Sickle has a very limited vocabulary, but she makes it work. Where Whisper uses words like a toolbox, picking and choosing to fit the situation at hoof, Sickle uses words more like a sledgehammer: a big, blunt instrument that she beats her problems with.

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Whisper just used Charm, when she should've used Intimidation or Diplomacy. I guess, Sickle is very pissed by everyone trying to change her, and to be frank, she does kill raiders and keep town safe, I can ignore verbal shit she throws around if that means I'm safe from crazy raiders. So, when she hears another "Hey fuck your personality, act like I want" she gets annoyed.

And yes, it's not what Whisper said, but I bet that's what Sickle heard. And hey, she just needs to change angle and try to befriend her, THEN subtly try to make her... less swear-y.

Hahahahaha, "Objective secured. Returning home" For the message? I liked this one, it took a bit of thought to have it click. But Nicely done! And Sickle, eh, I like how she is in the nuance of being exactly who she is. It's different, and while she's stood so far, eventually you punch above your weight class, and get smacked down. The question is what will be the nail in the coffin. This though, is certainly another enjoyable chapter. So bravo! Everyone feels quite spot on. Quirks and all.

Hah, so far I like every single character in the group. Though it'd be hilarious of it turned out that Sickle likes to read books or do interior design when alone.

I hope Whisper will find some other changelings.

Is there any kind of wiki for FoE? I wouldn't mind knowing more about the setting, but I'm not in the mood to read entire stories not involving changelings.

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You know, I doesn't actually like power-creep and fine with Sickle being bigger, badder and meaner than everyone else. These types of characters are very enjoyable when they get problem they can't deal with strenght, intimidation and superior firepower. Awakening concience, feelings toward other group members, impulse to befriend somepony meeting with how she acted beforehand, and creating awkward situations... saving someone from death and dealing with genuine gratitude... list goes on.

And you do need to remember, for all her crass personality and insults, she did kill biggest band of raiders and stopped being raider herself, becoming bounty hunter. And I'll take crass bounty hunter that keeps me town safe over pleasant raider that would torture and rape me.

And...My love for Sickle has resurfaced once again!

You know, I'd have left that booby trapped data alone. Copy it but leave the virus on the original. Then before handing it over mention that it's got a trap on it that you had to back out to avoid tripping and that you could possibly disarm it for some extra caps... and that you're going to count your payment in full before disarming said trap.

Milk that mare for everything she's got.

Oh Celestia. Please wake up at fuck-off-o'clock and bolt before Sickle tags along. You really don't want to go adventuring with a drug-addled psycho who threatens to kill you when she's relatively sober. Girl's the worst kind of time bomb.

7031372 Its not about what she's done, but what she can do, should she slip the leash, as it were. She was a raider, that much is true. She isnt now, so she says. But should she decide to turn on them, drop them, ditch them, or any other means that serve her own interests. The other three, are boned. Pure and simple. She is a rabid attack dog, that is being led around with scraps of meat, if the food runs out, guess who is nearby made of tasty tasty meat.

Thats more the problem here. You have in game terms a combat twink with folks whom are not, but passable for the setting. It's not even a contest who would win. It's fine to see she's killing those whom deserve it, but you don't take a rabid attack dog with you unless you are that kind of desperate, especially if it wants to stay around. Between the drugs, the after-effects, and the nature of what they do, that she hasn't succumbed to a bloodlust in battle is amazing. It can't last, though, as we already have the rumblings of folks being all too quick to see her going back to her old ways. Smart ones might turn on the big guns and just use it for provocation to end her that way.

I don't disagree with what you said. Her views are fine, but can you see any of the other three remotely trying to stick any appendage out with the threats she's belted out if it was a matter of them vs her?

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Well yeah, that's also interesting conflict that I'd like to see play out. Either she's boned and need help to survive, in which we can enjoy her trying to get others help her after all she said and done, or others get fucked up and she saves them and maybe needs to nurse them back for some kinda motive that doesn't let her just ditch em.

She is a rabid attack dog, that is being led around with scraps of meat, if the food runs out, guess who is nearby made of tasty tasty meat.

Gotta disagree here. She was rabid dog when she was a raider. Right now she's kinda crazy, but who in Wasteland isn't? And in spite of all her threats, all her badass-ness and stuff, she didn't kill or even maim, or even beat up two helpless mares that got into HER HOUSE. Normal ponies can kill in that situation, assuming intruders are here to steal their stuff. She, former-raider-bad-attitude-drugs-alcohol-enormous-powerhouse, just threw them out.

She was grateful to Whisper teaching her left from right previous chapter. In this chapter she even apologized, albeit not exactly being aware of that. I do think working with semi-friendly ponies lets her slowly heal from violent recluse she is.

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They kinda need main fighter here. And Sickle's not so bad!

Excellent as always.

...

Whisper used Persuasion!

It's not very effective...

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I just want to say, I love how much discussion Sickle has caused. It's really fun to see the different views and interpretations of her

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Well, I love how Sickle got into party and not disappearing from this story. I do love gruff and brutal characters that ultimately on 'good' side but not against some fun killing and fighting. Loved Rampage from Horizons, absolutely adored Atom Smasher from "Duck and Cover", so thanks for writing her! Will you get her some character development? Is she 'main-character-friend' material yet?

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The "friend" part might be highly debatable, especially depending on which of them you asked, but without spoiling it too much: we'll be seeing plenty of her, at least in the near future (And possibly beyond, but I don't want to spoil too much). And pretty much any character that's showing up a good deal will get some degree of character development.

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Neat! More shenanigans to come! Oh and PLEASE tell me you considering some kind of romance subplot for her? It would be so fun seeing her courting, or being courted.

7031510 7031650 And thats really it. It's a matter of perspective. I see her as a NE character, you see her more as a CN character. My perspectives here and experiences of dealing with this kind of person, place her squarely into the negative. I don't see this changing, just as your views place her into a more likeable state. I've dealt with this kind of person (many a time), and it's colored my views such that I have a personal disgust for them. That will never change, so we will be at odds on this.

So I just avoid them, given there is always a way to not deal with them. And they do reap what they sow.

Sickle is just such a precious lovable little massive asshole

Sickle has quickly become my favorite character in this story. I was hoping she'd stay but I never actually thought she would!

Normally I always immediately pick the changeling as my favorite because they are normally immoral, logical creatures that have no sympathy and do everything for their own gain. Whisper only half-way shows any of these at best. She's pretty logical but is incredibly sympathetic. More so than the others, despite the fact that she sees ponies as cattle! Sickle on the other hand-er um hoof shows little if any sympathy, and she does everything for her own gain. Sickle however does not have even the slightest logical nature. She cusses at everything and is over aggressive.

People tend to see enjoying killing as a bad thing, it really isn't, like at all. Even if the killing is directed at someone that's not a Raider. It is fine as long as your not killing innocents.

Sickle doesn't realize the power of words. Good, she'll have to learn eventually... or die. She sees them as whining, not helpful when they can be used as a weapon without even lifting a hand.

Some may consider that last part with Sickle and whisper as a big overreaction, and really, it was. I however would immediately act defensive or aggressive when I thought someone was trying to manipulate me, and that's what Whisper was trying to do, manipulated her into being better behaved around them. Dusty showed himself being capable and he has a past with Sickle, Star has been very aggressive and vulgar towards her (which Sickle finds amusing), but aside from helping her with her right and left has done nothing Sickle finds good. Whisper is sneaky, a good talker, overly logical, polite, and on multiple occasions been the sympathetic one. Sickle hates all of that. Whisper is by far the one in the party she hates most.

Whimper acts like a sisy. she really does act like a farmer like her hive compared to the predators that are most other changelings. I like the difference. I think she's a better character for it, but I like her less from it.

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The funny thing is, everything in the story was outlined before Fallout 4 came out, and the only detail that I knew was shared (A wartime character ending up in the wasteland) was something that I had been considering for a couple years, since shortly after reading Fallout: Equestria. Hearing that Fallout 4 was doing that certainly helped with my motivation, but it wasn't planned to follow the game.

...And then Fallout 4 came out, and I played it, and I was surprised just how many parallels I could draw between the two. I'd suspected the method of getting the wartime character to the wasteland would be very similar, of course, but I hadn't expected many of the other parallels. I don't want to give away spoilers, but, while it wasn't intentionally planned as a Fallout 4 story, and I'm not drawing specifically from it... yeah, it'd be fair to consider it a Fallout 4 entry. Once we get to a point where those parallels aren't quite so big of spoilers, I might have to make a post talking more about that.

Though I would said Heroes for New Vegas, but that's mostly because I haven't read Project Horizons to judge it for myself.

Sigh.......I loved this chapter so much, and now we have to wait.......I'M DYING SLOWLY DUE TO PAITIANCE!

I do hope sickle sticks with em, and I really want to learn more about quicksilver and her mom. Can't wait for the next chapter!

How to Talk to Ponies

"Hi!"
"'Sup."
Nailed it!

Finally read this! It's a biatch to read!

Sickle is best rhinocros, your argument is invalid. I wonder if she'llbe forced to fight bigger stuff than her, let's say - the pony counterparts of a Deathclaw and Liberty Prime.

And secound this guy:
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I'm not sure how I missed this. Sorry!

But yes, there is a Fallout: Equestria Wiki. It's got the occasional inaccuracy (Though fewer every day), but it's a pretty good resource.

And Sickle's gone from cool to kinda wanting to stab her after that last comment. Ah well, if that's her thing that's her thing. And I wouldn't stab her, she'd probably compare it to a mosquito bite and then impale me. I'd wait for her to drive me to the point where I have and am angry enough to use something that will guarantee a kill. Which at this point seems like nothing less than a balefire egg.

“Really? ‘Cause I’ve got like twenty fucking ears in my cans. I don’t even know how Gutfuck got that many dumbasses following him, and you think he’s got even more?”

Starlight groaned quietly. "Oh, wonderful. You managed to make his name even worse."

Sickle has this poetic gift for profanity, doesn't she?

After a couple seconds of silence, Starlight quietly spoke up. "Do you make a habit of killing the ponies you work with?"

Looks like fatigue diminished her common sense too. That was pretty uncalled for

Her cleaning was far from complete, but at least when she was done it looked more like "slightly dirty" rather than "horror story slasher".

My standards continued to slip in unpleasant ways.

Hah.

"Uh, you never got the bullet out, did you?" Starlight asked.

"Yeah, so?" Sickle said, tossing aside the bottle and returning to work on her armor. "Wouldn't be the first time. Probably got a dozen of them rattling around in me."

Tooootally called it. She don't give a fuck

She grinned with satisfaction as she looked over the pieces. They had struck right in the seam where two plates overlapped, and most of the fragments had stuck between one of the plates and the mesh behind it. The wound in her neck had likely come from a fragment of that bullet. I'm not sure why that amused her.

I guess she's just happy her armor did the job? She survived a bullet to the neck! Armor: 1, fuckers: 0!

"Here you go," I whispered as I offered her the pill. "It's a strong painkiller. I had to use one, once. It put me right out. I don't think I even dreamed that night."

Might wanna give only half of one to a weakened pony, then

My hive may well be depending on me, and if I died, I would have failed them all.

I dunno. It's been two centuries. I kind of doubt you can still make much difference either way

It was small, but effective; if I had been using a regular terminal, the resulting spell would have caused its spell matrix to implode.

Ow. That sounds like more than a reboot would fix. That's some nasty security!

I plugged in both devices. The transfer went off without a hitch, much to Starlight's relief.

These things have pretty much infinite storage capacity, don't they?

Emphasis on "a little". There's only so much reading I can do from a bouncing screen while stumbling along uneven ground before my head starts feeling distinctly fuzzy.

And then there's the fatigue, too...

Black insectoid forms chased colorful ponies through the morning sky.

That's gonna be Enclave, right? Their scary insectoid armour

Yup. Enclave. Heh.

She let out a strangled growl and stomped on the ground. "Great. Now I'm sympathizing with Sickle. That stupid bitch!"

Hah. Those two should totally meet. Just to see what would happen. The Prim Princess of Haughtiness versus the Crazy Queen of Profanity

(actually, I gather it'd just involve a lot of betting on how long it would take Sickle to smash Amber's head through a wall, lawl)

"These caps aren't… crimped? I think that's the word."

Hmm. Methinks somepony's found themselves an old factory...

"I'm not entirely clear on the details, but the way I hear it, things went to shit as soon as other ponies found out. Something about trade collapsing, two successful settlements dying off, cannibalism, that kind of stuff."

yay for unbacked currency

Let's hope that doesn't mean uncrimped bottlecaps are seen as "forgeries"

"Hope you bitches didn't want any chems or booze. I cleaned him out."

She cleaned out a town's booze supply? Daayum!

Sickle shrugged, metal plates clanking with the motion. "I figured I'd tag along, see what happens."

Haaa! All my yes

After a pause, her grin grew a bit more. "'Sides, I kinda like Star."

Everyone has the hots for Starlight

"Yeah, yeah, no killing and raping all the innocent townsfolk and traders. I got it."

Hah. As if she'd do that anyway.

"You mean you've been travelling around with a whole herd of mares and you ain't fucked any of them? You've got to be the dumbest motherfucker I know!"

That's what I've been saying!

Finally, she broke the silence. "You're a talker."

Gloriously dry response!

"Because I'm going to face-fuck you with this horn if you keep running your little cunt mouth. Got it?"

Wow. That failed and backfired most spectacularly. Master manipulator at work, people!

Okay, so... base64 and ROT3, huh? You really need to find something new in the future. Like, reversed text and then ROT.

Or, let's be evil... convert to big-endian Int32 and then base64; reversed per block of 4 characters

Remarks and corrections:
> Sickle turned on her
Seems like a cut off sentence.
> "Need any company?" She said, grinning
shouldn't have a capital letter on "she".

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I dunno. It's been two centuries. I kind of doubt you can still make much difference either way

Shh, let her keep her little glimmer of hope! She's got to have something to keep her going...

actually, I gather it'd just involve a lot of betting on how long it would take Sickle to smash Amber's head through a wall, lawl

I hadn't intentionally set it up so Sickle wouldn't be there when meeting Amber, but after writing the scene, I'm glad I had... because I really don't see Sickle tolerating Amber's attitude even before she pulls a gun on them!

You really need to find something new in the future. Like, reversed text and then ROT.

I'm keeping it fairly simple, at first. I've got plenty more chapters to start pulling out the really devious stuff. It's pretty much simple conversion stuff right now, but I plan on pulling out some things that will need some real work, later one. One of which will even let me slip in a cryptography pun that's been amusing me for a while, now.

Though I've also been setting up some patterns in how each method of encoding/encryption is used...

I have my suspicions about Amber, and that she will be crossing paths again with Whisper specifically...

I hadn't thought about it till just now, but taking the right ear makes sense for humans that don't have any bodily identifiers, but for ponies wouldn't it make more sense to skin the cutie mark as a marking? It would avoid the possibility for raiders to hire a pony to take innocent ponies ears to trade in. Raiders tend to have very clear cutie marks that identify them as such.

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I think with how much value cuties marks have in equestrian culture that it would be "wrong" to do that to anyone even a raider. also on the practical side it's easier and less messy to go for an ear then the flank and probably the real reason cause it's reference to fallout new vegas

While we ate and rested, I poured through the contents of the data-store.

Unless Whisper has taken on some sort of liquid form, I think you mean 'pored'.

For a moment I thought her charisma was ten, but it was actually just one.

Or maybe Sickle is just immune to persuasion checks.

She stared at him for several long seconds. Finally she stepped back, letting the door swing open again. “Very well.” She turned, eying us over her shoulder as she walked over to the bed and the saddlebags set beside it. “To be just as infantile as you are acting, you shall stay on your side of the room, and I shall stay on mine.”

Holy hand grenades, she is just the most juvenile noble bitch I think I've seen in this fallout universe.

Of course she isn't as bad as that one pink mare from The Society from Project Horizons that I forget the name too, but she is bordering there.

And I get the distinct feeling she isn't about to go pulling a reddening miracle out of her ass anytime soon either.

“If you live that long,” Dusty said, placing his cap back in the bag and closing it before looking to me. “Have you heard of… right, you grew up under a rock.” He looked to Starlight. “Have you heard of the Soda War?”

I find this ironic because, and please correct me if I'm wrong, didn't Whisper technically live under a rock? Like, as in a hive?

I just find it funny.

“Yeah, yeah, no killing and raping all the innocent townsfolk and traders. I got it.”

The way she says this,

She pointed a hoof at me. “Fuck you.” Then she looked back to Starlight. “And what the fuck’s your problem with my drugs? How about you get on Dusty’s case about his fucking smoking.” She leered at him. “That shit’s just nasty.”

You know, I'm noticing that Sickle doesn't have much of an opinion of Whisper. But she most define tell has something on Star. Do you notice how much attention she gives her, and the almost kind gestures she has made thus far?

Offering booze, then backing down when she was yelled at.

“See? I can get ponies to do what I want just fine.” She walked off, making me wince as an armored hoof clopped heavily beside my head. “See you in the morning, Whimper.”

I get the feeling Whimper may have pressed the wrong buttons.

She was trying to convince her to be nicer. Sickle saw this as an opportunity to prove that she didn't need words to make ponies doe hat she says.

It's all a matter of perspective...but I really don't think Sickle has a high opinion of Whisper.

Something is really fishy about that mare with all the new caps.
Oh great sickle is coming along, this aight to be fun. Xp

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Hahaha, true, and her vault was underground iirc, so it goes double

I stared down at her: crippled, barely conscious, slowly bleeding to death.

I was hungry.

I had momentarily forgot Whisper was a changeling when I read this and I was horrified, there is something distinctly awful about cannibal ponies.

I think Whisper tries too much to talk to other ponies about their problems. If you want to open people up you soften them up first. Do something that's good together.

How to talk to ponies... Jobs done!

With our lack of utensils, I had to resort to slurping the contents straight from the can.

Okay I can see how they can eat soup directly from bowls, but slurping food out of cans, now that is an invitation to cut your tongue if I have ever seen any! I thought that Starlight was so careful of not hurting herself, and then she allow something like that to happen, tsk tsk tsk those painkillers are surely dulling her survival skills right now. And yes, I will bitch and moan and rant about the lack of spoons since they are so easy to make!

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I have to wonder how you're drinking from a can that would put your tongue in danger of being cut. I mean, can openers (Even the super-simple ones you find on multitools and the like) cut down through the lid. If there's a sharp edge remaining on the can (And there generally isn't), then it's on the inside of the rim. You might be able to cut your upper lip if you press it down on the inside of the rim and drag, but you've got to put some real effort into hurting yourself with a can.

You're probably in far more danger of hurting yourself opening it, especially if you're using one of those cheap can openers.

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Given the type of pony sickle is, softening up requires a bigger, badder motherfucker to show her what its like to deal with her, untill she gets the memo.

Oh she does good, Sickle, but she ain't learning untill she gets proved wrong. She hasn't meant someone she can't bully that isn't on the "kill on sight" list.

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Even if she can't physically overcome Sickle, Sickle values defiance.

Really dislike Sickle hope she doesnt stick around the whole book will be disappointed.