//------------------------------//
// Chapter 1: Cutie Marks 
// Story: Fallout Equestria: Fly Away 
// by Freeflyingwolf 
//------------------------------//

Fallout Equestria: Fly Away
By Freeflyingwolf
Chapter 1: Cutie Marks
”How about the Cutie Mark Crusaders?!”

S.P.E.C.I.A.L
Strength:  3
Perception: 6
Endurance: 5
Charisma: 6
Intelligence: 5
Agility: 8
Luck: 7

Fear ran through the veins of one little colt. His name was Sunshy: a play on words of course, as well as homage to the nicest Pegasus to ever exist. He would make her proud, mommy always said. Why, he even looked like her: his legs were too long for his body, which was downright thin, his coat was a sunflower yellow, his hair was light red—pink in the light right—and grown long so he could hide his face, just like Fluttershy. Everyone who first met Sunshy thought he was related to her; she had no family, but then they’d say he was her reincarnation. It took him a while to figure out what that meant.
However, Sunshy had no Rainbow Dash to stick up for him. Sunshy was timid, scared, and never protected himself; he learned to make himself small and unworthy of bullying. It didn’t help that he looked more like a filly than a colt. So of course, he was perfect to be picked on. Even by those he came to call ‘friends’. These friends had forced him into a dare. Thus, his fear.
Actually, his fear was caused by what he saw in front of him. Sunshy was standing on the clouds, as all Pegasi do nowadays, staring ahead and down. It was scary to look down. Before, when he looked down, all he saw was cloud. But now…there was ground. He could see the ground. And it terrified him. That was when he discovered he was afraid of heights. When you live in the clouds, there was no discernible way to know just how high up one was. It was terrifying to know.
“Are you going or what, Sunshy?!” Another Pegasus shouted at the timid colt.
Said colt started violently before looking over his shoulder, staring through the veil of his red mane. His two ‘friends’ were glaring at him. The two brightly-colored winged ponies had cornered the poor colt on his way home from Fluttershy’s First Aid School for Foals and Colts. They demanded he go to the cloud cover over the Everfree Forest. No explanation, no other words, just demanded him to go and started shoving, not even letting him go take his medkit saddlebags back home.
So here he was, at the edge of the borderline between Equestria and the Everfree Forest. Staring down at the ground millions of miles down. It most likely wasn’t really that far down, but that was what his panicking mind told Sunshy. Trying not to seem scared, Sunshy stared directly at one tree. It was indiscernible from the thousands of other trees that could be seen from the breaking cloud cover.
“Go!” One of the two yelled at him.
The shout startled the yellow colt, causing him to jump into the air. At that moment, the clouds decided to gap under the little pegasus. Screaming, the yellow and red colt fell through the hole. Sunshy’s mind went blank; he couldn’t remember to fly, he couldn’t remember to do anything but scream and flail. While falling, he looked up to the sky he had called home and saw his friends staring down at him, eyes wide. They turned tail and fled.
Memories of his life flooded Sunshy’s mind. It was tragically short. The ground was coming up at him. The trees were gaping at him, going to swallow him. Their branches broke under his minute weight combined with the force of gravity. They were less than cushioning. Something else that made a strange noise was much cushier.

Groaning, Sunshy tried to open his cerulean eyes, but the light of the sun blinded him. While turning, he mumbled to Celestia to please keep the light down. Already large eyes shot open as wide as possible. Whatever he was on was alive, soft, and breathing. Wings opened and flapped enough to get Sunshy airborne. What he saw made him gasp and cover his face with his hooves.
A baby manticore. It was lying on the dark grass and leaf-covered ground. A ray of sun was spotlighting the little thing. Gazing up, the colt saw the hole he had made during his crash landing. Staring up at the sky gave him vertigo. Wings snapped shut against his side, making the gangly colt bounce onto his rump.
Breathing deeply while staring at the ground, Sunshy gathered his bearings. There were no broken bones, heart rate fast, breathing going down, a few scrapes and bruises, and no damage to his metal casing saddlebags. A deep sigh, some moments to gather up what little courage he had, and Sunshy lifted his head to observe the injured manticore.
Injured?!
Yes, a quick visual scan proved that the baby—cub?—was injured far worse than the pegasus. One wing was stretched out at an awkward angle, some gashes leaked blood onto its golden coat, dying it a dark brown and matting the fur. The yellow pegasus retched at the sight of a bone sticking out of the baby’s wrist.
Acting quickly, Sunshy ducked his head down and slid his medkit saddlebags onto the ground. Work mode activated, narrowing his focus; he opened both metal containers and took out rolls of gauze, some cleaning strips, a couple healing potions, Med-X, and bandages.
First, Sunshy gingerly flipped the manticore, taking great care of its injured wing and trying not to stare at the scorpion tail. First-Aid training compelled the yellow colt to press his ear against its chest; an irregular heartbeat and shallow breathing. With that knowledge to comfort him, the pegasus gingerly opened the baby’s mouth and squeaked at the rows of sharp teeth.
Tearing his eyes from the teeth, Sunshy turned and grasped the healing potion in his mouth. Then he leaned back so he could keep the mouth open with his hind hooves while he used his front hooves and mouth to uncork the potion. Once it was open, the petit healer poured the pink magical potion into the open mouth.
The manticore gurgled the potion before swallowing unconsciously. A sigh escaped Sunshy as he finally released the gaping maw. Truthfully, the baby manticore’s mouth could only have bitten his back, but fear was not rational. The smaller wounds healed before Sunshy’s eyes, the gashes slowed their bleeding, and the pegasus continued his medical treatment.
The wounds were bandaged carefully and only tight enough to stop the bleeding. Sunshy swore his heart stopped when the manticore growled in her sleep. Oh, he found out it was a girl while treating a lower leg injury. Holding his breath, he quickly injected the baby with Med-X before snapping its wing back in place. The baby grunted in her sleep and squirmed before settling back into unconsciousness.
Then there was the bone.
The first time Sunshy went to face this challenge, he blanched and lost his lunch into some nearby bushes. Second time, he puked again. This repeated until his stomach was completely empty.
With nothing else to upchuck, the colt felt he was forced to face this unholy challenge. With a held breath, he forced the bone back into place and quickly wrapped the injury as quickly as possible while not letting it become sloppy.
The manticore roared in pain and flailed, claws and tail slashing out to attack whatever caused her pain. She rolled over onto her paws, held her tail up to strike, and opened her wings to look intimidating. Then pain shot through her body in such succession that she crumpled to her knees.
“Are you okay? I…I have some more Med-X. It’ll make the pain go away.” Sunshy talked to the baby manticore cautiously. His body mimicked his tone; ears flat, crouching low to be eye-to-eye, and hair covering half of his face.
The manticore growled at him, raising her tail in warning while crouching down in preparation to pounce. Sunshy backed up and began moving sideways, never breaking eye contact. The manticore stared at the colorful pony, growling with ears flattened against her head, tail up, and wings pressed against her sides. Though he was forced to look away to gather his supplies, the manticore continued to watch him with cautious golden eyes.
Once all of his supplies were packed into his metal saddlebags, the yellow colt slipped it on and stood up with a needle in his mouth. He turned to the manticore and made himself as small and unintimidating as possible. While he inched towards the baby, she calmed down at his stance. Though injured and scared, it was inferred that this tiny pony was no threat.
Then the needle poked her leg.
A paw that was no bigger than a filly’s hoof back-swiped at Sunshy, knocking him onto his side. She roared in pain and struggled against nothing for a short while. Then a realization hit the young creature. 
No more pain.
Cautiously, the only other creature around rose to his hooves and crawled towards the manticore. This time, she turned towards him so fast that his body locked up in fear. The manticore pounced, Sunshy couldn’t even scream. And then he laughed.
The manticore licked his mane until it stuck up in a funny style. Sunshy continued to giggle as the manticore baby backed off and sat in front of him. Giggling, the small colt stood up and smiled at the manticore. In response, she wagged her little scorpion tail and mimicked his smile. It was much more terrifying than his.
“Good, you’re okay. I’m glad to have helped.” Sunshy smiled a little brighter at the manticore.
The female combination monster purred at him and rubbed her head against his chest and muzzle. A roar startled the two. The monster turned towards the source and roared back. Her voice was tiny and high-pitched compared to the deep, terrifying one before.
Out of the woodworks came a much larger, adult, male, manticore. The monster was two adult ponies high, and three wide. The wings were each giant bat wings as large as its body. The scorpion tail raised high above its wild red mane. Sunshy realized this was the baby’s father when she was scooped up and he received a roar in his face.
Much like the fainting goats, Sunshy seized up and fell onto his side. He was too scared to move, and instead watched as the little manticore roared back at her father and swiped at his face. The father howled in pain and dropped his daughter, raising a paw to his injured nose. The baby ran to her friend’s side and lied down next to him. She mewed at him and nudged his face in worry.
Fear slowly dissolved as the colt realized what was happening. He rolled onto his side and received a full-face nuzzle from the baby. The father stared at the scene in silent contemplation.
“I helped her. It’s okay. I’m not mean.” Sunshy told the father in a shockingly confident voice.
This seemed to be the final push. The father manticore nodded at them, turned, and began walking away. The baby jumped up and bounced after him—it seemed like she meant to run, but it looked like bouncing to Sunshy. After a while, the little one turned and meowed at him, beckoning to him with her head. With a grin that stretched from ear to ear, Sunshy got up and sprinted after them.
The darkness was terrifying; not even the company of a giant mix-and-match monster could quell his fears. The trees seemed to reach out at him with claws, or had faces trying to scare him. Every little shadow held something out to kill him. Any small noise scared him; every stick he stepped on made him squeal in terror.
Under his breath, Sunshy quietly sang ”Giggle at the Ghosties”. The song that transcended time actually helped dispel his fear. Soon enough, he was trotting along, belting out the song with a smile and a little mini manticore mewling the song along with him. The adult looked upon them with a fatherly smile.
Of course, the loud noises attracted unwanted attention. A few glowing eyes peered out at the group from the shadows of the forest. Nothing came too close to them; a manticore was a rather fearsome animal even in the Equestrian Wasteland. A large male manticore with his child in tow? Nothing was willing to come close.
Along their path, they made their way into a bog. The water was brown, mucky, thick, and generally unpleasant. The two manticores seemed to be wary of the gross water, and Sunshy was not one to jump into it. And then a giant five-eyed frog surfaced and jumped onto a lily pad larger than it. The baby manticore screeched and ducked behind her father, who stared at her with what seemed to be disappointment.
However, the little colt was drawn by an inane curiosity towards the freakishly mutated animal. It was as large as an adult pony, had brown and dark green camouflage skin, and three large eyes on one side, two on the other. All of the five eyes focused onto the yellow and red colt. Then the Radfrog shot out its long and sticky tongue, which Sunshy noticed was barbed. It didn’t even occur to him to duck.
Thankfully for him, the tongue was not aimed at him. It sailed over his head; he followed its trajectory and ducked when something big and brown came flying back. Looking back at the Radfrog, Sunshy saw that it was shoving some giant bug into its mouth. Once the bug was eaten, the Radfrog croaked at the pony and jumped back into the bog. The little manticore screeched and ran back from the splashes of the water while Sunshy laughed and just held a hoof over his face. The father shook his head and continued walking.
Their path was long and virtually straight. Once they had to cross a chasm. With her injured wing, the baby had to climb onto her father’s back. Sunshy wondered how he was going to cross before the father picked him up between his large front paws and sailed over to the other side. Only when he was on the other side did Sunshy remember he was a pegasus…while on the ground, paralyzed by fear because he made the mistake of looking down.
Once recovered, the trio resumed their journey. When his hooves began to hurt, Sunshy just began to fly beside them silently. It slowly became darker. The trees thickened. They came upon a field of overgrown blue flowers. Something told the colt to avoid them, and the two manticores doing the same proved it was a good idea.
Hours of walking proved to bear fruit to the group. They came upon a giant tree decorated with broken bottles hanging from the low branches and masks scattered around the area. Something compelled Sunshy to stop a certain distance from the tree. He stared at the door in the front, wondering if this tree was hollowed out to become a home.
The two manticores paused as well, behind the tiny pony. The large father nudged him forward; he looked back to him before moving towards the home. Scared at the thought of invading someone’s home, Sunshy paused before the door. Whispering a sorry to the owner, one hoof reached out and pushed open the door.
Complete and utter darkness with scary faces!!
The father manticore huffed and rolled its eyes before looking down at his paws. Sunshy was cowering between his large paws, shaking at the utter darkness in the inside of the tree. The father turned his head over his shoulder, grabbed his daughter, and set her down beside the quivering colt. 
Then he strode forward into the building with wings wide open. A few strong flaps caused the air inside to fly around. The stale air rushed by the smaller creatures’ heads, throwing out dust as well. Once that task was cleared, the manticore father pulled back some curtains with his teeth, letting the light shine in through the grime-coated windows.
Cautiously, Sunshy stepped forward into the hollowed-out tree hut. The inside was…amazing! It was decorated with wonderful masks, potions, brews, books, and all sorts of fun things! Sunshy was no smarter than most other ponies, but he loved to learn! And now, he wanted to learn everything about this place and these neat-o things!
Bubbling with excitement, Sunshy bounced around the hut, trying to absorb everything his big cerulean eyes could take in. After a short while, he bounced forward, was jerked back because his tail did not follow, and fell flat on his belly spread-eagle. Looking over his shoulder, he saw the large manticore with a paw on his tail, staring evenly at him.
The colt folded his ears back and felt a little blush growing on his face. The manticore made a snorting hiccoughing noise. It took only a moment for Sunshy to realize he was laughing at him. His blush covered his face, making it look a little orange. The manticore released him and licked his head, giving him a new manedo much like his daughter had.
Sunshy took his time to scan the one giant room; masks, bottles, broken things everywhere, and a bed. There were also a few books, but upon inspection, were in Zebra. Still, Sunshy set them aside as the little manticore helped him clean by sweeping the broken glass into a pile with her tail. The large manticore used his tail to sweep the collection outside, dug a hole, and buried the glass pieces.
With that done, Sunshy took off his saddlebags and walked onto the bed and lied down. He just wanted to lie down, but then his eyelids became heavy. The little manticore pushed her way under his leg and cuddled up to him. That’s when an idea came to him.
“I need to give you two a name.” Sunshy stated, looking between the two. The larger manticore walked over and lied down, curling up with the little ones against his belly. Looking at the baby, Sunshy muttered sleepily, “I’ll call you Celly, after Celestia.” He looked up to the father, “And you can be Big Sol.” 
Big Sol raked his tongue against Sunshy’s mane, while Celly groomed herself to clean off her blood, careful of the bandages. After his little giggle fit calmed, the content colt curled up against his friends, seeing something on his flank as he closed his eyes.
Wait, what?!
Sunshy shot up so fast that the manticores jumped back. They watched as he spun in a circle, eyes wide, grin breaking his face, trying to get a good look at his brand-spanking-new cutie mark! Big Sol held out a paw and stopped Sunshy in such a way that he was almost nose-to-nose with his cutie mark. It also almost broke his spine. So he fell onto his side and stared at his cutie mark with barely-contained bubbling ecstatic excitement.
The cutie mark was rather strange, even though it was his. It was the face of a smiling lion holding a roll of bandage. No, wait, it was a manticore, there were little bat wings behind the smiling face. But who cared! It was his very own cutie mark! And to think, he never would have gotten it if he hadn’t…fell…from…….his home.
All the excitement of receiving his cutie mark was washed away in that one depressing thought. Sunshy flopped down onto the mattress and lied down. Now he was depressed. He was no longer home…his home was up above. He didn’t know if he could fly that high, he was a colt, after all. Even still…the Enclave didn’t let ponies on the ground go back up. The ground was poisonous…the air…
Wait a minute…
Was the air really that bad?
Sunshy had been here since a little after noon, and now, the silver ribbons of light streaming in through the grime in the windows told him it was night. He had been here hours, and nothing had happened. He felt fine…sure, some monsters were changed, but these manticores must prove something, right? Not everything in the Wasteland below could be killed or changed by the poison.
What if there was no poison at all?
What if…
A sigh escaped the little yellow colt. This was too much to think about while he was so tired.
One thing was certain, Sunshy thought as his manticore friends curled up around him, the Enclave was either lying to all of the pegasi about the surface, or they didn’t know it wasn’t poisonous. They sent scouts all the time..maybe they…liked the little froggies and fed them pickles…
Ignoring how strange those thoughts were, Sunshy gave into the sweet embrace of sleep. It was so easy, curled up next to two warm and very fuzzy bodies. A contented sigh escaped the gangly colt as he drifted into bliss, dreaming of his first day on land and how it wasn’t so bad. After all, he made two real friends who wouldn’t want him to do dangerous dares for no reason. It was a good day after all.
Level up! You are now level one! 
Medicine is at 50
Perk added! Fluttershy reborn: You look, act, and even talk just like Fluttershy! You know just what it means to do better. You can speak to animals on a different level and know how to take care of them! Ponies, however…meep.
Medical History! Small Frame: You are smaller than most, adding +1 to Agility, but your bones are 25% more likely to be broken.
Claustrophobic:You have fear of enclosed spaces (probably because you’re a pegasus). You gain +1 to all your SPECIAL attributes when outdoors, but -1 when you’re inside.
Side note: You now have a cutie mark! It’s a symbol of you growing into a full-fledged adult, good for you! Now that you’re no longer a blank flank, you know what your destiny is in the Wasteland. Be happy; at least you lived this long.