//------------------------------//
// Odd's In Our Favor 
// Story: Fallout: Equestria - The Oddity 
// by Masquerade313 
//------------------------------//

"On the ground I lay, motionless in pain.
I can see my life flashing before my eyes.
Did I fall asleep? Is this all a dream?
Wake me up! I'm living a nightmare."





There was nothing around me. Not simply a white or black horizon, but truly nothing. I could see myself, but not anything around me, for there was nothing to see.

From the nothing, I could see little specks materializing. They just appeared. And they multiplied, and grew, and became a shape. The shape twisted and contracted and made all sorts of movements before becoming something recognizable. It looked like a blue branch. Next to that appeared a horn. From nothing, such shapes continued to appear: some sort of claw, a paw, a lizard-like tail...

In what seemed like a minute or two, this creature, a jumble of all sorts of creatures, stood before me. It looked entirely bizarre. It wasn’t the strangest of my dreams at the moment, but the most vivid by a longshot.

“Hello?”

“Hello,” it replied. It had a masculine voice. “I’ve been looking forward to seeing you, Odd Job.”

Well, that didn’t make any sense. What was this, some manifestation of mine? A symbol for the fact that this had been my first dream in nearly a century? ... Then again, this was a dream. It didn’t have to make sense.

“Shouldn’t there be more things here?” I asked, looking around. Absolutely nothing else but this creature had materialized so far. “I mean, this is my dream. What happened to all of the things that I’ve seen recently? Shouldn’t I be running from Imps or Blade right now?”

He squinted at me. “You don’t want that to be your dream, do you?”

“No, of course not! It’s... It’s just, this is a very boring dream,” I said.

“You’re right,” he said. I could see a twinkle in his eye. “Would you like to play a game?”

“What kind of game?”

“Anything you want.”

“Baseball?” He snapped his claws, and strange-looking striped clothes and caps materialized on both of us. Some sort of large glove now covered his paw, and there was a white ball in his claw. He dropped his arm slightly, the ball levitating in place while he snapped again. A thick piece of wood appeared in my mouth. He snatched the ball out of the air and chucked it at me. I could see for a brief second the face of an Imp on the ball before it burst into flames. I ducked out of the way.

“Hopscotch?” He snapped his claws again, and everything disappeared. Several chalk squares filled with images of ponies and monsters were suddenly laid out before, above, below, and around me. I knew how to play hopscotch, but this was ridiculous! I’d never be able to manage all of the squares!

“Chess?” Another snap, and the squares compacted together. The dust from them coalesced into a black and white checkered board.

“Yes! That sounds great!” Yes, chess, a nice, safe, game. It was definitely one I could manage, too. I quite enjoyed chess, actually. I’m glad we had a set to play with in the Stable. That’s probably why he mentioned it. I knew this dream would somehow relate to me eventually.

The pieces were the next to appear. There was a problem, though; the pieces all looked the same. Each one was of a small pony standing on two hooves and kicking the others into the air. As the game progressed, it would be near impossible to tell either side’s pieces apart.

I voiced my concern. He simply smiled and waved his paw over the board. My pieces remained white, and his became black. The shapes changed also, for him at least. His pawns had turned into some sort of insect creature with horns and wings. His rooks had changed into some sort of large dogs; his knights had changed into Imps; his bishops were now alicorns; his queen, a mare with a strange-looking hat; and his king, now himself.

“What about my pieces?”

“Hmm? You can change them if you want.”

I shook my head a muttered. “This is such a weird dream.”

He chuckled.

“What?”

“Oh, nothing,” he said, still chuckling.

I waved my hoof over my board pieces. I had no concrete idea of what I wanted any piece to be, I was simply trying to see if they would change. The only one that did change was my king, which slowly changed into a statue of me.

“Interesting,” he muttered. Then he shrugged. “They’ll probably change when we start to play.”

My pieces were white, so I assumed I was supposed to go first. I moved my knight to a3. He, in turn, moved his pawn to e6. My knight was now in danger from his bishop. To counter, I moved my knight to c4. He then moved his pawn to b5.

I saw his pawns change back into the pony statue they were before. Except, some of the pieces started losing... pieces. Flecks of whatever they were made from were sloughing off and evaporating.

My piece morphed into a unicorn with a cross on his flank--





I awoke to the sound of someone coughing... Loudly, of course. It was okay, I guess. Just someone getting the morning crud out of their throat, I guessed.

I rolled back over and noticed how great it felt to have slept. I couldn't even tell what time it was. It might've just been an hour, for all I knew, but I felt fantastic.

The coughing still hadn't stopped, and it was getting much... Worse. It sounded really deep and airy. I heard something thud onto the floor.

Okay, something was definitely wrong.

I stood up, rubbed the sleep out of my eyes, and hurried up the stairs. The coughing was getting much louder.

As I rounded the corner, I saw Cutter struggling on the floor behind a table. She was the one that was coughing. Her hooves were crossed over her throat, grasping for something I couldn't see.

"Oh, shit!" I screamed, finally realizing what was going on. "You're choking! Uh, umm... Come on, stand up! I know the Heimlich Maneuver, but you're not in the right position for it!"

She glared at me, still quite obviously choking, and started getting up. I turned her around and lifted her up enough to where she could hold onto the table. Then, summoning up all of the medical knowledge I'd learned in Seventy-Five, I dug my hooves into her abdomen and squeezed.

The first squeeze didn't do anything but jolt her forward, so I helped her get on all four hooves before trying again. That didn't do anything either, and I could tell she was getting worse. I stood her up on her rear legs and sqeezed a few more times, and was finally rewarded by the sickly plop of some half-eaten something landing on the floor.

She collapsed to the ground and sucked in as much air as she could. "Thank you," she said, releasing a shuddery sigh. She crawled over to a chair and heaved herself into it. "Oh, thank you. I'm so glad you were here to help."

"I didn't hurt you, did I?"

"No, no... Not at all." She looked down at the blob of whatever on the floor. "I guess I just bit off more than I could chew."

"I'm glad it didn't take too long. I was getting worried you would pass out."

"I almost did. But everything's alright now." She took another deep breath and looked around before focusing on where I had come from.

I turned around to see Chance standing at the top of the stairs, red-faced.

"I didn't just... You two... Should I...?"

Cutter and I glanced at each and looked away just as quickly. My face was getting hot.

"Goddesses, no!" we said.

"She was choking on something," I said quickly. "I woke up, rushed up here, and helped her."

"Nothing else," she added.

Chance stared at us, wide-eyed, before quickly running down the stairs. “Well... I-I guess I’ll just eat down here, then...”

“Chance, there’s nothing to eat down there.”

He just as quickly ran back up the stairs with his saddlebags in tow, chuckling nervously. “I’ll just be at Billy’s, then.” He tried speeding towards the door, but Cutter made a run for it and blocked his path.

“If you tell anypony about this, I swear to Celestia that--”

Chance panicked, threw her aside, and made a mad dash through the door out into Appleloosa. Cutter attempted to follow him, but I held her back.

“What the hell are you doing?” I asked, taking her place to prevent her from running outside. “You’re going to threaten him to make sure he doesn’t say anything about me stopping you from choking?”

“But he thinks we were having sex!”

“Even though we didn’t?” That stopped her. It was rather difficult to argue with me about that. “And then you had to go and threaten him about it! You basically just told him that we were having sex!”

“Yes, but...” She sighed and went to go sit down again. She didn’t even attempt to continue eating (whether from her near-death experience or her shame, I didn’t know). “You should probably go tell him then. I... I think he’s really freaked out about it.”

I didn’t bother collecting my stuff. I just pushed the door open.

Before I left, I looked back through the door. “If it makes you feel any better, I won’t tell anyone.”

She smiled weakly.

I shut the door behind me and made my way to the saloon. There was a steady, but thin, trickle of ponies heading into the building. Hopefully it wouldn’t be too hard to find Chance. ... Hopefully, he hadn’t run somewhere else.

Inside, ponies were taking table seats, waiting to be waited on. I scanned the tables, but didn’t see Chance anywhere. He was instead at the bar. And he wasn’t alone. Blade and two other ponies were standing before Chance, who looked as if he was still stunned from what had happened. He was shaking, even. Neither of the ponies around him seemed to care. They were simply taking turns poking fun at him.

“You look like you’ve just seen an Imp or somethin’,” said one. “You scared o’ those things?”

“O’course he’s scared of ‘em!” said the other. “If he wasn’t, he would’ve wiped ‘em all out instead of runnin’ from Seventy-Five with his tail between his legs!”

Blade moved to Chance’s side and stepped closer. “Speaking of running away, you left pretty quickly after stealing all of my money. And I remember saying that you’d be dead if I ever saw you again.”

I was past the point of screaming out ‘That’s not true!’. I ran up to Blade, who was completely oblivious, and punched him right in the jaw. He went slack, hit against the counter, and slumped to the ground. The other two ponies went wide-eyed and backed off a bit. I rounded on them.

“Keep making fun of him,” I growled. “Go ahead, I dare you.”

“Look, buddy, we don’t want any trouble--”

“Then gather up your friend and get lost.”

They looked at each other briefly before moving to pick up Blade, who was entirely unresponsive. All the better, I thought. They hefted him up onto their backs and trudged back through the saloon’s doors.

I took a seat next to Chance and sighed. This wasn’t going to be fun... “Chance, I--”

“Please tell me you two weren’t having sex!” he blurted out.

“We weren’t,” I answered calmly. “Like I said before, I woke up, heard her choking, and went upstairs to help. And that’s all that happened.”

He turned to me. HIs blue eyes were quivering slightly. “But everything you said... And when you two were blushing... And then when Cutter said...”

“Cutter didn’t mean what she said: she was just embarrassed. She told me that she was sorry for freaking you out so badly.”

“So you two really weren’t doing anything?”

“Not at all.”

He closed his eyes and breathed deeply, then released a shuddery breath. “Okay.”

It was quiet for a while. Chance still hadn’t moved or anything. He had stopped shaking, but he was still just sitting there, staring at the wall in front of him.

“Are you sure you’re okay?” I asked.

“... Yeah.” He fidgeted a bit. “It was just really weird, I guess. And then Blade came up to me. I... I thought he was really going to kill me. ... All over a card game.”

“I don’t think you’re going to have to worry about Blade for much longer.” His ears perked up. “I wasn’t planning on staying here for much longer, actually.”

“Do you think we can leave before Blade will notice?”

“We might, but I still have to go get my stuff from Cutter’s before we can leave. You can just stay here, if you want. It’ll only take me a few minutes. Then we can go to Presto’s get my rifle back, and go.”

He seemed to relax almost immediately. “Alright, I’ll stay here. Just... Just be careful, Odd.”

I patted him on the shoulder. “I will be.”

I left and made my way back to Cutter’s clinic. When inside, I was ecstatic to see that Blade was still unconscious. And I found it slightly amusing that the other two, who had poked fun at Chance for being scared, looked horrified at the sight of me.

“Like I said man, we don’t want any trouble,” said the one closest to the stairs.

I smirked and moved forward, side stepping around him as he shrank back even further before I made my way downstairs. My stuff was still tucked away in a corner of the basement. I pulled it on and headed back up. The two ponies were still shying away from me. Cutter, on the other hoof, took a break from examining Blade to talk to me.

“So I’m guessing you did this?”

“Yes, I did.”

She took a deep breath. “I’m assuming you had a good reason to?”

“They,” I said, waving my hoof around at all three ponies. “Were standing around Chance poking fun at him for being afraid. And Blade threatened to kill him for winning the poker game last night, so I thought it’d be better not to give him the opportunity.”

“I guess he deserved it then. I can’t say that Blade didn’t have something like that coming to him. I can’t say I’m proud of what you did, either.”

“Well, it doesn’t really matter.” Her face scrunched up in confusion. “Chance and I were going to be leaving soon anyway.”

“Leaving for where?”

I shrugged.

“Well, if you’re sure that you don’t want to stick around, you should at least take a few of these with you.” She went over to a cabinet and pulled out four more of those healing potions.

“But aren’t those really valuable, considering how much they do for--”

“Considering what happened earlier, I’ll just give them to you.” She didn’t really give me the option to refuse, as she started slipping them into my saddlebags. “If you’re going to go somewhere, New Appleloosa’s the place to go. You’re going to have to catch the train, though.”

“Train?” They could only find one sink in the entire town that worked, but they had a train?

“Well, it is the easiest way to get there. And the least exhausting by a longshot.”

“Alright, then.” That did sound better than trekking through treacherous Wasteland. “Thanks for your help, Cutter.”

“No problem.”

I went back through the doors and trotted briskly to the saloon. Thankfully, Chance was already waiting outside. I called for him, and he came to follow me.

“So are we leaving now?” he asked.

“Soon,” I answered. “We’ve got to stop at Presto’s and pick up my rifle. After that, Cutter says we should get out of town and catch a train to New Appleloosa.”

“They have a train here?”

“Apparently.” I pushed my way through the door and into Presto’s shop.

He looked up from working on what looked like my rifle, except that it looked much, much nicer. “Hey, Odd, glad ta see ya! I got yer rifle all fixed up last night, had time ta polish it even! There were a few dents in the stock an’ the strap was almost fallin’ apart, but I managed ta find everythin’ I needed!”

“That’s great! How much did it cost?”

“Straight-to-the-point, I see. No worries, though, it’s only gonna be eighty caps.”

“Sounds fair to me.” I fished another hoof-full of caps out of Chance’s saddlebags.

“I’ll throw in some ammo for you ta test the scope with, if ya like.”

“Where would I test it?” I sure hope he didn’t mean testing it in the field...

“Come with me,” he said.

I clumsily strapped the rifle onto my back and followed Presto through a back door. Chance followed behind me. Outside, it ended up being some sort of target range. Traditional, alternating red and white circles were set up on posts at different distances, stretching away towards the fence around the town.

“Yer gonna wanna start at the closest target, then adjust the scope, and go further. Don’t adjust too much, though. Ya only need ta turn the scope about half a rotation fer it ta start movin’.”

I unclipped my saddlebag and set it on the ground. Presto and Chance lied down on the ground while I fiddled with my rifle. The only way I could think about getting to it was rolling the strap along my shoulder until it got to where I could hold it. The most awkward part was that I couldn’t just bring the scope to my face; I had to tilt my head until I could see through it. It wasn’t uncomfortable, though. It... It just felt right.

I lined up the scope on the first target and pulled the trigger.

Quite a few things happened. First, I jumped. I honestly did not expect the gun to be that loud. Second, Chance jumped, for the same reason. Third, I heard the bullet thud into the dirt. And, fourth, I heard Presto chuckle.

That hurt, so I lined up my shot and tried again. I hit nearly the exact same spot on the dirt. At least I knew I was consistent...

“Which way do I move the adjustments?”

“The top one moves it up and down, and the bottom one moves it left and right.”

I clicked the scope a few times so that it moved up and to the right. Another shot, and another miss. Though, this miss was much farther away. That had to mean the scope was moving up, at least. I moved the scope up and to the right a tad more.

The next shot I made hit the target, right in the center.

“Wow, Odd,” said Presto. “That’s a lucky shot.”

I wanted to tell him that I didn’t believe in luck, but the evidence was right there before me. I lined up the scope and took another shot, which once more landed in the bullseye.

“No point in shootin’ a dead pony, Odd. Move on to the next target.”

... I was doing this to ensure that I could shoot ponies. It was quite a shocking revelation, trust me. But a part of me wanted to continue. It wanted to make sure that I knew how this thing worked, in case I would ever need to use it.

I aimed for the next target, and shot the outer ring of the target on the first try. I realigned a few times and got to dead center again. For the last target, which just looked like a dot without looking through the scope, I never quite hit the center. My shots were consistent, but none of them were bullseyes. It was close enough, I guessed.

“Well, I would say it’s time for us to start heading for the train.”

Presto yawned. ‘Oh, yeah, I forgot about that. You two really should get goin’. The train’s supposed ta leave in a few minutes.”

I rolled the rifle around my shoulder, and it landed comfortably in the same spot as it had before. I gathered up my saddlebags and went to shake Presto’s hoof. “Thanks for the help, Presto.”

“No problem,” he said.

We headed at a slightly faster pace towards the entrance to Appleloosa. Presto did say it was leaving soon, after all.

As we neared the entrance, I noticed Papa and Forty conversing. Papa looked gravely serious, and Forty had his tail tucked between his legs. There was one last emphasized something before Forty walked away, looking like a zombie.

Papa turned and noticed us. “Oh, Odd Job! Good morning! How are you two today? Are you thinking about staying here?”

“We’ve been better... We were actually just going to catch the train to New Appleloosa now.” I turned to see Forty still walking away, still looking nearly dead. “What exactly did you say to Forty?”

“I let him go,” he said simply. “He wasn’t doing his job, and there isn’t any room in Appleloosa for those that don’t do their job.”

That sounded extremely assuring. We clearly weren’t doing anything, yet he made an exception for us. What was that supposed to mean?

“Well, we should get going, then--”

Kvetch came to us now. “Oh, you’re not leaving so soon, are you? You still have five hundred caps to pay me. Which reminds me, where’d you get those fancy clothes from? I bet they didn’t come cheap” asked Twitch.

“We got them from Presto. Can we go? We’re trying to catch the train.”

“Hold on a second,” said Kvetch. “You bought stuff from him, knowing you had to pay me five hundred caps?”

“But you said we could just go inside!”

“I never thought you’d make it out alive! Hell, I didn’t expect to see you two ever again! But if you made some money, and you want out as badly as you want in, you’re gonna have to pay!”

“Hold on there, Kvetch.” Papa walked up to the stallion, who was noticeably taller and bulkier than he. “With all that these two have gone through recently, I don’t think you need to be taking their money.”

“But we had an agreement--”

Papa said nothing. All he did was stare into Kvetch’s eyes. Within a few seconds of this, Kvetch’s argument had been reduced to an angry mutter. He stepped aside and let us pass.

I heard Papa call to us as we left. “Goodbye, Odd Job, Chance! Do come back soon!”

“Hopefully we never have to,” said Chance.

Yes, hopefully we would never have to come back again.

Hopefully, someone else would come save the slaves inside.

...

Once we were out of the gate, I turned to the west and continued along the perimeter of the fence. In the distance, I could hear a whistle sounding. I couldn’t think of anything but a train that would make such a noise. And I couldn’t think of a better reason for a train to sound it other than its arrival... Or departure.

I could now see what was unmistakably the train ahead of us. There was also another pony, wearing a floppy brown hat and a similar, large coat, running for the train. He was much closer to it than us. The strange thing was, the train was being pulled by four ponies. Shouldn’t it be moving slowly enough for him to catch it?

Apparently, no; the train was getting farther and farther away, as was the pony. Rather than slow down, he pushed harder and actually started gaining on the train.

“Chance, come on!” I kicked hard into the dirt, leaving him behind. “If he can make it, so can we!”

Chance mirrored me and started running. Though we pushed harder, things were looking grim. The train was moving faster and getting further away. The pony ahead of us looked like he was slowing down. By the time we caught up to him, the train was but a dot in the horizon. There was no chance of us catching it now.

We stopped, coughing and wheezing, next to the pony.

“Damnit!” he shouted. “I swear, they left me here on purpose!”

“When will the train come back?” I asked.

“It won’t be back here for days!” He shook his head, stomped angrily on the ground, and continued walking.

Chance and I shared a confused look and followed him.

“Where are you going?”

“I’m heading down the tracks, of course! I can’t wait here in Appleloosa for days on end!”

“But isn’t that dangerous?”

“It’s not going to be dangerous as long as the train doesn’t turn around. And, like I said, it’s not coming back for days. As long as I don’t fall off the edge, I should be golden.” He continued on. “If you want to come with me, be my guest. Or you could stay in Appleloosa, where it’s ‘safer’.”

Well, I didn’t have to ask to know what I wanted to do.

“Are you sure there isn’t some other way through to New Appleloosa?” I asked.

“Yeah. Junction R-7’s south of here, but it’s held by griffons at the moment. Not the nicest folk around.”

“I don’t think I’ve ever seen a griffon.”

“That’s something you should continue doing. Every griffon I know is some sort of mercenary. It’s just better not to risk it.”

We finally ended up on the track, which was easy enough to trot on. And it was wide enough to merit Chance and I walking together, with some space left on the edges. This was fantastic, considering that it looked like a very, very large fall to the bottom of the gorge.

“Name’s Keep,” he said. “Well, it’s Finders Keepers, but you can call me Keep. What’s yours?”

“My name’s Odd. My friend’s name is Chance.”

He looked over his shoulder at Chance. “Why didn’t he say his name?”

Chance, in response, moved a little closer to me. “He’s a little shy around new ponies,” I answered. Chance glared at me and muttered ‘That’s not true.’

“So are you two friends or something?”

“Eeyup. We’ve been friends ever since we were four.”

He chuckled. “I guess the best kind of ships are friendships...” He glanced down at my PipBuck. “What Stable are you from?”

“Seventy-Five,” I answered.

He stopped in his tracks and turned completely around. I took notice of his PipBuck. “No kidding?”

“Not at all,” I answered. “We grew up in Seventy-Five.”

“And the Imps didn’t get a hold of you... Why?”

“Oh, we were put in some experimental Stable technology and stored alive for about a hundred years. Until just two days ago, actually.”

He just shook his head. “And I thought I’d heard everything...”

“What Stable are you from?” I asked.

“Ninety-Four.”

“Are there any Imps in there? Any Stable-Tec experiments?”

“All of the Stables were experiments, Odd. But, no, I don’t think we have anything along the lines of live-pony storage going on inside.”

“What do you mean, all of the Stables were experiments?”

“Well, my Stable is a trading kind of Stable. Whatever happens inside is dictated by who has how much money. Stable Two is supposed to stay in lockdown for a long time, still. Then there were other Stables where the ponies inside were used to test drugs or the effects of radiation or cultural clashes--”

“Wait, how do you know all of this?”

He chuckled. “Money goes a long way, Odd.”

That cut the conversation off quite effectively. We continued trotting along silently. I plugged in my PipBuck’s earpiece and turned on the radio. The same buck’s voice from when we were approaching Harmony Church came through.

“Hell-o, my little ponies! This is DJ P0n-3, and do I have some news for you! Remember a few days ago when I said two ponies crawled out of Stable Seventy-Five? Well, I’ve heard from a reliable source that those two weren’t just Imp slaves, but that they were actually living down there! Just when you thought the Wastes couldn’t throw another curveball, eh? Just goes to show that nothing is what it seems. I would wish them the best of luck, but considerin’ they got out of a Stable full of Imps without dyin’, I think my wish would be wasted.”

How did this pony know anything about us? I hadn’t noticed anyone following us. Wouldn’t it have been obvious if someone was keeping track of us?

“Hey, Keep, what do you know about DJ P0n-3?”

“Not much. Other than the fact that he broadcasts out of Tenpony Tower, I know nothing about him.”

“Tenpony Tower?”

“Some building in Manehattan,” he answered. “It’s just a really big, fancy hotel that rich ponies live in.”

Well, that was great. Now that I knew somepony was magically keeping tabs on me and Chance from a city miles away, I felt so much better.

I tuned back in to the radio.

“Now, I’m sure you all know about ghouls. Yes, those pony-eatin’, body’s-rottin’, good for nothin’ ghouls. They’re unfortunate enough to absorb massive amounts of radiation and live, and we discriminate against them because of this. But do you know what matters most of all? Even though they may look different from us, ghouls are ponies too. So before you go and kill every ghoul you see, stop and think: would you want a ghoul to kill you just because you’re a pony? No, I didn’t think so.”

Just then, what was unmistakably a ghoul pegasus mare flying a wagon through the air gently lowered herself down to our level to fly along beside us. I didn’t even know how she was flying. She didn’t have any wings (only stubs where they should have been)!

Keep started talking to her. “Hey there, miss Derpy! What brings you around these parts?”

“I was just heading back from Manehattan with the healing potion recipe I was talking to you about.” She glanced over at the two of us. “Who are your new friends here?”

I answered for Keep. “My name’s Odd.”

She giggled. “Well, aren’t you going to tell me anyway? Ponies call me Derpy and Bright Eyes, but I still tell them that. Your name can’t be that odd.”

“No, my name is Odd. It’s Odd Job.”

“And that pony there is his friend Chance,” said Keep. “He doesn’t talk much. Ain’t that right, Chance?”

He murmured a syllable in response, which was unusual. I knew Chance was kind of shy, but he wasn’t that shy. I turned to ask him if something was wrong, and I saw that he looked absolutely terrified. He had shied even closer to me and was now just barely looking past me with wide eyes. He was cautiously eyeing the pegasus that flew with us.

“Chance, what’s wrong?”

“There’s a zombie flying next to us!” he hissed. “What do you think is wrong?! And she’s a pegasus! Doesn’t that mean she’s with the Enclave?”

“I don’t know. Why don’t you ask her?”

She must have heard us. “Ask me what?”

Chance whimpered and disappeared behind me, so I spoke for him. “He wants to know if you’re part of the Enclave, because you’re a pegasus and all.”

“It’s so easy to tell you two are new here, it’s not even funny,” Keep said. “There’s no way those elitists would let a ghoul join their rank. They wouldn’t even give her a chance, seeing as they shoot every ghoul they see.”

“Just a better reason to stay away from her...”

Derpy didn’t seem to notice Chance’s mumbling. “Do you three want a ride back to Appleloosa? I’ve got plenty of room in the wagon.”

Keep shrugged. “Sounds good to me. You two should probably come with us. I wouldn’t want the ghouls to get you.”

I took all of my willpower to keep Chance from throwing himself into the wagon.

“Alright, just let me set her down here, so you don’t have to jump or anything.”

I just don’t know what went wrong next. It appeared that Derpy just casually flew ahead of us and set the wagon down, but whatever she did caused a huge crack to appear. Against our better judgement, the three of us rushed forward. The crack widened even further. Then, the earth shifted. Chance jumped for it and managed to get inside of the wagon. Keep and I joined the moving earth and fell into the gorge.

Thank the goddesses our descent was more of a very steep slide, rather than a straight fall. Both of us seemed to be fine. The only thing of note was that my earpiece wasn’t properly connected anymore. A song blasted out of my PipBuck and echoed eerily off the gorge’s sides.

“Your cover’s blown -- nowhere to go --
Holding your fate...
Know that I will walk alone...
Fire your guns!
It’s time to run!
Blow me away!
I will stay with the mess I’ve made...
After the fall, we’ll shake it off!
Show me the way!”

And that’s when they appeared... They must have been ghouls. They matched Papa’s description perfectly: rotten skin, missing hair, and they definitely didn’t look sane. Their eyes were blank, but fixated.

They were fixated on us.

One ran at us, but had its head blown away by Keep’s gun. Its already dead body died once more, tipping over and thumping onto the ground. That seemed to be the signal for all hell breaking loose. Several more than what we could see rushed us from around a bend in the gorge. They were all running towards us now.

I panicked and dipped my head into my saddlebags. The nearest weapon I could find was my laser pistol. As soon as my head came out of the bag, the world turned green and froze.

This again... Yes, because S.A.T.S. worked so well for me the last time. Though, now I had some time to think and observe. I scanned the frozen Wastes and counted nine ghouls in all, excluding the one Keep had just shot. There were six of them heading for Keep and three coming for me.

I somehow managed to target all three of the ghouls that were running at me. I queued a shot on each of their heads. The screen then prompted me:

>Execute Queued Attacks? Y/N

Yes.

The green tint that had covered everything quickly disappeared, and things continued moving, but slowly. I pulled the trigger as each shot lined up, hitting two ghouls right in the head, and hitting the third one in the chest, which staggered it. It lunged at me, and in a panic, I flailed my hooves about. I felt and heard a heavy thud against my PipBuck. I dared open my eyes and found the ghoul now on the ground, almost entirely decapitated. My right forehoof was stained with blood.

Meanwhile, Keep had taken down all but one ghoul that had surrounded him. The last one lunged out at him and pulled him to the ground. Before my eyes, it lowered its head and bit down hard on his chest.

It ripped out a huge piece of flesh, and Keep screamed like I’d heard no one scream before.

I moved forward and shot a beam of light right through the ghoul’s head. It dropped, releasing Keep’s partially rended flesh.

I retched once more, and once more, nothing came out.

And he kept screaming...

I heard something heavy thud onto the ground next to me. It was Derpy, with wagon and Chance in tow. Chance jumped out as soon as he could and ran to Keep with a healing potion. Keep eagerly snatched the potion from him and chugged it. The hole in his chest shrank until the only thing left was a jagged, pale patch of skin.

“Agh.” Keep gasped. He sat up against the mass of fallen rock. “All my life, and I’ve gone without getting bit by one of those ghouls.”

I hurriedly shut off the radio on my PipBuck.

“I’m sorry,” I said.

“For what?”

“That was my fault, the ghouls attacking us. If I turned off my radio, that never would have--”

“Don’t be giving me that shit! I won’t have any of it!” He dusted himself off and stood up, crossly pointing a hoof at me. “They were around the corner. Even if you hadn’t made so much noise, they still would’ve gotten to us.”

“But I--”

“Ahem!” He glared at me briefly before going about the ghouls, searching them for whatever he wanted to search them for.

Chance walked up to me. “I’m glad you guys are okay.”

“Yeah,” I said half-heartedly. “I’m glad, too...”

Those were ponies. Those were ponies just like the Imps were ponies. And now I couldn’t get away from the fact that I’d killed ponies. Four of them lying on the ground before me were proof of that. Even though they would’ve killed me, I didn’t feel happier or better for killing them. The same goes with the Imps from a few days ago.

... I was confused.

“Okay, there’s nothing here. Let’s keep going.”

Nothing here... Nothing here but spent ammunition and ten dead ponies...

We hopped in the back of Derpy’s wagon and settled down amongst the sacks and boxes scattered about. Even though Chance seemed unnerved at the thought of flying, he was rather quiet. Keep had nothing to say, either. We flew for about ten minutes before coming back to earth.

Chance quickly hopped out of the wagon. I didn’t feel like being a burden for Derpy, so I joined him. Keep stayed in the wagon, looking like he was about to fall asleep. We caught up to Derpy as she continued walking (Chance still kept his distance from her).

Having met yet another new pony, I went through the pleasantries once more. She asked us our names, looked at us like we were crazy when we talked about Seventy-Five, and questioned us about how well we had fared so far.

“Other than problems with Slavers, we’ve been great,” I answered.

“What kind of problems?”

“Chance beat this one pony at a game of cards, and he threatened to kill him. Actually, that’s why we left Appleloosa. Then one of them held us up and we missed the train, so they’re not exactly my favorite kind of pony.”

“If it makes you feel any better, I don’t like them either.”

“Neither do I,” said Chance.

Keep snorted. “I didn’t know you talked!”

He mumbled something in response.

Keep turned himself around to look at Chance. “What was that? Do you have something to say to me? Say it loudly enough for me to hear it at least.”

“Leave him alone,” I said. “He’s been through enough today without you rustling him up.”

“He’s right, Keep. Listen to yourself,” said Derpy. “You’re being rude.”

He ‘hmph’ed. “It’s the silent ones you have to watch out for, if you ask me--”

“Good thing nopony asked you,” said Chance.

Keep stopped talking. He simply turned around and settled back down in the wagon. Chance assumed an expression of disgust and also stopped talking.

Derpy leaned over and whispered to me. “Your friend sounds a little upset. Is something bothering him?”

“Aside from Keep being an ass? I don’t think so. He was really upset about that Slaver earlier today, but other than that I--” No, there was something else. He had seemed pretty upset about what had happened this morning. I still didn’t understand why, though.

“You what?”

I shook my head, clearing it to get back to the discussion at hoof. “I... can’t think of anything else that would make him strike out at anypony so much. Normally he’s so... I don’t know. He’s just not this bad most of the time.”

“The Wastes get to everypony in a different way.”

Tell me about it...

The rest of our journey was entirely silent; even our hoofsteps didn’t make noise. But I guess that wasn’t a bad thing. Before I knew it, I could see what had to be New Appleloosa on the horizon.

To put it plainly, New Appleloosa did not look anything like Appleloosa. There were no catwalks or strings of lights, or even ponies. Even though night was approaching, in Appleloosa, there would be ponies milling about the streets. Other than Chance, Keep, Derpy, and I, there wasn’t anyone around.

“Is New Appleloosa abandoned, or something?”

Derpy sighed in response. “No... It’s just a very, very small town.”

“How long has it been around?”

“About a hundred years, give or take a decade.”

“I wonder why it hasn’t attracted more ponies. It looks much nicer than Appleloosa.”

“Oh, it’s no secret why there aren’t a lot of ponies here.” I looked over at Derpy to see that she had her head hung very low. She looked rather upset about the size of the town. “There isn’t any fresh water, there’s no real clinic, there’s nowhere to really settle down unless we find enough materials to build a new house. And there’s a ghoul living there.”

I assumed she was talking about herself. “But you seem like a very nice pony. I don’t see why anyone would think you living here’s not a good reason to live here.”

“You would be surprised how prejudice ponies can be about ghouls.”

“I--” I choked on what I was about to say. Earlier, hadn’t I briefly been afraid of her, simply because she was a ghoul?

Ghouls are ponies, too.

“But that’s all about to change,” she exclaimed, suddenly standing up straighter. “I’ve got that recipe for healing potions now, so I can head off into the Everfree to get the ingredients. Once ponies realize they can buy potions here, they’ll come more often. And when I get enough money, I’ll be able to hook up the water system with a purifier...” She shivered. “It’s all coming together.”

“You seem rather invested in the town,” I mentioned.

“Well, why wouldn’t I be? I did build it, after all.”

“Really?”

“Yes. After the war, I had a lot of time on my hooves, and I thought that it’d be a good idea to make a town that ponies could live in once the fallout settled. There was already a house here, so I lived in it while I built the rest of the buildings.”

“What are they used for?”

She looked at me. Maybe I just never noticed it, but her eyes looked a bit... Off. Before I could even think about asking her, though, they were back to normal. “Well, two of them are being lived in by other families. Then there’s a bathroom and shower room for mares and stallion, separate of course. And then there’s Absolutely Everything.”

“Didn’t you just say that Appleloosa has nearly nothing?”

She giggled. “No, that’s just the name of our little local store.”

I could make out six structures. There was one that wouldn’t even fit a pony. Then there were three that were roughly the same size -- all two-story. The remaining two were about the same size, but smaller than the other three. “Which building would that be?”

“It’s that one,” she said, pointing at the taller building in the center of the town.

When we were in the town proper, I could confirm that was the store. There was a window through which you could see stacks of... Junk? Regardless, the other buildings were empty. Two older ponies were on the porch to the side of the building, sleeping on rocking chairs. Other than that, it was only us.

The door of the building had a sign above it that read


Absolutely Everything





Yes, I do deliveries!


No hooves, nasty stingers? No service.


Ask me about special orders!




Derpy wriggled out from the wagon’s harness and went to unlock the door. Chance and I followed behind.

The inside of the store was exactly what the window had shown -- filthy. Pieces of paper covered just about every surface of the room (including the roof, even!), and any open space was reserved for... Merchandise. Random bits and pieces were scattered everywhere.

“Sorry about the mess,” she said as she flitted around. “I wasn’t really expecting company.”

“What’s all of this paper for?” I asked.

She shoved the pieces she had gathered so far onto the floor next to a terminal. “Oh, just a little project I’ve been working on. Don’t worry about me, just make yourselves at home.”

Keep stumbled in through the door. “By that, she means take the room upstairs and keep your hooves out of the merchandise unless you’ve already paid for it.”

I took that to heart and headed upstairs. There were two beds, and a set of lockers was stuffed away in the corner. Chance threw his stuff under a bed and shuffled onto it. He curled himself up and said nothing. I didn’t see a reason to disturb him.

I also didn’t see a reason not to do the same. It had been a long day, after all.

I had no idea that a rotten, old mattress could be so comfortable...





Side Note: Level Up
New Perk: BZZAP, Sizzle, PZZOP! - You never really wanted to shoot anyone, much less another pony, but you’ve found out that you’re rather good at it, especially with that little laser pistol you’ve got. +10 to Energy Weapons