Fallout Equestria: Black Cat

by Rixizu

Chapter 28

Break groaned as something pushed her awake. She fought against it for sleep was far more inviting than the waking world, but whoever trying to do it was persistent. Deciding to humor whoever was bothering her, Break opened an eye to see who it was.

“Wake up!” A familiar voice said. “We are in big trouble.”

That made Break open her eyes up and she found herself wide awake. “What’s going on?”

"We are under attack!" Starburst said in a desperate panic. "A whole army is outside the town. A whole army Break!"

Break let out a series of curses and threw herself out of her bed. She looked out the window next to her bed and her eyes widened at the scale of the forces opposing them. There had to be at least 40 ponies there and they moved to surround the town, cutting it off from any escape. Her heart raced when she saw of most of them carried arms. These raiders weren’t messing around.

No, this is too soon! I didn't even get a chance to prepare! Starburst had an overwhelming look of fear in his eyes and he desperately clung to her to save them all.

“Where’s Calling Card?” Break asked.

"Outside preparing for the war," Starburst replied, "I think he forgot about you."

“Come on.” Break said out the door and down the stairs and Starburst followed her like an obedient puppy.

The whole town was in a terrified blur of motion hiding their foals, barricading exits and homes, and preparing to die. No hope occupied their eyes, but they planned to fight on, anyway. They weren't going to let themselves die easily and Break admired them for this. She found a place on a nearby roof and used it to survey their situation. Dear Celestia, there were so many of them and all this for one small town?

A voice boomed from a loudspeaker in the distance. “I would recommend you surrender. Sure, you’re all going to die, but hey at least we promise to make it quick!” There was an uproar of laughter from the raider army.

“Bite me!” Calling Card yelled back. “If you want this town, then pay for it in blood!” That put a smile on Break’s muzzle as she admired his grit and determination. This reply only seemed to amuse the raiders, and they broke into laughter again.

“I would surrender if I were you.” Another friendlier voice said. “You have a half an hour.”

Extending our torment, huh? Break made a face. Just like a raider to do something like that. Fatten them up with fear before moving in for the kill. Worse, looking into their faces told her that these ponies were eager for the kill. There was a psychotic delight to these ponies if you could even call them that. If they got into the town, nothing would survive.

Break rubbed her face and thought furiously. No way any of them could get out of this without fighting. Reinforcements seemed unlikely with Zinnia too far away, so they were on their own. Still, these ponies didn’t know who she was or her capabilities. It wasn’t much, but it might be a deciding factor in all this. She looked down at Starburst who looked at her with a terrified but desperate hope. In his mind, she was their only hope for survival and Break prayed to Celestia that he was right.

What do we have? Break looked around to see what type of weapons the villagers had. It wasn’t much only a few rifles at most. She would just have to make the most of it. Looking back at the raiders, she realized not all of them had guns. In fact, only about four-fifths of them had a projectile weapon. Some raiders preferred using a blunt weapon like a baseball bat with nails in it instead. Two or three had an energy weapon, but that was about it for exotic weaponry. She just hoped the crazy plan she came up with wouldn’t end with her getting shot. Still, if she could at least take out half of them, it would be something. This might just be doable.

“Starburst.” Break said getting the young stallion’s attention. “We don’t have much time. Tell the villagers to fire at the raiders while I drive them away.”

“What?” Starburst gave her a bewildered look.

“Trust me.” With that, Break used Good Times, Bad Times to float herself into the air and dove right at the raider army. Starburst gawked at her as she left.

Break thanked Celestia that the raiders didn’t notice her approach too distracted at the moment by their mission and she landed in the middle of a group of several raiders slamming so hard into the ground it cracked the ground.

“Ow.” Break’s bones rattled from that landing. Next time she’d have to remember to not land so hard.

“What the…”

“Who the hay are you?” The raiders gaped at her sudden and unexpected appearance.

“Sorry about this.” The raiders didn’t even get a chance to respond as Break used her ghost to punch every opponent in sight and her gravity powers to fly through the army taking out anypony that got too close to her.

In a moment, Break was outside the main part of the army and surveyed the damage she did. A line of devastation cut through the enemy forces as she punched everypony in her line of sight. The horror and confusion Break caused by her powers was short lived and remaining raiders all turned their attention towards her. The pony in charge all directed their attention towards her and ordered his fellows to fire. Thankfully, Break predicted this and flew away to make sure the enemy fire was only coming from one direction. She didn't want to face fire from more than that for she didn't trust her bullet-deflecting power to be fast or good enough to deal with that.

As she expected, the town was all but forgotten as this new unexpected threat appeared. The army turned all their attention towards her and bombarded her with bullet fire. Break sweated from the fear and effort of keeping all these bullets from tearing her to shreds. Thank Celestia that she targeted the few raiders with energy weapons first for they would have proven to be the biggest issue since her ghost was useless against them. She made sure to render them useless so they raiders wouldn’t think to use them against her.

“Watch out!” A raider yelled and Break’s eyes widened as at least ten grenades flew her way.

Oh crap, oh crap! Break pushed herself high into the air and winced when the hairs on both her bottom legs singed from the explosion. That was too close.

The raiders tried to fire at her, but this attitude made it almost impossible to hit her with simple rifles and she didn’t even have to deflect too many bullets from here. Before going back into battle, Break used this moment to survey how much damage she did. Much to her disappointment, only about a quarter of the forces were down for the count and some of the ponies she’d hit were recovering. She hadn’t hit them hard enough. Good news though was that the villagers saw the commotion and opened fire on their attackers and they were scoring some good hits. The raiders turned their attention back to the town, and she decided it was time to split their attention and let herself fall back to the ground.

“Don’t forget our objective.” A raider said. “Get into the town and use force if you have to.”

Never!

Her ghost attacked as soon as she got in range of the raiders on the ground and she landed in front of the town’s entrance taking out several more raiders. The remaining raiders attempted to surround her and peppered her with bullets, but the villagers used this opportunity to thin their ranks. Break held firm to hold her position and she proved to be too much of a wall for them to push through. Her ghost blocked any attempt to get past. The firing at her lessened as the raiders became confused about which target to take, her or the villagers taking pot shots at them. Somepony in the village was skilled markspony and every shot they took downed a raider with a single bullet. Break contented herself with holding the raiders back while that pony did their work.

The raider who gave the orders paled when he saw his forces fall back. “Damn fools! Think of something! The boss will have our hides if we don’t win. He’ll do worse to us than the villagers if we come back empty hooved!”

“If you have a suggestion Terabyte, you better give it.” A raider yelled back.

Terabyte scowled and stared right at Break fear and hatred in his eyes. He charged at her with blind abandon emptying a shotgun right at her. She deflected each shot, but he kept coming. He threw the shotgun away when it came up empty and pulled out a pistol and unloaded that too. The desperation threw Break off for a moment and the rest of the raiders followed him focused firing on her too. They abandoned their retreat and ignored even the fire from the villagers. They wanted her dead at all cost.

Not good. They had her pinned down shots coming from every direction. Break winced when a bullet ran across her shoulder drawing blood. There were just too many of them, but she fought on anyway giving the villagers time to fight back.

"See, she isn't invincible," Terabyte said, "don't let up. Without her, the village ain’t got a chance even if we all die here.”

Oh, ponyfeathers. Break thought. They’re suicidal now. Who knew what they might try?

Break used her powers to fly up in the air deciding the situation was too dangerous and gasped in horror as a grenade flew up with her caught in the gravity well created by her ghost’s power.

Terabyte smirked at his plan’s success. She screamed curses and used her ghost to grab the grenade and throw it away, but it wasn't able to throw it away far enough in time and it exploded with an ear-shattering bang. The heat of the explosion singed her fur and the force of the explosion made her go flying and she crashed in the ground with a bone-breaking crash.

Break screamed in pain certain she’d at least broken a few ribs since breathing became more difficult. From unnatural bend of her leg, Break knew her left leg was broken and her head throbbed from a terrible head injury. Her ears rung and it took several moments for it to at least come back at least somewhat intact. The pain was almost unbearable making it impossible to concentrate. Her head spun and had the sudden the urge to throw up. There was an exchange in gunfire with the raiders focusing on the townsfolk instead of her now. Break feared she might have a concussion.

"Is the thing dead?" One raider asked hiding behind one of his bigger raider friends.

“What the heck was she, anyway?” Another said. “What kind of pony can do those sorts of things?”

“You act that she’s really a pony.” The first replied. “She’s a demon wearing a pony’s skin!”

“Whatever she is, I’m emptying this entire clip in her head to make damn sure she down for good.” Terabyte hefted his pistol and pointed it at Break’s temple.

Break’s eyes widened in fear uncertain if she had the mental capacity to deflect even a single bullet in her state. The pain was just too much. She summoned her ghost, but it moved sluggishly her poor concentration making it difficult to control.

A shot exploded and Break readied her flimsy defenses, but not directed at her. Terabyte screamed in pain and cradled his gut. A raider tried to smash her head in with a baseball bat with a nail in it, but Break blocked with her ghost despite her wooziness. A shot in the head killed him before he could do anything else. Break noticed that the villagers were focusing their fire to protect her. Many of the raiders next to her ran for safety trying to fight back against the more protected villagers. Much to her amazement, Starburst ran out the front entrance with a shotgun in his aura and roared killing a raider in the head with a headshot.

“Don’t worry Break, I’ve got your back!” Starburst said.

Break nodded and used her power to knock out two raiders that got too close. Losing their leader made the remaining raiders lost their stomach to fight. There were only 8 of them left. After Starburst killed another of their number, the remaining bandits each fled into a different. Break leaned on a nearby rock and enjoyed the victory despite feeling like death at the moment. Two of the raiders got shot down during with escape, but the others got away. She couldn’t believe it, it was over. Right now, she felt she might sleep for three centuries. The whole town erupted into one enormous cheer. Many of them began chanting her name and Break’s heart melted at the sound of it. Maybe this hero business wasn’t so bad. The nearly dying part was the only thing she wasn’t fond of though.

“Break are you okay?” Starburst asked coming up to her. “Medic! Please, medic!”

“Don’t worry, I’m fine.” Though Break didn’t fight when a shorter stallion put her in a makeshift stretcher using two pieces of long wood and a bed sheet and pulled back into town. She laid back and closed her eyes unable to fight back her fatigue and let herself sleep. Maybe she wouldn’t feel like death itself when she woke up.

---

“She’s gone Scavenger.” Burn said trying his best to be consoling. “I’m sorry, but there’s nothing anypony can do.”

“But!” Scavenger paced.

Break was on her own and the little town she was in was doomed. He wanted to bang his hoof into a nearby wall until it bled. After all they went through, this is how it ended. No, he had to hope beyond hope that Break could do it. He couldn't panic. What he needed was information.

“L-Loopy, what’s go on?” He asked. The pegasus stoked his chin.

"Not sure," Loopy replied and peered into his telescope, "strange, I expected to see signs of fire by now. Raiders love to burn anything they can get their hooves on."

Loopy cursed. "Stupid cheap thing. I can’t much with this. Lilly itself is too far away.”

“D-do you t-think…” Scavenger was about to say before the other pony cut him off.

“Go and take a look with your mighty wings?” Loop sighed. “Why not? We need intel on these raiders. How many survived, what weapons they used, that sort of thing. If we are to survive, we need that information. No doubt they want out hides next. I’ll get as close as I can.”

“Good luck.” Burn said and without another word, Loopy fly off into the distance flying with everything his wings had with the telescope in his hooves.

Thirty tense minutes passed in silence neither wanting to speak. Scavenger said nothing too caught up in his dark thoughts brooding over Break’s fate. It stunned both of them when Loopy flew back to them his face excited.

"They won!" Loopy grinned in pure naked joy. "Celestia dammit I don't know how, but they did."

Burn blinked. “What, how?”

“Really?!” Scavenger couldn’t believe his ears somehow Break pulled it off again.

“Not sure, but the raider army is defeated." Loopy said, "I'll go down and talk to them soon. First, the city council needs to hear about this." With that, the pegasus flew back inside the ship.

“S-she did it again.” Scavenger said dumbstruck and fought back the urge to cry.

Burn too was ecstatic. “Ha! If I small group of villagers can beat an army, maybe we aren’t doomed after all! Shall we go look? And check up on your friend of course.”

Scavenger didn’t reply and just nodded. Eager and excited.

---

The body of the messenger screamed its final words as it crashed into the wall broken beyond repair somehow thrown by a powerful invisible force.

“What?! What?! What?!” The boss screamed the words at the top of his lungs furious beyond words and even reason. Every raider ran from their leader fearful of becoming the next victim.

“What now boss?” The raider asked in a squeak.

“Burn!” The boss replied. “Everything will burn for this! I will not be humiliated like this when I am so close to ultimate glory! Zinnia and Lily and everything else will suffer my wrath.”

Everypony in the room nodded not daring to voice any objection despite how reckless an action this might be. In this state, the boss was impossible to reason with.

“We are going!” The boss screamed so loud everypony had to cover their ears. “We will match these pathetic villagers at full force. They will see our power and tremble!”

It was time for the bandits 1000 strong to go to war and woe to anypony that got in their way.