the winning group, but the two factions were no more than a few pony lengths away from one another, making the battle a close quarters shootout, one pony firing nearly blind and returning to cover before another fired. Briefly, I stopped to get a clearer view, and to my alarm, I saw that the faction attacking the three outnumbered ponies wore that familiar black and red armor. They were more invaders… where the hell did they come from?! I didn’t have to second guess myself, and I knew that whoever these invaders were fighting were the ponies that needed help. Taking in a breath, readying myself for more killing, I swooped into action.
I dove first towards the invader that was closest to me, a white unicorn mare with a red spiked mane. She was grinning as she reloaded her rifle, a weapon with a strange action comprised of a bolt. As I lined up for the shot, I activated my S.A.T.S. spell and lined up my target, targeting the head of the invader mare. In unison, my markspony carbine and Fire Rose roared their presence, but the two shots missed, kicking up dirt around the mare and making her turn up with a start to see me. With a growl, I pulled back up and away as her own bullets lashed after me. I beat forward, arcing wide to pull out of range and buy myself some time to line up another shot. My S.A.T.S. spell was roughly half-way depleted, so I had enough charge to take one more shot with it, and as I angled in, I targeted the same pony. I angled in head on towards the invaders and lined up my shot. But bullets whizzed by me like angry insects, at least one of the invaders following my flight path, and I rolled out of the way and banked left to evade. In a desperate move to get back on target, I snapped my wings out full and halted, briefly, but just long enough to launch upwards at a right angle, and I coiled back around to face my enemies once again. But just as I righted myself, an explosion of fire erupted from up ahead, and I halted in surprise. The fire was attached to a trail of smoke, and it lingered all the way to its origin. One of the ponies on the defense had shot something that made that explosion… focus damn it!
I turned back and shot forward towards the lingering cloud of smoke left behind from the explosion. The force behind that explosion had killed two of the invaders, leaving them bloodied and dismembered. The remaining five were spreading out, and even my novice combat skill could let me tell that they intended to flank their enemies. I saw as another invader, a dirty orange earth-pony stallion with a matted and darker orange mane, break for cover that was closer to his enemies. Snapping hard left, I dived in towards the invader stallion and activated my S.A.T.S. spell, targeting his torso. I fired two pairs of shots, the first two kicking up dust around him, but the second two hitting him in the side and bringing him tumbling to a halt. I flew over him, but turned in the air and came to ground near him as he cried in pain; there was no way I was going to let this invader get back up. His weapon, a strange pistol with six cylinders, was lying nearby, and when he saw me land, he begun crawling towards it. I bolted towards the wounded invader, but the stallion had a remarkable amount of energy left, even after being shot twice, and he reached his pistol and swung it around to point at me. I skidded on the ground, burrowing my hooves into the earth, and I used that as a springboard to leap to my left as he fired. His awkward position prevented him from following me as I circled around him, and though he fought to right himself around to fire at me again, I had already crouched and fired. I had been close enough to the invader that I had no need to take time to aim; now he was finally dead.
Dust flew up around me as another invader targeted me, and I jumped back to focus, rearing around and leaping to cover behind a rock to catch a few breaths. Checking my E.F.S., I faced my cover as I prepared my next move, and saw the four red dashes marking the compass. Breathing, I counted silently to myself… one… two… three… and with a sharp inhalation of breath I dove out from cover and fired blindly. One pair of shots struck the rock that served as cover for the nearest invader, sending bits of stone into the air. The second pair just missed as the unicorn invader ducked back behind cover, spotting me, and I followed his example after, stepping back to cover as he swung around and fired his own weapon, a rifle-looking weapon that fired a single loud shot that ate against my own cover. I heard the crack of the same weapon fire again, raising dust from my cover, and I took that chance to step out from cover again, facing towards where the invader had been taking cover. He had stepped out at roughly the same time, levitating his weapon as he finished reloading, and that bought me enough time to fire once more, and the two shots found home, both shots hitting him in the chest and killing him. I ducked back behind my own rock, feeling as Fire Rose's auto loader kicked out the empty magazine and reloaded the pistol fresh. I glanced at my E.F.S., seeing that three red dashes still remained. I very carefully poked my head out from cover to check for any other invaders nearby. Though I could see one, the white unicorn mare, there was cover between the two of us that I could use to get closer.
I bolted out from behind the first rock and dashed to the second, seeing as the unicorn mare turned to fire on me. I felt as the bullets kicked up dirt against my coat, the bits of earth pelting me like needles, and I skidded behind the new closer cover. I quickly readied myself, preparing to jump from cover to fire again, but then I saw a shadow on the dirt. With a cry, I reared up just as a light brown earth-pony stallion leapt down from the top of my rock and plowed bodily into me. We tumbled over each other once, but then he was on top of me, driving a hoof into my chest to shove me against the ground. I understood unarmed combat as much as I understood science… which wasn’t very much, and my situation was not improved by the fact that this stallion’s physical strength was far greater than my own. I instinctively raised my own fore hooves over my face and planted them against the invader’s chest, shoving with all my strength as we wrestled. Using one foreleg, the stallion knocked away one of my forelegs, but I brought it back up and struck him full in the face; it wasn’t a strong hit. Immediately, growling in anger, he returned the favor and struck me hard in the face with a fore hoof. He hit me a second time in the face before I shoved again, making him stumble. But he still remained over me, and putting his full weight against me, he struck me square in the neck with a hoof, making me choke. Laughing, he taunted, “Look at the little filly trying to play tough pony! Oh I’m gonna carve you up good.” And then he reached around to a sheath on his shoulder, and I gasped as he pulled out a wicked looking and slightly rusted metal blade, sharp on one side with jagged teeth on the other. He situated it in his mouth so that the tip of the blade faced right towards me, and he struck me again with a fore hoof, trying to weaken me so that he could finish me off with the knife. I gave a cry of struggle as I managed to free up one of my forelegs from the tangle, and I reached and struck him in the jaw again, trying to knock the blade out of his teeth. But he had a death grip on it, and my punches were much weaker. He hit me once more, bucking me in the stomach with a hind leg, and that hurt just as much as being punched in the throat. I was in pain now, but when I saw as he moved in for the killing blow, the adrenaline erupted through me. Snapping my head left, my neck popping, I dodged the blade as it burrowed into the ground right by my face. As he yanked the knife from the dirt, rearing back for another stab, I pulled back my hind legs and with all my might, I bucked him in the gut. That was enough to make him drop the blade (which sent a sharp chill through me as the flat part of the blade slid down my foreleg) as he grunted in pain. I wasn’t going to let up now, and I bucked him again, making him falter. And then I bucked him a third time in the same place before I finally kicked him off of me and he fell over onto his side. Trying my best to ignore my pain, I rolled back onto my side and got to my hooves. He had risen with me, breathing hard and glaring at me. “You… you dumb BITCH!” he swore, his words carrying hateful fire, and he wasted no time in attacking again. With a cry he sprang forward… but I was the one with the guns. Rearing up, I followed his path and fired just before he would’ve plowed into me. The power behind the two weapons tore through the invader with enough force to nearly halt his momentum, and the stallion fell to the dirt, dead in front of my hooves. I staggered back to cover, collapsing against the rock for safety. My heavy breathing provoked a painful wave of coughing, my throat, my chest, and my stomach still hurting from the times I had been hit.
That brawl had been my first real near-death experience. Sure, I could have died in the Stable, and I could have died in Hopeville, but those were different. In that brawl, death was less than two hooves away from my face, literally, and I had barely escaped it. My mind was racing, building up to panic again as I thought about what would’ve happened to my brother if I had died then and there. At one instance, a very brief but very sickening image had flashed before me, showing me laying lifeless in moist dirt with that blade buried into my neck. I couldn’t imagine leaving my brother alone in this wasteland… this hell… I had to be here with him! I huddled low to the dirt, shaking my head with a growl as I fought against those thoughts. No, I was still alive, and those ponies were still fighting. Stomping a hoof on the ground, I cast away those dark thoughts, focusing on the present. When I turned and checked my E.F.S., there were still two red dashes left on the compass, but they were moving, and they were moving towards me. There was no way I was going to let myself get beat up on again, and so I snapped out my wings, fortunately untouched, and I launched into the air, catching sight of the two remaining invaders as they approached. Seeing their target escape into the air, they fired up after me as I looped around. They weren’t going to let me attack from up high without a lot of aerial acrobatics… so why not make a show of it? Even if I was fighting, being in the air was good for me, and I found myself grinning as I picked up speed. I shot back down in a dive towards the ground and then pulled up to draw parallel to the surface, putting about two pony-lengths between me and the earth. I heard the shots of the invaders, trying to pace themselves so as to not use up all of their ammo all at once. But I was going fast along the surface, the wind of my passage raising a trail of dust behind me before I pulled back up and coiled around, drawing in slightly closer to the two bullet-slingers. But as I cut across the air again, winding closer, I saw as one of the two remaining invaders went down. Whoever the ponies were that had been fighting them, they were coming out, realizing that they now had the upper hoof. There was only one left now, the white unicorn mare, and she was frozen, unable to think of what to do. With her former prey coming up toward her, and a very evasive target up in the sky that she couldn’t hit, she was unable to think. That was what had cost her life, as the side of her head erupted in a spray of blood, and she fell over onto the dirt, dead. With the last invader killed, I slowed and came to land on the ground. Though I had intended to give my wings a break, I found that my legs hurt more than my wings did. From this, I could add bruises to my overall injury count which had already included two gunshot wounds and a series of shrapnel wounds. I could feel a dimmer pain in my chest and in my throat, which was still sensitive to my own touch… yeah, those would definitely bruise.
I pricked my ears at hearing hoofsteps, and I looked up and to my right to see a unicorn stallion approaching, cautiously looking over the dead on the field. The unicorn had a solid yellow coat and his orange mane was short and clean, running down his neck and to his shoulders. His mane matched the color of his tail, which was short, only ending beside his knee. He was wearing a black vest with multiple pockets stitched to the fabric and by his side, he levitated some sort of compact weapon, not long enough to be a rifle, but not small enough to be a sidearm. He rotated it as he walked, pulling down some kind of lever from the bottom of the weapon before levitating three shells from one of his pockets. He loaded the three shells into the top of the weapon before pushing the lever back up. So the weapon was a shotgun of sorts… “Are you okay?” the unicorn stallion called.
It took me a moment, but I saw that he was looking at me… duh… “Yeah, a little shaken and bruised, but I’m okay. Are you alright?” I asked back.
The unicorn returned his lever-action shotgun to its holster on his back. “I’m not hurt.” he answered, stopping a distance away from me. There was reason for both of us to be tense, because both of us were strangers to each other in a hostile wasteland. “Thanks for the assist. I didn’t expect a Pegasus to be flying around out here.” the unicorn added, giving a smile.
For one reason or another, I definitely felt safer around this stranger, even if his apparent confusion at me being a Pegasus left me a bit puzzled myself. “I heard the noise from back out west.” I explained. “I was out traveling, so then when I heard it I decided to come and investigate. I guess I’m developing a tendency to ignore safety and go find trouble.” I finished with an uncertain little laugh, feeling that partially what I had said was true.
“Seems we’ve already got a similarity.” the unicorn stallion replied. “I was out scavenging in the north when I heard the shots.”
“Those invaders weren’t attacking you directly?” I asked, realizing too late that I had used the name bestowed upon them from the rest of my people.
“Invaders?” the stallion asked, raising an eye. “Raiders, you mean. Though I’m sure they’ve invaded several places. No, they weren’t attacking me. I found a group of ponies fighting against them. For only being four strong, they really left their mark on a raiding band of thirteen. But they lost three of theirs. My sister’s doing the best she can patching up the survivor, but she’s no medical pony.”
So he had a sister… and he was a traveler as well. At this point, I felt it safe to give some information, but I was more curious about who these ponies were that had come under attack. “I was out scavenging as well, trying to see if there was any place nearby. I was traveling with some friends, and they’re on their way here.” I explained. “Who were these ponies that were attacked?”
“Never seen them before.” the unicorn answered, nodding for me to follow him. As we trotted together, he added, “They looked too well equipped to be out here in the ass-end of nowhere though. I don’t know if they might’ve come from Challenger or someplace else.”
Challenger? What the hell was that? Wow I had a lot of questions coming up really fast… As we continued, I was about to ask him that very question until my eyes fell on the dead ponies we had been talking about. I knew who they were right away because of their armor, the yellow number 181 stamped onto the blue and black padding; it was Saber’s first scouting team. With the three dead security ponies, I also saw a unicorn mare laying down beside the fourth security pony, apparently the survivor, whose armor and weapons had been removed. The caretaker mare was the rather unique color of bright green, her coat a solid emerald color that matched her eyes. She had a long and flowing purple tail, and her equally violet mane was also long and combed over the right side of her face, nearly covering one of her eyes. She was levitating three red rags, cloths drenched in blood. “I’ve cleaned off a lot of blood, but some of these wounds are pretty deep and they wont stop bleeding. One of the raiders must’ve been using armor-piercing rounds.” she called to us… or just her brother. “Oh… hello.” she added uncertainly, spotting me.
I trotted away from the unicorn stallion and approached the security pony the mare was tending to. “Hi…” I said, only half-mindedly as I looked over the wounded security mare. The earth-pony was breathing very shallowly, and she was barely moving. Her eyes were shut and her face showed that she was in tremendous pain. Just at first glance I could see that she had taken half a dozen gunshot wounds, four to her chest and shoulders, and two more on her right side.
“We didn’t pack a lot of medical supplies.” the unicorn mare said to me, standing beside me. “I only had a couple of rags to clean some of the blood off of her. Plus, I’m not much of a medical pony. I deal in weapons, not physical health.” She added this last part rather shyly.
“That’s okay.” I said, casting a glance at the mare. For being a total stranger from the wasteland, she looked genuinely concerned. “I um… I have a healing potion in my saddlebags. Could you get it out for me?”
“Yes of course.” she said quickly, using her horn to open my saddlebags.
As she searched, I turned back to the wounded mare. “Hey…” I said, gently putting a hoof on her foreleg. “Hey, if you can hear me, I’m Nova from Hopeville. The captain sent me out here. Can you tell me what happened?”
The mare was unresponsive, only her sides moving as her weak breathing continued to allow her to cling to life. But after a moment, I saw her mouth move slightly, a weak reply coming out. “Ambush…”
I nodded, seeing as the green mare showed me the levitating healing potion. Even though it was a smaller bottle, I knew that every bit would help. “If nothing else, this should lessen the sting of the wounds.” Looking back at the security mare, I said gently, “I want to give you a healing potion. It isn’t a larger bottle, but it should help a bit. Can you open your mouth for me?” The mare managed to oblige, and upon slightly opening her mouth, the other mare opened the bottle and guided it to the wounded mare’s lips. She drank slowly, but she still managed to gulp down the entire potion without wasting a drop. Even though I had used a potion before, I was still amazed at seeing just how quickly the elixir worked. The wounds begun to mend before my very eyes, and even though they didn’t fully close, they looked much better than before and the security mare looked to ease a bit. There was nothing else that I could do for her now. Gracie would have to get here quick and give the mare proper medical attention.
“Did you say that you came from Hopeville?” the unicorn mare asked me as I stepped back from the security pony. Damn it… again, too much information had gotten out of my mouth that I had intended not to share.
“Um… yes.” I said, thinking fast. “I set up a temporary camp in the ruins of the town. I’m just setting up for a bit while I travel.”
“That’s a bit of a risky endeavor don’t you think?” the unicorn stallion asked me, sounding rather expectant of an affirmative answer.
“Why?” I asked back, suddenly feeling rather lame and dumb.
“Hopeville was hit by the Black Blood six days ago.” the yellow stallion answered. “You sound like you didn’t know that.”
“I actually… um… am from the heartland.” I lied, still unwilling to give out information about myself.
“Really?” the stallion asked, smiling. “I’ve done a lot of traveling up that way. But to be honest, I think its safer up there in the northwest than it is down here.”
“What makes you say that?” I inquired.
“There’s a lot going on around here. And believe me, I know most of it. I’ve been around the southeast, from Hopeville all the way to Ashton and everywhere around and between. The Black Blood Raiders are a real problem in these parts. Hell, so far as I know, Challenger and Ashton are pretty much at war with them.”
“Who are the Black Blood Raiders?” I asked, winning a look from the both of them that showed how much of an idiot they thought I was.
“I guess you really aren’t from around here. We just fought a dozen of them.” the unicorn mare pointed out.
“They’re the cruelest, meanest, most savage ponies in the wasteland, least out of all the ponies I’ve met.” the yellow stallion said. “They take no prisoners, they torture and butcher their victims for fun, and to top it off, they’ve got their own organized army. I don’t know where they come from, but they’re all over this area. You see, that’s how Hopeville got knocked out. They were a settlement farther out and more isolated from the others, so the Black Blood chose that as a target and took it out. I’m no tactical genius, but it doesn’t take a lot of brains to know that they’re trying to cut off the southeast from the heartland.”
So the invaders had their own organized force, and they had a name. The Black Blood Raiders were the ponies who had taken out the Stable… “What’s this region’s connection with the heartland?” I asked to get the thought out of my head.
“The settlements in this region send their own caravans up to the heartland at least once every month, if not twice or even three times. That’s how they survive is through trading with the big cities up there, Manehattan, Fillydelphia, even Old Appleoosa. Takes about a week to get up to the heartland, but it’s a necessity. They established a calendar for when they need to go and get supplies, and then they send a caravan up. Challenger primarily deals with that however, and then usually it trades some of its stock with the other settlements. I think that place is probably the safest in this region. They’re well-armed, well-trained, and are decent folk along with that.”
So Challenger was some kind of settlement. That was encouraging because now I could report to Captain Saber that we could interact with other ponies out in the wasteland, and possibly trade for the goods that we need. “Is there anything else you can tell me about Challenger?” I asked.
“Challenger is further southeast from here.” the stallion answered. “It’s a city that was built from the dirt up. Ponies banded together and made a settlement of metal sheet and iron plate. It’s a prosperous enough place, and they know how to barter and trade honestly and fairly. I’d recommend their shops to anypony, including you… hey I know that machine there.” I raised an eye, puzzled until I saw that he was looking at my Pipbuck. “You know if you’d let me, I can set a destination marker to Challenger into your Pipbuck, and you’d be able to see it on your map.”
I saw no reason not to, and this stallion and his sister seemed respectable enough… why not? I raised my Pipbuck leg as invitation, and he approached, looking over the machine with an expert eye. “This looks a little different than other models I’ve seen… it’s a little simpler but it’s still got most of the same functions.” he explained, speaking mostly to himself.
As he worked, the stallion’s sister asked me, “You said that you came from the heartland? What city were you born in?”
“I was actually born in a Stable.” I said. That much I had to tell the truth about.
“Wow.” the mare said, rather taken aback with astonishment. “Which one? Stable Twenty-four, Stable One-o-one, Stable Two?”
“Stable Two.” I replied quickly, smiling to bolster the wave of lies I was dishing out… why? These ponies seemed like good ponies… but I was still nervous around them and very hesitant to reveal information that I thought was sensitive. Why?
“We’ve heard of some of the local Stables in the heartland, but Stable Two was the only one my brother and I tried actually going up to. We knocked, but the door never opened… didn’t really think anypony lived in there.”
One little fib was one thing, but as more and more stacked up, it was hard to continue speaking. I sighed, giving up entirely and breathing in before I told the truth. “I have a lot of faith that we wont end up fighting amongst each other, so I’ll actually tell the truth to the two of you.” I announced. “I’m actually not from the heartland. I was born in a Stable, yes, but I wasn’t born in Stable Two. I was born in Stable One Eighty-One back west. The Stable was secluded and well-hidden, built far away from the heartland… Roughly three days ago, the Stable was attacked and we had to abandon it. I’m part of a refugee column of about two hundred ponies. We’re all that’s left of the Stable, and only yesterday we came across Hopeville and we took shelter there.” There was still a lot of information that I intentionally left out. That information was too sensitive, but I felt better telling them some of the truth now.
Their looks of amazement made me shift uncomfortably. “So you actually got Hopeville set up again as a settlement in this region?” the stallion asked after stepping back from my Pipbuck foreleg, finally letting me lower it.
“Well, kind of.” I said. “We’re working on cleaning up the town after we had an encounter with… um… zombies. They were dead ponies, walking around, and they attacked us in a herd.”
The two siblings exchanged glances. “Zombies sums it up quite nicely.” the brother said grimly. “They’re a very common sight in this region. While they’re not dangerous alone, they’re a real threat in a large group, and they’re always vicious.”
“You see,” the sister added. “those zombies out there were ponies who had been exposed to a massive amount of radiation. They turned into what we call ghouls, but then later on, they lost their minds and became feral. They attack any living thing on sight, and then if they kill them, they eat them… plain and simple.”
“You said that you call some of them ghouls?” I asked.
“Ghouls are the zombie ponies that aren’t zombies. In other words, they still live among us as reasonable ponies who wont eat you on sight, but they just look like zombies.” the sister explained.
“But about Hopeville,” the brother continued. “you say that you’re group from whatever Stable you mentioned actually live there now, and there aren’t raiders or anything out in that pre-war town?”
“No.” I said with a shake of my head. “The town’s safe for now, and we’re doing our best to establish our own community.”
“Well that’s damned good news.” the unicorn stallion said with a big smile. “Back before it was hit by the Black Blood, my sister and I traveled there from time to time to do some trading. Those were good ponies that lived there before… it’s a shame they got hit.” I nodded sympathetically with him, remembering that we had found the former residents of the town the previous night. I never saw them, but I had a feeling that that was for the better. “Well since I’ve been talking so much about trading, I should probably go ahead and introduce myself.” he said, standing up tall and proud before me. “My name’s Lucky Hallion and I deal entirely in the trading business. This mare here is my sister Marian, and she’s a good shot and a good repair pony. She acts as my caravan guard as well as the pony that fixes things that my customers might bring to my attention.”
“So you run a caravan.” I said, genuinely intrigued. “What’s your primary trade?”
“I provide safety my good mare.” he said, making it abundantly clear that he was always in better spirits when he was doing his job. “And that safety is the type of safety that can only be ensured by an abundance of weaponry. The way I see things is that out here, everypony needs to be armed in order to be safe. That way, at least everypony has a chance to survive out there against the wasteland, its monsters, the Black Blood, all of that good stuff.”
“I remember you saying that you’ve been around this region.” I pointed out curiously. “How far does your traveling take you?”
“I’ve been everywhere.” Lucky Hallion answered proudly. “I’ve been in this region for a bit, making stops along Ashton, Challenger, Plainwell. And then I’ve gone out and beyond to the heartland cities and all around Equestria to Salt Cube City, Hoofington, Trottingham, Baltimare, Las Pegas, the list goes on.”
“Seems that you’ve really established a name for yourself.” I complimented.
“You betcha.” Hallion replied with a smirk. “I do my fair share of scavenging, but I also make my own weapons when I find the parts I need. Some cities I’ve been to have been left mostly untouched, and so there’s lots of opportunity to profit from having a good eye for scavenging. Out here in this region, I’ve got a cozy little setup for while I stay here, and then I have other shacks and hideouts in other regions of the wastes that I stay in while I trade. And speaking of names, I think we’ve established an acquaintanceship, so I’d like to ask your name.”
I was about to oblige him and answer when somepony else answered for me. From behind me I heard hooves against the ground and with tremendous relief, I saw my friends racing up to meet me. At seeing Lucky Hallion and Marian begin to tense, I quickly intervened, trying to discourage negative thoughts by saying, “Wait, they’re all cool. These are my friends I had mentioned earlier. Hold on just a second and I’ll introduce them to you.”
Racing to meet up with my very out-of-breath friends, I gratefully embraced my little brother after he hopped down off of Gunny’s back. It was good to have him back and close to me again. “You look a little worn out.” Gunny said, even though he was the one lowering his head to catch his breath.
“Did we miss anything? What happened?” Shore asked between breaths.
“There was some fighting.” I explained. “I was beat up a bit, but I’m fine. I found the captain’s first team that he had sent out, and that’s who was fighting. Three of the four of them are dead, including the sergeant.”
“Damn it…” Gunny said, shaking his head but not yet looking up at me. “How did they die?”
“More invaders. I met two ponies who call them Black Blood Raiders.” I explained. “I should introduce you to them.” I turned to walk back to Lucky Hallion and Marian, my brother trotting along next to me and the others following behind. As we walked, I told Grace about the wounded security mare, explaining the wounds and how I had given her my healing potion. Immediately after my explanation, she trotted ahead and right past Marian and Lucky Hallion to begin working on the security mare. As for the rest of us, we stopped before the other two, and there was that strange atmosphere of meeting new ponies around us. “Hallion, Marian, these are my friends. That mare over behind you is Rosemary Grace. Behind me are Shore, the black earth-pony, and Gunny, the brick-red unicorn. This little colt here is my baby brother Blake, and I’m Nova… Everypony, this is Lucky Hallion and his sister Marian.”
Introductions and greetings went smoothly enough, and soon the semi-tense atmosphere had been suppressed enough for Lucky Hallion to repeat everything that he had told me to my friends so that they too would know what I knew. Like me, they took it in slowly; it really was a lot for my friends to think about, especially being newcomers to the wastes. After this, we had gradually come to decide that we would get to know each other even better by pulling loot off of the dead raiders as well as burying our three dead. Grace had stayed with the wounded mare the entire time, Marian being rather curious as to how a professional of medicine had worked to heal a pony. Blake stayed with Gracie of course, because I didn’t want him pulling equipment off of corpses; he wasn’t old enough for that yet. Shore had checked the sergeant’s Pipbuck, declaring it destroyed before joining Gunny and I. We helped Lucky Hallion with the looting of the corpses after we had put our dead to rest; we buried them with their armor and weapons, taking their ammunition. Upon knowing that Lucky Hallion was a rather prosperous weapons merchant, Gunny became instant best friends with him and their conversations strictly involved the listing of weaponry from the Stable, the description of their background experiences with firearms, and the explanation of where and how their passions for weapons came to be.
Our looting had taken only about thirty minutes, and between that and the funeral, we were done with our tasks in just over an hour. We met back up around Gracie as she finished preparing her patient for travel. Even though we had met two new friends, we had to get back to Hopeville and report back to Saber with the wealth of information we had received, about Hallion, about the Black Blood Raiders, about Challenger. Though I hadn’t predicted it, I wasn’t surprised that Lucky Hallion had interfered in our goodbyes to do his job. “Can I interest any of you in some trading before you leave back to Hopeville?” he asked, very professionally.
I smiled, looking over at Gracie. Of course, the patient with us had to come first. She needed to be back in Hopeville and resting, but for now, Gunny’s back would have to do for a bed until we returned. Gracie nodded, indicating that the patient, now having drank two other health potions and been properly tended to, would be okay during the trip home. “I don’t see why not.” I said, suddenly rather eager to see what this trading thing was all about.
“Hell yeah.” Gunny voiced strongly. “Let’s see what you’ve got.”
Lucky Hallion looked around on either side of him, raising an expectant eye. “Now where’d she run off to this time?” he asked Marian, his sister also looking about.
“She always seems to be… oh there she is.” Marian said, raising a hoof to point off to her left..
“There who is?” I asked, turning to follow where Marian was pointing… and screaming at what I saw! There, trundling forward on four skinny legs was a very hideous looking creature with two heads, a pair of horns on each one. The beast was burdened with a series of large sacks, solid briefcases and duffle bags, all jangling together noisily as the creature slowed to a walk and stopped before Lucky Hallion. “What is that thing?” I asked, raising a fore hoof in disgust.
“Oh, this here’s my pet brahmin, Betsy.” Hallion answered happily, patting the creature’s left head with a hoof. “She’s been with me for all twelve years of my caravanning career, carrying everything I want to take with me to trade on a trip.” Without delay, he used his magic to levitate one of the duffle bags off of the two-headed… cow… thing… and he set it before me as Gunny, Shore, and even Blake stepped up to see; Gracie remained with her patient at a respectable distance. After having removed three duffle bags in total along with one briefcase, lining them up before us, he used his magic to undo the straps that held the bags together along with the clamps that held the briefcase shut, and the four containers opened, revealing their contents.
Gunny gave a cough, and I saw him look down at the merchandise with starry eyes and a wide smile. Shore even looked impressed despite his preference for energy weapons. To be honest I felt that, even despite my low firearms skill, I was in paradise as I gazed down at the massive stock of weapons and ammo. “Please, enjoy my selection of high quality problem solvers.” Lucky Hallion said, humbly smug as he stepped back to let us browse to our heart’s content.
The three duffle bags had unrolled along the dirt, revealing a tidy yet awesome arrangement of ammunition, sidearms, rifles, and even weapon attachments. The first duffle bag I looked over was the home of a wide selection of ammunition. But really, I only knew so much about ammunition. I called Lucky Hallion over, and as he trotted up beside me, ready to help, I asked him about the ammunition. He begun to explain by drawing a hoof over a line of red and yellow shells, indicating that these were shotgun shells arranged in order of their respective gauges. There was at least fifteen shells of each gauge tucked into the duffle bag, and he pointed out eight-gauge, twelve-gauge, sixteen-gauge, and twenty-gauge shells. “I personally prefer the twenty-gauge.” he added. “My lever-action shotgun is a twenty and its served me well.” I nodded, looking away from the shells to come across a massive array of rifle and pistol rounds.
I think my head would’ve exploded trying to sort through all of these, and so instead, I asked him, “Hallion, the two weapons I have right now are a forty-five pistol and a five fifty-six carbine. Do you have ammo for those?” He pointed them out amidst the huge collection, and I nodded, scouting over the rest of the first duffle bag. The first bag of gear was an impressive collection all on its own, and moving down to the next duffle bag, it only got better. This bag had several small firearms and disassembled rifles and machineguns, from pistols to SMGs to hunting rifles and shotguns to heavy machineguns.
“I guess you don’t have much of a hard time keeping yourself defended.” I heard Gunny remark with a laugh that Hallion joined in on.
“Not at all.” Lucky Hallion answered with a grin. “Something catch your eye?”
“Now that I’ve seen just how impressive your collection really is, I’m thinking that if there’s something you’d recommend replacing this assault rifle with so as to more effectively take out the bad guys when I meet them, I would be a happy stallion.”
Deciding that there were just too many guns here for me to decide on something quickly, I listened in on Lucky Hallion’s explanation. “That depends on what your looking for. Assault rifles are typically well-rounded weapons, good at close and medium ranges, generally very durable, accurate. I can tell just by looking at you that you’re not looking at long range, so a sniper rifle, or any kind of precision weapon is out of the question. I’ve found and made a good selection of assault rifles that you can get accustomed to, but again it all depends on what you’re looking at arming up with. You mind taking your rifle off?” I watched as Gunny used his magic to levitate his assault rifle to the ground, Lucky Hallion looking it over with a professional eye. “To be honest, this already looks to be a pretty damned good weapon. It’s in good shape, well-kept…”
“That’s just an advantage of having been made and kept clean in the Stable.” Gunny said with a nod.
“Makes sense.” Hallion concurred, handing the rifle back to Gunny.
“So Hallion,” I called then, catching his attention. “if one of us does buy something, what exactly are we looking at trading?”
“Out here, the currency is strictly bottle caps.” Hallion explained, making me raise an eye. “Most shops do barter and trade too, trade an item for an item, or labor for an item, stuff like that. I do some barter and trade as well, an item exchange, but the currency is bottle caps. There’s tons of them out there in the wasteland, and they never go away. They’re almost as bad as pre-war bits.”
“So I was right!” Gunny said, looking at me with a triumphant grin as he levitated the pouch of bottle caps he had secured to his armor. “I’ve got seventy in here.” he said to Hallion, who’s eyes glinted at the sight of the post-war currency inside. “I just need a little bit of information on how the money flows out in the wasteland.”
“Well its simple.” Hallion explained. “One bottle cap is one, and items cost a certain number of bottle caps. You have enough, you can get the item. I like to consider my prices as being very fair, because while I do make a living off of being in the trading business, I also like to make sure that ponies are armed with the best so that they can take on the dangers of the wasteland. Go ahead and point at an item, and I’ll name a price. I’ve already chosen a price for each item, but we might be able to strike a deal with some negotiation as well. Your choice.”
As they continued their discussion, I had begun wandering over the goods again, contemplating on whether or not to buy ammo for Fire Rose. According to my Pipbuck, I had twenty-seven shots left, which was still okay. But then again, I didn’t know how long it would be before I would meet Lucky Hallion again. We would be back in Hopeville, and Hallion would be off in whatever corner of the wasteland he wanted to travel to next. Seeing that Hallion had both the ammunition and the magazines for my pistol, I called him over and asked a price for each magazine. For one magazine, it was ten caps, which I had instinctively thought as a rather good deal, considering that each magazine held seven shots. And so with Gunny’s approval, he levitated ten of his caps to Hallion and I removed one magazine from the duffle bag. Of course, Gunny had to help load the new magazine into the auto loader, but it only took a bit of magic to raise a panel from the pistol’s auto loader, load the magazine inside, and then close it again; checking my Pipbuck again, I saw thirty-four shots registered on my inventory screen.
Alas, it seemed that we would have to make a lot more bottle caps to make a larger purchase, and so we begun to wrap up, Gunny spending twenty more caps on another magazine of assault rifle ammo which he stuck into a free pocket on his security armor. And with that, our business was concluded. We rejoined around Gracie and her resting patient as Lucky Hallion and Marion stowed their duffle bags onto Betsy’s back. As Marion finished up, Hallion joined us to say his goodbyes. “Thank you all for your patronage.” he said, humbly dipping his head to us, and we returned the gesture. “And thank you Nova for your help today. I’m sorry about the loss of your friends and I hope for the best for Hopeville. It really is good to hear that that town is back on the map. I do intend to stop by there some time to see what’s new, so perhaps I’ll be seeing you again soon.”
“Thanks for answering my questions.” I said, now my turn to say my thanks. “The information you gave us is going to be invaluable to our captain. Hopefully we’ll be getting our presence known by some good ponies instead of raiders and zombies.”
With another dip of his head, Hallion returned to his sister and their pet… cow thing… Turning back once more as we begun to depart, he called, “It’s my pleasure to help out. Remember, I’d recommend trying to travel to Challenger if you get the time. Getting in contact with other settlements sooner will give you better chances to get into the trading circle around this region. Those ponies will really help your town get onto its hooves. Good luck out there! Keep your skills sharp and your eyes peeled!” And with that final farewell, we parted ways. My friends and I left in good spirits, eager to report our wealth of new knowledge to Hopeville… maybe we really did have a chance to start a new life out here.
Footnote: Level Up!
New Perk: Gun Nut (Rank 1): Conventional firearms are finding a new place in your heart. Each rank of this perk increases your small guns skill by +5.