//------------------------------// // Chapter 5 - Two Minutes to Midnight // Story: Fallout Equestria: Blue Destiny // by MagnetBolt //------------------------------// Despite all the ponies crowded into it, the room was big enough that it shouldn’t have felt crowded. It was big enough to park a cloudship in, with raised platforms and catwalks making the best use of the space along the walls. Mom had ordered spotlights brought in, and they surrounded the roiling orb of floating steel specks on all sides. Every time I looked at it, my right forehoof ached under the bandages. I tried not to think too hard about that. “Explain it to me again,” Mom said, sighing. She took off her thin glasses to rub the bridge of her snout, annoyed. “You should know more about this than I do,” Dad said. “You’re a unicorn, after all. Isn’t magic your area of expertise?” “Red,” Mom said, her tone getting an edge to it. Dad held up his hooves in resignation and started walking. “Fine, if I must. The SIVA Core is in a magical shield. That shield is being projected from here.” He pointed to the armored form sitting directly underneath the core. It didn’t look like any powered armor I’d seen before. The Enclave used a few different models, and I’d seen parts of armor that had been built for earth ponies before the war that were massive and heavy, but this was different. It was sleek and looked like it was made of smaller, interlocking plates. If it wasn’t for the horn I’d almost want to guess it was some kind of zebra armor, with how alien it looked. “How can there be a pony here still casting a spell?” I asked. Mom tilted her head towards me, obviously wondering the same thing. “I don’t think there is a pony still here,” Dad said. “I’m pretty sure whoever was wearing the armor died a long time ago.” “But…” “The suit is acting like a repeater and amplifier. No, hold on, let me try and think of a metaphor,” Dad sighed. “It’s always easier to explain things with metaphors. Imagine building a room designed to create echoes, and yelling as loud as you can, so it just bounces around and around long after you’ve stopped yelling. This suit of armor is like that, and like having a microphone and speaker in the room that ‘top up’ the echo with mechanical assistance. I think. I can’t examine it directly because the pony was smart enough to shield themselves, too.” He turned and kicked the armor, and the crimson-colored shield brightened where his hoof struck it. “So how do we remove the shield?” Mom asked. “Well, the armor has been burning through its fusion core reinforcing the shield. If you wait long enough, it should eventually fail on its own.” “And how long will that take?” “Another forty or fifty years, give or take.” “I don’t have that long and neither do you. I need real options and you know it, or you wouldn’t have started with such a stupid suggestion.” “You could try shooting everything,” Dad said sourly. “That’s probably what you were going to try anyway, right?” Mom shrugged but didn’t deny it. “I’d prefer not to. It might damage the core.” “Then all you need to do is find the captain’s name and command code,” Dad said. “If you have the correct prefix code you should be able to control the armor remotely.” “That’s dumb. Why would they have that function?” I asked. “Isn’t that super dangerous if your enemy gets your codes?” “Ponies were more trusting back then,” Dad said. “And if I’m wrong and there’s still a pony inside that armor, they could override it. But they’d also be two hundred years old, so they’d either be an alicorn or some kind of horrible ghoul.” “Cool!” “No, Chamomile,” Dad sighed. “Horrible ghouls aren’t cool.” “So all we need is the command code,” Mom said. “Good. That isn’t an insoluble problem. This section of the ship is largely intact, to the point it still has power. There should be working terminals, if you can get into the computer core you can find the command codes.” “These aren’t Stable-Tec terminals,” Dad countered. “You need an expert to slice into them! They can’t just be taken down by a few overflow commands--” “And thankfully we have you as an expert,” Mom said. “I’m sure Chamomile would be very disappointed if you didn’t put in at least as much effort as she did, hm? I’m sure it won’t take you too long to find a working terminal.” Dad sputtered. “I’m not--” Mom turned to two soldiers I recognized. “Rain Shadow, Emerald Sheen? Go with them.” “Them?” Dad asked. “Chamomile is apparently quite lucky. I’m sure she’ll be an asset, or at least a reminder of how important finding that command code is to your future. My soldiers will make sure you get back safely, since things can be so… dangerous.” “This is why I broke it off with your mother,” Dad muttered, as we walked through the corridor. “She’s a psychopath.” I really wished I had an argument to use against him, but to be honest, I sort of had heard her order a bunch of ponies to their deaths and she was also kind of in charge of a prison camp where it seemed like ponies who went in weren’t expected to come out. I had some serious concerns. “Let’s just find a computer,” I said. “The guards are probably here to shoot you if I try anything,” Dad continued, ignoring me like he usually did. “‘Good luck’ my flank. She just wants to make sure they can put the boot to me.” “He’s wrong,” Emerald said, stepping up to walk beside me. She folded her helmet back so we were face to face. “We don’t have orders like that.” “But you’d shoot me if you were ordered to do it?” I asked. “No, she’d probably stand there and make me do the dirty work,” Rain Shadow said from behind us. “I don’t know how she pulled this detail. She’s got a soft touch.” “Don’t pretend you want to go around shooting prisoners,” Emerald countered. Rain Shadow scoffed. “My point is that most of the ponies here are hardened criminals. You spent almost no time at all talking to them, so you don’t know what they’re like. It’s not like they stole a loaf of bread - most of them have rap sheets as long as your foreleg!” I scratched my bandaged hoof. “The good thing is, you’re not a prisoner,” Emerald said. “And you’re absolutely right about just finding a computer. The faster we get this done, the less time there is for something to go wrong.” I nodded. “I hope there’s something in this section.” “If it’s anything like our cloudships, the computer core would be near the reactor,” Emerald said. Rain Shadow nodded. “All the engineering stuff is kept together. Since this place has independent power, we should be in the right general area. It’s just that this bucking ship is the size of a city!” “I’m surprised there aren’t signs,” I said. “The first time I came here there was a panel with red borders that had--” “--Emergency medical supplies?” Emerald asked. “Like a cloudship?” I nodded. “Why is that important?” Rain Shadow asked. “It means the ponies who used the ship didn’t just have everything memorized,” Emerald explained. “She’s right, there has to be some kind of guide. This is an intersection, if there’s anything, it has to be around here. Everypony check around.” I wasn’t sure what I was looking for. A big neon sign with arrows would have been nice. The clean, bright corridor made me feel like I was an idiot for not seeing whatever should have been there. It wasn’t like it was a ruined mess where a pony could mistake scrapes and damage for a message, it was just a nice, brightly lit T-junction with mostly unpainted wall panels and lines of color gently curving around the corner. I blinked and pointed. “What about those?” I asked. “What about what?” Rain Shadow asked. “The wall panel didn’t have words on it. Maybe they didn’t want to use signs with words for some reason,” I suggested. “Do you see how the colored stripes are right near eye level and they’re different in both directions?” “She’s right,” Emma said. “This grey stripe goes to the next door, then it’s painted all around the doorframe, then it stops after it. No telling what the colors mean, but they must lead to different sections.” Dad huffed. Rain Shadow turned on him, obviously angry. “You couldn’t have missed it,” Rain Shadow accused. “You’re some kind of archaeologist, right? So you should have known what to look for!” Dad turned to give him a sour look. Rain Shadow grunted and shook his head. “I knew it. He’s trying to take us the wrong way!” “I was trying to take a little extra time to think!” Dad snapped. “Something all of you should be thankful for, since I’m the smartest one here!” “You’re gonna look real smart with a bucking laser blast right through your--” “Stop it,” Emerald sighed. “You can’t shoot him. And no, you can’t shoot his daughter either. What we’re going to do is follow the painted lines and see where they go. We’ll start with that grey door. Go open it.” She motioned to Dad. “Why me?” Dad asked. “Because I’m trying hard to be convinced having you with us is more useful than letting Rain Shadow actually shoot you,” Emerald said. Dad grumbled and stomped over to the outlined door. He hit the control to the side and it swung open smoothly, the old pneumatics squealing as they unlocked for what was probably the first time in centuries. “It’s a janitor’s closet,” Dad said. “Amazing.” “And now we know we can ignore grey doors,” Emerald said. “We’ll try red next.” “We should skip this one,” Dad said. “Why?” I asked. “Because it’s dangerous. There’s a security seal,” he said. “I can get it open, but I can’t disable the alarm.” “That just makes me want to open it even more,” Rain Shadow said. “Pop the hatch.” “I just told you--” “You said it’s dangerous, and you’ve also been trying to keep us from getting anything done this whole time, so either you’re telling the truth and there’s a security seal and I want to know what’s so important on the other side of the door, or you’re lying and this is exactly where we need to be,” Rain Shadow said patently. “I’m not as stupid as your daughter.” I glared at him. “Hey! But, also, fair.” “It’s not like there’s a label,” Dad said. “All I know is, I open the seal and alarms go off.” “Forgive me for saying this, but there really isn’t anypony left to hear them,” Emerald reminded him. “We can deal with some sirens and flashing lights.” “Maybe nopony is here, but that doesn’t mean it’s not guarded,” Dad said. “Chamomile fought a robot.” “I did fight a robot,” I admitted. Rain Shadow nodded. “Here’s what we do - you unlock the door, Emerald and I take point. If robots are in the room, we blast them. If not, then everything’s fine and we don’t need a special plan for that.” I nodded. Dad took a small panel off the wall and fiddled with the wires. There was a spark, and he nodded. “It’s unlocked,” he said glumly. I pushed him back behind me. I doubted he really appreciated the gesture but even if he was a jerk he was my Dad and I wasn’t going to let him get blasted by whatever was waiting behind the door. Emerald Sheen kicked the door control, and the hatch slid open. An alarm started beeping, more like a digital clock trying to wake up a pony from a nap than a siren blaring about an incoming megaspell. We tensed, waiting for robots or turrets or robot turret hybrids that walked like ponies but were made entirely of guns. Anyway, while we were all looking into the room and watching for movement, the security panel recessed into the wall behind us hissed open. The good thing is that after more than a century stuck in a wall with no maintenance, the three security bots must have had all their targeting stuff out of whack because the first shots went wild. One laser clipped Dad’s shoulder and he screamed like a filly and bolted. More went into the walls and ceiling, one hit me in the chest, and the rest somehow managed to avoid hitting the only ponies in armor that could have shrugged off the attack like it was nothing. The bolt to the chest felt like I’d been stabbed with a needle made of ice, so hot it felt cold in the moment before it started burning. It was the same sensation as when I’d burned myself cooking, that sense that something was wrong even before the pain started. The uniform I was wearing caught on fire, which was better than melting but not as good as, say, not being on fire. I beat my chest, trying to put it out before it could spread across the thin material. “Chamomile!” Emerald yelled, pulling a rifle off her battle saddle and tossing it to me while I was trying not to be on fire. I fumbled with it but didn’t quite drop the crystal-tipped carbine, taking a moment to figure out how to fire it. I pointed the magical rifle at the approaching security bots, which looked almost like skeletal steel ponies wrapped in faded plastic armor, and pulled the trigger. As it turned out, I had awful aim. My shots went even more wild than theirs had, and despite them walking slowly towards me I couldn’t hit a damn thing I aimed at. I mean, can you blame me? It was designed to be mounted on armor and controlled through a targeting spell. Trying to fire it by hoof was basically aiming down a box with no sights and barely anything like a grip. Emerald and Rain Shadow missed because they were trying to shoot around me instead of through me, which was touching, really. The robots fired another scattered volley, and one cut across my cheek, almost into my eye. The burst of heat and pain almost made me drop the rifle. I was done trying to do things the civilized way. I charged the robots, slamming into the first and throwing it back into the one behind it before turning to the third machine and clubbing it with the laser rifle, bashing the plastic armor apart and breaking something inside it. Sparks flew out of the ruptured metal and the rifle started to get hot in my hooves. I threw it at the other two security bots and, like most things in my life, it exploded, the spark batteries inside shattering like grenades and taking the robots out with them. I turned back to the others to make sure they were okay, taking a few deep breaths. Rain Shadow slid his visor back, looking at me with wide, shocked eyes. “Buck the goddesses for a bottlecap, what was that?” he whispered. “Don’t get on her bad side,” Emerald hissed back. “What?” I asked, confused. “Let’s just say most ponies wouldn’t have dealt with the situation that way,” Emerald said. “Let’s look at those wounds.” She stepped over and prodded my chest. “It’s not that bad,” I said. She pulled a healing potion out of her pack and offered it to me. “If you say so,” she said. “Nothing vital got hit. Obviously. Still, that should be hurting a lot more than it seems to.” “I’ve got a high pain tolerance,” I said. I downed the potion and coughed at the taste. “Ew. Grape? I hate grape flavor.” “I’ll try and find you a cherry potion if you end up shot again,” she said. “If all they have are peashooters like that I won’t really need them,” I said. “They’re antipersonnel scatter lasers and-- you know what? Never mind. You’re just built different. Let’s see what they were protecting.” I shrugged and finished off the dregs of the potion she’d given me, the sting on my cheek and chest fading as it healed the last of the burns. I don’t know why they were acting like that. The laser hadn’t even hurt as much as being stabbed, and that was more annoying than dangerous. I guess it might scar worse, but I wasn’t gonna worry about that when I had so much else to worry about that was more important. “What is this place?” Rain Shadow asked, which was something I really wanted to know, too. “Some kind of laboratory?” Emerald guessed. “Where did Red Zinger go?” “I’m fine, thanks for not asking!” Dad snapped, limping back towards us from where he’d been hiding. “In case you didn’t notice, I got shot!” “Barely,” I muttered. “I don’t spend my time getting into fights and throwing myself through walls, so forgive me if I’m not used to being assaulted,” Dad said. “A normal pony could go their whole life without being shot even once!” “A lot of ponies spend their whole life not being shot,” Rain Shadow agreed. “Right up until the end. So why don’t you tell us what we’re looking at in here?” Dad sighed and looked into the sealed room. “It’s…” he frowned after a moment. “I’m not sure. I was going to say armory, but there aren’t any weapons, and it’s almost like a dock for a cloudship, but it’s too small, not to mention indoors.” I couldn’t describe it either. It was almost like medical equipment crossed with scaffolding, all blinking lights and wires and weird boxes surrounding a space where something should have been. Tools hung on the walls and I couldn’t even begin to guess what half of them were for. “This looks important,” Emerald said, holding up a crystal orb. Colors swirled around inside it. “Some kind of magical weapon, maybe?” “It’s a memory orb,” Dad said. “Or… similar to one, anyway. They record memories and thoughts from a pony and allow them to be replayed later. Give it here.” Emerald passed it to him, and he turned it over in his hooves. “There were a few different formats,” he explained. “The original versions weren’t very practical, at least for civilian use. They require a unicorn to view the contents. I don’t think those were ever really intended for widespread use, but they were pressed into service until ponies did what ponies always do, and innovated a solution.” “Please don’t keep us all in suspense,” Rain Shadow sighed. “Let me guess, they found a way to make it so anypony could view them?” “Also so anypony could record them. They were called Recollectors, but… this doesn’t exactly look like one of the Black Opals they recorded onto. I can’t tell for sure. It’s similar, very similar, but the material seems wrong. It’s some kind of compressed resin instead of natural crystal, and it has some kind of metal shavings in the matrix making that glitter effect. Maybe some method of capturing thaumatic orgone energy? Hm…” He held it up to the light and we all waited a moment before Emerald cleared her throat. “You said they used Recollectors?” Emerald asked. “So there’s something in here that can play whatever’s on that orb? A terminal interface?” “No, a computer would never be able to play it,” Dad said. “Just to interpret a pony’s thoughts would require a massive computer. I don’t think there were ever more than a few in the entire world that could do that, and even then… I’m not sure it’s a problem that can be solved with brute force.” “Sorry, Chamomile, looks like you can’t help with this one,” Rain Shadow joked. I raised an eyebrow in surprise at his joke. “So what should we be looking for?” Emerald asked. She stepped up to the array of scanners and wires, obviously looking for somewhere to put a hoof-sized orb. “A Recollector would look like a crown,” Dad said. “I’m not sure we’ll even find one, they’re practically priceless, and a glimpse into the past like that…” He licked his lips. “It’s what historians dream about.” “If these Exodus Arks were supposed to be self-sufficient, they’d have to carry the player and the orbs, right?” I asked. “So there had to be at least one onboard.” Dad tilted his head, forced to admit I wasn’t entirely wrong. “Naturally. But it could be buried anywhere, or just melted into slag by lava.” I nodded and started opening up the tool cabinets. I spotted something in the second one I tried. “Does it have to be a crown?” I asked. Dad stepped over to look at what I’d found. I pulled it out of the cabinet so he could see. It was a thick necklace, the articulated links showing multicolored wires in the gaps between them. A grasping, spring-loaded claw sat in the center, and it was either a setting for a really gaudy gem or… “I’ve never heard of a Recollector with a design like this,” Dad admitted. “But it does have the right interface, and it’s obviously designed to be worn. It might be what we’re looking for.” Dad started slipping it over his head, and Rain Shadow cleared his throat. “I don’t think you’re the right pony to wear that,” he said. “What’s that supposed to mean?” Dad asked. “It’s a piece of unknown technology that was sitting in a box for two centuries,” Rain Shadow said. “And if it does what it’s supposed to do, it messes with your brain, right?” “It replays memories, if that’s what you mean.” “My point is, if there’s something broken, and it doesn’t work right…” “Some memory orbs produced by the Ministries did have security spells encoded on them to prevent unauthorized viewing,” Dad mused. “Sometimes with very unpleasant deterrents.” Everypony else in the room turned to look at me. “What?” I asked. “Here,” Dad said, giving me the device. “What?” “If it causes brain damage it probably won’t be so bad for you,” Rain Shadow said. “Very funny,” I growled. “If something goes wrong, we need Red Zinger to try and fix it,” Emerald said. “And he’s more likely to make an honest attempt if you’re the one in danger. No offense, but he’d probably just shrug and say there was nothing he could do if it was one of us.” “And if you don’t do it, I’ll shoot you,” Rain Shadow said matter-of-factly. He had a strong point. He would shoot me. I put the necklace on and clipped the orb into the empty socket. The world fell away. Everything was suddenly huge. I was standing in the same place I had been, but the doors, the rows of shelves, the tools, all of it had grown twice as large. I tried to look around or say something, but it was like one of those dreams where you’re aware but not in control. I was looking down at my chest, which seemed slimmer and fluffier than usual, and tapped the memory orb around my neck with a delicate hoof. “I hope this thing is working,” I muttered, in a voice that wasn’t my own. “Should have tried to get a real Recollector instead of reverse-engineering it from a Black Opal somepony smuggled out of the labs...” I tapped it a few more times. “Hopefully, somepony is hearing this,” I said. Or not me. I was starting to figure this out. I was viewing some kind of recorded memory. The pony speaking wasn’t really me, it just felt like it because I was seeing it all through their eyes. “My name is Destiny Bray, and this is my first and last Captain’s Log, made as the commanding officer of the Exodus Blue. She was supposed to carry hope for all of Equestria but it looks like we couldn’t even get that right. I know the Exodus Red managed to get underway ahead of us, but I don’t know if the Green or White made it off the ground. We lost contact with the Cosmodrome and… the backwash of interference is probably from a megaspell detonation.” She stepped over to a blue suit of powered armor. It was the same set that was outside projecting that field around the SIVA core. “That was a few hours back. We should have been going out to sea and planning an orbital route, but things have fallen through. There’s been a mutiny among the crew, and I might be the last pony still on-mission.” I felt it through the recording when Destiny started using magic, a crimson aura surrounding parts of the armor and unlocking them from one another, the components smoothly resizing as she started putting them on. “I need to be brief because there are probably thousands, if not millions, of lives at stake. My brother Karma has lost his mind. Our mission was to get above the clouds and wait out the war, but when the megaspells hit and the news came in from the BrayTech offices in Manehattan…” She stopped. I could dimly feel her emotions. She was trying to only dimly feel them, too. It was like the were welled up inside her and kept behind a leaky dam, and I was getting splashed every time the waves made them go over the top. “He didn’t take it well,” she said, eventually. “Dad is the real captain, but he’s in stasis with the rest of the sleepers. I was always the best pilot in the family, and getting the ship stable was supposed to be my job. Guess that’s not happening now.” The deck lurched under Destiny’s hooves, and we hit the wall hard enough to stumble. “Damnit. If you’re hearing this, none of the details matter. You’ve probably found some kind of awful mess and you want to know how to clean it up. Got to focus on that.” She steadied herself. “You probably found some kind of living metal, or horrible monster, or whatever it is by now. That’s SIVA. It was supposed to be our way to save the world, but my idiot brother snapped and he’s halfway reprogrammed it into a weapon.” Destiny had most of the armor on by now, and when the next lurch hit, something in the boots activated and she kept her balance. “He’s planning on flying the entire Exodus Blue over to Zebrica and unleashing whatever horror SIVA can come up with when it’s been ordered to make monsters. This isn’t like the megaspells. It’s not going to be one big bang and a long goodbye. If this gets out in the state it’s in, I can’t even guess what it’ll do.” She picked up the helmet, looking into its eyes. “I’m going to try and contain it. This armor should protect me long enough to get the spell going. With the medical reserves in the suit’s vector traps, I might be able to hang on for a few months, maybe even a year. If cooler heads prevail, that’ll be enough time for them to get other ponies out of stasis and rescue me. If not, well that’s why I’m leaving this recording.” The helmet came down, and their view cut off for a second before coming back to life in a flurry of status windows. “To anypony who gets this recording - destroy the SIVA core. It’s too dangerous to be allowed to exist. Maybe when we’re mature enough not to try killing each other with it, we can have that kind of power. If you don’t have the firepower or know-how to destroy it, seal this place up as tight as you can and run away!” Destiny adjusted her helmet, dismissing most of the windows with incredible speed. Clearly she could read faster than I could, and being in the memory of somepony smarter than I was felt strange - I could sense the way they were thinking, and it was like being caught up in a jetstream, shoved along at a pace that you couldn’t match. The deck rocked under her hooves. Destiny swore. “I’ve adjusted the ship’s structural integrity shields to protect the sleepers. Do what you can to get them out of here safely. They’re good ponies. They just wanted to wake up to a better world. I swore an oath to build one for them. If it’s safe to wake them up, my command code is Destiny-Pi-1-1-Alpha.” Destiny touched the orb one last time. “I hope… somepony finds this someday. Learn from our mistakes. Be better than we were. Anyway, good luck. I have a feeling anypony hearing my voice is going to need better luck than I have.” She tapped a button, and everything went black. I blinked, the room swimming around me. The necklace I was wearing, the knockoff recollector, was smoking and sparking, obviously broken. I popped the orb out, and that at least made the sparks stop. It still stank like the air after a lightning strike. “Are you okay?” Emerald asked. “You were just standing there for a few minutes.” “That’s normal for memory orbs,” Dad said. “It takes as long to view them as they took to record.” “I’m worried about brain damage if there was something wrong with that orb,” Emerald said. "I told you it was getting too hot!" “She seems fine, and how would we know if she had brain damage?” Dad asked. “You’d need an expert just to tell.” “Thanks for the words of encouragement, Dad,” I muttered. “All we needed was a command code, right?” Emerald nodded. “Okay. I think I have one that might work. The orb was sort of a last will and testament from the captain, and she left her code in the recording. She said something about waking up sleeping ponies.” “Stasis pods,” Dad said. “I suppose that was their solution to staying airborne with a large number of ponies for a lengthy period. They couldn’t grow food or carry enough supplies, so just put everypony to sleep.” “Do you think any of them are still working?” I asked. “Well, there’s still power to this section, so it’s possible,” Dad muttered. “But they’ve also been buried in volcanic rock for two centuries, and I don’t think they were designed to run for that long even in good circumstances. A few minutes without power or any kind of malfunction and it’s all over.” “I’m sure after we give the commander the codes she needs, she’ll want to look into it,” Emerald said. “Why?” Dad asked. “I don’t think she can turn them into bombs, so I can’t imagine she’s interested in them.” “She’s not heartless,” Emerald said. “You weren’t married to her,” Dad countered. “Let’s go give her the code before she has all of us killed for spending too long talking without shooting anything.”