Fallout Equestria: Tales of Transylvania
Intro
There was a time, where the all the races of Equestria lived in harmony; throughout the entirety of their existence, Equestria had very few conflicts that threatened the relations between the ponies. The griffons, the zebras, the bat-ponies of Hollow Shades and Transylvania, and all of the other races that comprised the utopia under the diarchy that governed her were united and at peace. But when arcane technology grew, demanding for more resources, so did the tension between the borders of Equestria and the resource-rich Zebralands. Soon, war broke out, starting with minor conflicts over shipments of the life sustaining coal that Equestria burned in her raging inferno of industry. The zebras refused to continue to trade with Equestria’s ridiculously low economic terms, and began to recall shipments to the pony dominated country. The small conflicts cultured into a full scale war after acts of terrorism began to erupt in both countries’ cities.
Industry for science and technology quickly turned to the industry for factories building the tools of war. Boats for exploration adopted armor plating and large bore guns to defend the shipments, ceremonial swords and armor ditched for scrap and replaced with “Ironshod Firearms” rifles and other small arms, simple chariots upgraded with arcane motors and plated with steel to defend the vastly growing army as they rode into battle by the thousands.
The war continued for years, and as time progressed, the situation between the countries deteriorated, with Princess Celestia stepping down and only Princess Luna in command of Equestria’s armies, a blood soaked stalemate formed between the countries. But Equestria’s government Ministries of Arcane Science and Wartime Technology began research for a weapon that could end the war in one fowl swoop. They produced the Megaspell. A weapon of highly concentrated destruction magic that would bend the laws of arcane science and warp the physics of their universe, the spell was capable of creating an exothermic reaction of such magnitude, it ripped apart the fundamentals of the composition of nature, and transmuted all local elements into radioactive isotopes as a result.
This weapon was not built, however, without the zebra operative’s espionage on the research. The zebras quickly learned of the Equestrians motives and raced against the clock to create a weapon to match the Megaspells shear power. Using their vast resources and ancient alchemical techniques, the zebras were able to manufacture a slurry of chemicals deemed Balefire that would match almost identical in destruction to what the Equestrian’s Megaspells were capable of. As both countries built weapons of mass destruction, an arms race ensued, forcing both countries to divert all resources to build more and more Megaspells and Balefire bombs. With each new weapon pointing at a new city, a countdown to the end of their existence soon began.
On a regular day during the week, in the evening when most ponies were sitting in rush hour tuning into the day’s most recent broadcast about the war, hushing crying foals in the backseat after recently being picked up from school, or eating a quick on-the-go meal in the chariot waiting for traffic to start up again, the world simply ended. Balefire bombs rained out of the sky in a ferocious attack, quickly igniting the skies around Equestria into a blazing inferno. The Equestrian military responded at the speed of light and fruitlessly launched all of the mega spells in retaliation, hoping to take out the zebras in the dying breath of the world.
Many cities didn’t get a chance to sound off the early warning systems, as they were eradicated immediately upon attack. Those lucky enough to be outside of the city when the bombs erupted, only had hours to live as their bodies were quickly irradiated by massive amounts of Hooftonium, Coltbalt-60 and Ursanium-235 raining down, as the fallout clouds drenched the entire country in a radioactive storm. Many tried to hide in their homes, or in the subway tunnels, but soon found nothing but the thickest concrete and lead could prevent their dying bodies of being further exposed to radiation. As the world ended around them, mothers clenching their foals as their bodies melted from the immense heat soon turning them to ash, lovers embracing in the metro tunnels as the radiation slowly tearing their flesh away, leaving nothing but blackened skeletons. The existence of Equestria; the existence of the world, came to an end.
But not all of the inhabitants of Equestria perished that day. During the arms race, a company of scientists came into existence, tasked by Princess Luna herself, their goal was to create a series of shelters that would house millions of ponies in the inevitable event of a Balefire strike. Their name: Stable-Tec. Stable-Tec quickly ramped into overdrive to develop a shelter that would withstand a direct hit, they experimented with many designs opting out any form of surface structure, as the radiation would seep in quickly, they ultimately came upon one plan, an underground vault-like structure with a giant sealed entrance that could hold roughly six-hundred occupants. They named these structures Stables, and quickly sent out tickets of admission to certain families of all races that were deemed genetically capable of living within one. Stables were quickly built by the hundreds across equestria, many of which were built simply to protect their inhabitants, but some of the scientists, however, needed answers, answers they could not obtain nor will they ever in their lifetimes, but answers nonetheless. Many Stables were built with intentional flaws in their systems, to test the ponies and see how they could survive in confinement, others filled intentionally with too many occupants but not enough living space to comfortably contain them, one built with hundreds upon hundreds of rooms, but would house only a single occupant. Stable-Tec’s experiments continued to grow more sinister in nature as building progressed, with one housing an armoury that was publically accessible to occupants of mental disorder, or another with a total male population, but containing only a single mare. By the time Stable-Tec reached their one hundred and first stable, the signs of an imminent attack began, and Stable-Tec gathered all the occupants quickly telling them to go into the respective shelters and tried to protect all that could make it, but with the unexpected attack, not enough Stables were built, and it was certain there just weren't enough Stables to save Equestria.
Some Stables, however, were not built by the evil minds of mad scientists, toying with the end of the world in their last effort to discover. Many were built by engineers with honest intentions, trying to save what remained of the location nearby the Stable’s location, one such stable, was Stable 17.
Being built into the Smokey Mountain in the White Tail Forest, located on the far northwest coast of Equestria, it was built overshadowing a town called Transylvania. A town untouched by the horrors of balefire and holocaust, the town still retained it's classical outlook of Equestria even during times of wartime industry, populated entirely by the rarer breed of pony, unceremoniously called “bat ponies”. These ponies weren’t quite the same as their Pegasus, Unicorn and Earth Pony cousins, sporting darker colored coats and manes, two sharp fanged teeth, leathery wings, tufts of fur on the tips of the ears, and golden colored eyes, with vertical pupils. They lived peacefully in Transylvania, apart from the war in a vast village in which the construction plan was according to how the rocky forested landscape allowed the fanged ponies to build. With it's economy driven mainly by the farming of fruit bearing plants by it's residents, the town saw little to no action in the war, and was blissfully left out of any attacks during the balefire bombing that consumed Equestria. Unfortunately, even though the town was not struck directly, the effects of radioactive fallout was still a threat.
The Stable-Tec engineer charged with creating Stable 17, built it with the intentions to save her dying race of Transylvanians, for she was certain the city where the vast majority of her race resided, Hollow Shades, was going to be destroyed, as it was located right next to the capital city Canterlot. The bunker was designed with two purposes in mind: To save it’s occupants from the inevitable threat of Balefire holocaust, and for the race of Transylvanians to survive. Stable 17 was built early on in the war, being only the seventeenth stable in production, the stable was built with the most robust materials, and with the latest technology at the time. Unlike later stables which were being built during times of great economic recession from the war, 17 was carefully manufactured and perfectly set to keep all of it’s six hundred occupants alive for generations. As a final touch to the creation of the stable, the engineer instituted a system with the occupant selection, that would ensure that all of the three hundred residents of Transylvania would be selected, and the other three hundred occupants were selected by the Stable-Tec standard gene pool selection process.
Stables had a very simplistic government system to run them, Stable-Tec would elect an Overmare, and occasionally an Overstallion, to lead the teams of ponies across their jobs, and effectively extend the life of the stable, the next generation of the Overmare or Stallion would be the sucessor. The Overmare elected for Stable 17 at the time of its creation, was Night Shade, a Transylvanian mare, whose former job was the coordination of the farming district in Transylvania. She was tasked with the important mission of maintaining strict enforcement of the social policies instituted by Stable-Tec, to ensure that all of the ponies would mingle accordingly to keep the gene pool fresh, as well as fulfill the ulterior motive of the engineer who built 17: break the social norm, and spread the races throughout the whole stable into one uniform multicultural race.
When the bombs fell, and all the occupants were settled into their new home, there was a major problem immediately upon informing the populace the rules within the stable. The ponies rejected the idea, and formed factions of their own race, dividing up the floorspace of the stables’ many levels to stay away from each other, fearing they will be forced to breed like animals. Noticing this, Night Shade quickly instituted a new system, skipping the first generation of stable dwellers, knowing they will never conform to the new society, she created an educational system called “The Multicultural School for Fillies and Colts” or MSFC, where the next generation of ponies would learn from a young age, not only the basics of knowledge, but more importantly, they would learn about one another and were taught that it was one hundred percent natural for ponies to only marry those of the other race and unnatural to marry and breed with their own. This brainwashing quickly took a foothold in the fresh minds of those born within only the confines of the stable, and the society began to shift as the former generation passed and the new one grew older. With the new Overmare, Night Shade’s daughter, in power. The stable finally settled into a time of peace and social normality.
But Night Shade, while still alive, whose mind has slowly gone mad with the ability to change an entire society, wanted to keep her ponies forever. The ponies she believed she created through the MSFC. For when Night Shade passed, she executed one final command, sealing the Stable door permanently, with the occupants, as well as the new Overmare herself, blissfully unaware that their only hope of ever returning to the surface has been whisked away. For when the bombs fell that fateful day years ago, the door to Stable 17 was sealed, never to be opened again.