//------------------------------// // Chapter 17: Bounty // Story: Fallout Equestria: Deductions in New Pegas! // by Hugo Reed //------------------------------// We’d better get moving! There are things out here we really don’t want to run into after dark! Chapter 17: Bounty I looked around a vast city, the likes of which the wasteland had never shown me. For the first time in my life, I truly understood what places like Dodge Junction must’ve been like before the megaspells. Of course, I’d seen pictures of Canterlot in my history books, but this was so much more than that. This was vast city of crystals. Every inch of it was shimmering in a rainbow of sparkling hues. It made me feel… lighter… happy just by seeing it. This must’ve been what the crystal empire was like before the war… However, I wasn’t given long to admire its beauty. A small group of guard ponies came flying past me and I followed them, curious as to what part of history I’d landed in. Soon enough, they lead me to a huge room, and I saw a unicorn stallion with a white coat and blue-streaked mane. He wore the golden armor of a general, but I could tell from the look in his eyes that he considered every solider there his equal. “Barricade the door!” he shouted, gesturing with his hoof. “We’ll hold out against him here! You men, finish evacuating the children and women!” Then I saw a beautiful pink mare with a multi-colored mane trot up to the general and kiss him softly. “I’m not going anywhere,” she said softly. “If you stay, I stay.” “This isn’t up for discussion!” he said sharply. “We don’t have the men to fight him off, and the ponies here are way too frightened to power the crystal heart.” The door suddenly gave a loud bang and I could tell something was very insistent about breaking in. Despite it being just a memory, my body tensed up, ready to run or fight. Whatever was trying bust down that door was as furious as a fully-grown dragon. “Shit!” the general swore. “Phillip! Get her out of here!” A young stallion came up and took the pink mare through the entrance I’d come in, despite her protests. I felt sorry for her. It was clear she loved him and wanted to die by his side rather then live alone. Whoever she was, he clearly knew she was more important then he was and was ready to die defending her and the other ponies. “Soliders!” he yelled out, stirring the hearts of the ponies in the room. “We all know what this is! I have fought with you all for years now, and I have seen us do the impossible time and time again!” Bang! “I can’t say that I know we’ll live through this! I don’t say that we’ll see victory here today. All I can do is ask one thing of you. If we are going to die here today, then we give this asshole all the hell we can muster before we do!” Several ponies cheered, readying themselves to fight. This was new to me. I’d never seen an entire battalion of ponies resigned to fate and ready to meet it for the greater good. Bang! Honestly, had I been alive at the time, I would’ve fought then and there. I vaguely wondered how much of a hero complex I had that twice now, I’d been stirred by a long-dead military pony. “We are soldiers of the Crystal Empire!” an earth pony near me shouted. “Let’s fuck him up!” BANG! The door was shattered, and wooden shards were sent everywhere. Through the door, a huge lance made of dark crystals flew in the impaled one of the forward ponies. “ATTACK!” shouted the general pony, charging with his sword held high. It was a slaughter, pure and simple. Oh sure, the ponies put up a good fight. Guns were fired and pleated the dark creature that entered. But there was no hope for them. They were sent flying, often with their limbs and heads blown off. I may not have known the general or the pink alicorn for earlier, but I knew this creature. King Sombra. I’d never seen a picture of him before but there was no other pony like him. He was called the last of the cave ponies and clearly was driven insane either by his isolation or by his defeat from trying to re-take the crystal empire. Either way, he was nothing like I’d seen before. He was less pony and more demon that happened to have a muzzle and horn. He almost waltzed through the room, killing in a blood rage as he went. Any pony that challenged him died. The general did everything he could to save his friends, but couldn’t stop the beast that was the Dark King. I came to realize through the battle that Sombra was intentionally leaving him for last. Whatever it was that the general did to him, Sombra hated the pony a great deal. The general stood facing Sombra among the dead bodies of his troops. “You bastard!” he growled, raising his blade. “I’ll kill you! I’ll kill you!” He charged forward, swinging mightily. It was clear the general was a skilled fighter, but he never stood a chance against Sombra. I watched, horrified as Sombra tore his head off and drank the general’s blood, laughing manically all the while. With that horrible vision I was sent back to the wasteland… and was immediately sick. I put the potion back into my bag, and rolled over, trying to get to sleep. I woke up before John did, and when I woke up we were alone. The rockets had launched and Chester had left. It didn’t matter, our job here was done. I went upstairs and went through my saddlebags for some food and pulled out the radio I was given by the NCE. I switched it on, and immediately got a response. “NCE frequency two! This is Sergeant Lestride, please state your business on this channel.” “This is Sherclop Pones reporting in,” I said. “The situation at the factory outside Nieghton has been resolved. There will be no further ghoul activity there.” I heard a moment of silence from the other end. “Copy that. We’ll have a courier deliver your payment. Where should we send it?” I considered it. We would need a base of operation before long and John had said there was this New Pegas place where all wasteland movers and shakers ended up, so that sounded as good as anywhere. “You have troops stationed in New Pegas?” “Yes, on the outskirts.” “Send it to them, I’ll be making my way up there.” “Roger that. We’ll have your payment there by tomorrow evening. Lestride out.” I turned off the radio and smiled. Case closed… so much as it deserved to be called a case. I relaxed, letting my brain terminal sort and organize the facts of Neighton and Chrysalis. It was almost soothing. Since entering the wasteland I hadn’t really stopped. Oh sure, I’d rested. I’d taken the time needed to sleep or think, but I’d never really just relaxed like this. After a few hours, John came up to me, blinking wearily. “Gotta say, I like the tracking on this pipbuck thing. Makes it easier to find you when you go wondering off.” “It’s nice now, but it became a bit of a cluster-fuck in the stable,” I said. “I’m planning on heading up to New Pegas and set up a sort of business for my detective work there… I’m just letting you know that if you want to come along, I’d be happy to bring you into it. “Hell yeah!” John said smiling. “You’re my best friend, and it’s fun traveling with you, and we’re helping ponies! I can’t think of another way I’d want to spend my time.” I smiled brightly at his enthusiasm. John was an odd pony, no doubts about it, but we were friends. “Well if you’re ready, let’s head topside and I’ll show you how SATS works.” John nodded and we slowly head through the hallways and up the steps to the outer world again. It was a few hours up the road before anything more interesting happened. John was quickly getting proficient with SATS. No doubt his military background helped with that. It was as we were approaching the outskirts of the New Pegas barrier that we were stopped, this time by more of the Chyrsalis Legion. It had been a long time since I’d met these ponies, and I was no longer a helpless stable pony. I was a branded badass detective. “Sherclop Pones!” said the leader of this group, clad in fine armor. “By order of Moripony, you are to be put to death!” “Death huh? Sorry boys, I’ve got a practice to set up, can we reschedule?” In answer, they drew swords and gun and John and I fired our weapons. Boom Boom! Bang! One of the ponies went down, but the leader John had shot barely even flinched. I dove behind the highway’s barrier and glanced at my HUD. His health barely even budged. “Dammit!” I hissed. “I knew we should’ve bought some armor piercing bullets!” There was really very little for it but to unload what we had on the leader. But first I decided to wipe out the other two he’d brought with him. They were armored well but their faces were unprotected. My skills in hoof-to-hoof combat made quick work of them, and I turned to see John taking cover behind a large rock, hiding from the rifle the legionnaire had pulled out. “HEY ASSHOLE!” I yelled, letting my pistol ring out several times. At first he didn’t respond, but two of my shots caught him in the hind quarters. Angrily, the stallion turned to me and sprinted forward, his rifle firing in quick bursts. However, he was an earth pony and wasn’t ready for somepony like me. Using my telekensis, I lifted and threw his helmet, leaving his head open for John to snipe from the air. Boom! And down went our would-be assassin. I looted them with John, giddy with the thought of the caps we would get for their gear. John suddenly gave a small snort and tossed me a letter one of them had been carrying. Curious, I opened it. My Legion, we have another holier-than-thou white knight who needs putting down! Here are your details: Name: Sherclop Pones Appearance: Tan coat, Brown mane I am placing a bounty of 1000 denarii for his head! Moripony I smiled widely, pocketing the note. “Wow,” I said. “I’m flattered. I haven’t even met this pony and he’s willing to pay 1000 caps to kill me.” “Actually 4000,” said John. “Denarii are worth more than caps, though I don’t know how the rate’s figured out.” I laughed. “Now he’s flirting with me. Should I send him a fruit basket? Maybe attach a note about how my barn door doesn’t swing like that?” John laughed too, and we continued on our path to New Pegas. I was truly amazed at just how big the place was. John hadn’t mentioned that it had several different districts. I wasn’t sure there were even enough ponies in the wasteland to fill this massive place up. However, this pleased me in a sick sort of way. Whenever large congregations of ponies meet up, there is inevitably crime that happens. Where there is crime there is mystery, and so if I were to set up a business in crime solving, this was the town to do it in. Of course, we’d have to actually get in first. As we pushed open the gate, I was shown a pathetic shithole of strip. This I hadn’t excepted. I couldn’t help but watch aghast as two young fillies chased down a large rat, and finally beat it brains in and ate it furiously. This was depravity I wasn’t ready for. I gave John a curious look and he nodded at me. “Yeah, it can be that bad here sometimes. There was talk of the NCE and the beards getting things fixed, but the leader of the beards is a stubborn bastard, and the NCE… well you know about them.” “The beards are some type of gang?” “Yeah, named after somepony who was famous before the war. Somepony the Bearded. Whatever the first part was, most ponies forgot and so they just took the names the beards, and their boss is simply The Bearded. He’s a decent enough guy, but has a hell of a temper on him.” “How do you know all this?” I asked, curious. “Before I settled in Trottingham, I stayed here for a bit. The beards seemed the best of a bad group, so I figured I would do what I could to help them out. Eventually, I got too wound up just sitting around, so I left.” “I see.” “Hey boys,” said a armored mercenary. “Name’s Odin. If you want some protection crossing Hillside, you can’t get better than me.” “Yeah, I think we’ve got protection covered,” I said laughing. “Look,” he said in a hushed tone. “Hillside's a rough area. You really could use an extra set of eyes at least. Come on, only 200 caps.” “We’re fine!” insisted John. “We’ll come back if we change our mind.” “I’ll be here.” There were another two bodyguards for hire, one of whom I could only guess was one of the beards. However, we had loads of equipment to sell off first, then we could look into this mess with the beards. It was as we were rounding the corner and heading into the second quadrant that I heard a voice. “Pst! Yo man, you need a fix?” “A fix?” I asked, turning to the mare who called out to us. “What are you selling?” The mare opened up her saddlebags, laying out her goodies before us. My eyes went immediately to the huge amounts of Dash I saw, and I bought them. My mind raised a concern about it being so cheap, but I figured that it was probably just because this seller was working a poor area. I happily slipped ten new vials of Dash into my bags, handing over just 150 caps, which we could pay and barely notice, and now I had Dash! John cleared his throat irritated but I ignored him. I didn’t have a problem, hell I had barely even used any Dash. “Let’s go,” I said, pointing out a door that read Dried Apple and Apple Butter’s Apple Ammo! I shook my head, vaguely wondering if it was a test to them to see how many times they could fit apple into the title. John right behind me, I opened the door and went inside.