Borderland: Friendship is futile

by reddestreaction

rude awakening

“Oh look at all these dead bodies. It’s a shame really, but… Hey, rest in peices...I guess.” a shrill high pitched voice says.

“Help.” I whimper, my voice barely above a whisper. My body hurts, i can barely move. I’m so tired. It’s so cold that i can see my breath against the ground and hear the air scream as it blows.

“One’s alive!!!!” the voice cheers, waddling towards me. It scans me. “Yep, alive. Barely, but that’s something.”

I feel something stab into me, filling me with adrenaline. I jump up, dizzy but ready to fight. Everything was happening too fast, my mind trying to catch up and doing a lousy job of it. I’m not even sure if it is the ground or if it's me that’s swaying right now.

“Vault Hunter! Welcome back to the realm of the living!” the voice says, cheerfully. I blink to find a bat shaped robot. It’s name was scratched out at the top but still legible. B4TT-RY. Battery?

“How do you know my name?”

“I didn’t!” Battery exclaims, a bit too cheerful. It waddles around me. I notice the crack in its lens and it’s broken, nearly torn off right wing. Almost silent whirs and clicks went off as the robot thought and analyzed. “Oh, what luck that I have! With your help, we can rescue my master’s beloved waifu and the package that we were tasked to deliver.”

I blink at the robot. Waifu? What?

My stomach rumbles If this robot can lead me to people, maybe it can lead me to a decent meal afterwards. And some shelter.

“Fine.”

I sigh. I trot over to the dead bodies of my comrades, picking their pockets for ammunition and money. It’s not like they are going to need it anymore. Boy am i lucky that we had just got done raiding a vault when we were ambushed.

I pretended to not mind the lingering warmth of each pony body i touched. My magic wouldn't penetrate the gear they had on, the material made especially for things like that. As i pickpocket them, i said my own little goodbyes and prayer in my head.

I land upon the head chief of our group, Secret Tale.

She was easily the toughest filly in our group, smart and skilled. Even though she was just an earth pony, she was able to do things that most couldn’t. She was strong and firm, but caring all the same. I remember her taking me in after she raided my village...she didn’t care if my family was psychos or not.

Her goggles rest upon her neck, her signature gun laying next to her. She created her own guns and ammunition from any spare guns she happens to pick up after a successful raid. She affectionately named her gun, “the Messenger”. She said it was an inside joke, but i never got it.

I take off her goggles to find a key and an envelope. I take the key and place it in my inventory for safe keeping. The envelope was affectionately signed to Silver Bullet it even bearing a cutie mark. I never heard of them, but i place the envelope in my inventory just in case.

“Ready when you are, i guess.” I say. Battery wobbles over to me.

“Great! I can lead you there! At least , to the best of my abilities, my lens is cracked.”

I roll my eyes, helping Battery get on my back.

Before trotting off, i only thought it would be fair to set my gang on fire, allowing their bodies and souls to rest in peace. I shoot two fire bullets, engulfing the bodies instantly. My eyes burned from the rancid smell (and not because i’m emotional) but i salute them one last time.

“Heat signature on the horizon!” Battery warns, waving their hands in the air. I glance around but see nothing and no one.

Heat signatures?

Bullymongs jump off the glacier peaks of the mountains, landing in the snow bank below, surrounding us. I quickly pull out “the messenger” and shoot at them, trying to clear a path for us to escape.

“Switching to defense mode.” Battery updates me.

I keep my corrosive bullets, there being a scarce amount of them already. I hit them with one shock bullet each, giving me an opening to bury as many normal ammunition in them as possible. Battery was shooting corrosive lasers to lighten the load a bit.

It hurt as the swiped at me, pain splitting through my body, but it is part of the job and a bit of the thrill in battle. I double over in pain only to return it tenfold. Any blood spilled will be pay for in the long run.

When the battle was over, i quickly loot their bodies. I recycle most of the ammo that was used, because i was running low on bullets and i don’t think i will be coming upon them anytime soon. Any guns or grenades was picked up. They can be useful later or scrapped later for parts or money.

I happen upon three pieces of Eridium while looting the largest one. That will definitely come in handy.

“Come, mighty Vault Hunter!” Battery chimes.”The fair waifu awaits.”

“My master’s waifu makes the best muffins in all of Pandora. How her cutie mark isn’t a muffin, I’ll never know.”

“Food is scarce here in Pandora, since the soil is only radiation free in certain spots. Ration are usually transported and sorted once a month, but this month’s delivery has been less and late. I wonder why that is?”

“Have you ever had Sugar Muffin’s pastries? They’re to die for! Literally. They only sell their products once a month and they are first come first serve. I wonder what her secret recipe is.”

I roll my eyes, continuing our journey. I listen to the nonsense Battery spouts as we go. Eventually it got annoying, especially since it kept reminding me how hungry i was.

“Battery. Can you stop talking about food, please? Tell me about this package you was supposed to deliver. How did you get separated from the “Waifu” in the first place?”

“Funny answer to that, actually. We was cornered by psychos and i went to seek help. She was then captured by the parrot, Bloodbeak and his minions.”

In other word, he abandoned her to fend for herself. Real classy, Battery.

“You don’t think anything bad happened to her, do you?”

“Negative. Nobody would ever dream of hurting the master’s waifu!”

We come across a bandit camp that surrounded what looks like a fallen skyship that was partially sunken into the ice. Great.

“I sense the waifu’s presence!” Battery says, cheerfullly. Sadly, it was a bit too loud, alerting all the bandits that i was there.

I sigh, pulling out my gun again, firing at will. I ignore all their disturbingly lewd and angsty remarks, focusing on getting to the boat. I loot their body as i go, ammo and money only. I notice there was some radios, static running through them. Battery quickly transferred the frequency.

“Forgot something?” says a mocking, gravelly voice. A parrot-man comes out of the shadows at the the very top of the ship wreckage. A cage dazzled from the bowsprit, it holding a gray filly pegasus pony.

“Release my master’s waifu! You coward.”

“And miss out on her cute little bubble butt. You’ll have to come get her.” He threatens. Scythids, Crabworms, and Spiderants flooded the area. Rakks flew in the air.

“Oh you gotta be kidding me!”

There are times i wish i had stronger spells and magic then just levitating and making shields. This is one of those many times.

I didn’t even try to attempt to kill all the bug-things. I just decided to shoot a couple, enrage them, and let them duke it out on their own. It wasn’t much of a stretch, them fighting over the one pony that they could eat. Add some random grenades in places and our escape was almost guaranteed.

A little trick i learned from Secret Tale.

“Isn’t she a pretty little birdy?” Bloodbeak cackle maniacally, tapping at the cage. The pegasus looks less than pleased, pushing herself to the otherside of the cage.

“Aww, don’t be like that now. I just wanna have fun with ya before we cook ya up and eat ya.”

I jump onto the ship, charging for the cage. I duck into rooms, scavenging the ammo i come across and behind storage crates to lessen the crossfire damage. Battery tried their best to keep up and lessen the numbers and stakes.

Eventually we gave up looting, telling ourselves that we’d come back for the haul afterwards.

“Eep, look out!” the waifu squeaks.

The parrot man falls from the sky, perching in front of me with what look like a mini submachine gun at the ready. The bullets sprawled out, causing me to duck.

“We need a plan!” I groan, low health. My stomach growled, protesting me from using any more energy. I knew hiding like this was futile, but i could use the little regeneration points i was getting by doing so. “Like a really good plan.”

“I have a plan!” Battery exclaims, hopping off my back and waddling away.“ Continue fighting Bloodbeak.”

“Battery, if you run off and i survive. I will hunt you down and so help me…” I growl.

I jump out, giving my fight everything i got, which wasn’t saying much. I waited for him to reload most of the time to get any quality shots in, not wanting to waste my bullets or any chances.

“Two ponies in one day, Pandora must have blessed me!” He exclaims, threatening smile on his face that sent a chill down your spine.

A bullet right to the thigh and i fall, my gun sliding across the deck.

Oh,no. Oh no. No no no!

“ Time to let the bird out of the cage!” Battery exclaims, shooting the post in which the cage hung. The cage drops down, landing on Bloodbeak with a sicking “Plop!”

Blood poured from under the cage, splattered across the metal floor.The pegasis inside spread her wings out to lighten her fall, letting out a little shriek on her way down. She still inside with a soft “Thunp” however, her head hitting on of the bars of the cage.

She shakes her head before looking up.

“Oh, hello.”she smiles. “I’m Derpy.” The mare looked at me kind of embarrassed. She was super cute. “Oh, i just don’t know what went wrong! Can you open this cage? It’s kinda stuffy in here.”

I trot over and look at the cage, observing it. The lock looked a bit rusty, like it hasn’t been used in a while, or was previously scavenged and used. It use the back of my gun to break it, opening the door. Derpy then pounces on me.

“Oh thank you! Thank you! Thank you! I promise to make you a batch of muffins when we get back to Sanctuary, I promise.”

My stomach rumbles at the thought.

“Waifu Derpy, where is the package?” Battery asks.

She turns, glaring at the robot.

“You…” she starts. “You left me!”

“I went to find help.”

“And if you didn’t find any?”

“I would have returned to the master to inform him of your predicament.”

“I wouldn’t be in this predicament if you stayed on course. Now we are late to deliver the package!”

“I heard a strange distress signal.I had to answer, it is written in my code.”

Derpy sighs, brushing off the robot. She flys back up to the post the cage was handing on a retrieves her saddle pouch.

“Let’s just go home. It wouldn’t be the first time I failed a mission.”

Her ears sulked at that. It was then i realized that her eyes was unaligned. She sighs.

“Nonsense, we have the mighty Vault Hunter with us. She should be able to help us get the package delivered. She has nowhere to go or do, and we are not guaranteed to return home until the package is delivered.

I glare at Battery.

“It depends, where are we going?” I ask.

“To Lyra’s Berg. It is not too far from where we are.”

Walking behind Derpy was a challenge in its own. Not that she wasn’t a good flyer, but she was unaligned...or bottom heavy. And talking about her bottom…

Her cutie mark is bubbles. I wonder what kind of experience with bubbles caused that to be her cutie mark.

“So...uhh...bubbles?”

“Hm..?” she looks back at me, sees that I’m looking at my cutie mark and blushes. “Oh...you wouldn’t believe me if i told you, but i used to be a really good flyer when i was younger … wonderbolt level good…” her ears sulked a bit, her flying position lowering.

She was right, I couldn’t believe it. But now that she had told me,I couldn’t help feeling a little sorry for Derpy. Pandora is very cruel to some ponies.

“Then my eyes had became crossed after an Eridium blast had happened...i crashed into things a lot after that. So with extra money from the three jobs i have, i bought myself a special shield that nullifies all fall damage called “Bubble Catcher”. I got my cutie mark the first time i used it. ”

Her ears perked up.

“But if that Eridium blast didn’t happen, we wouldn’t have the Eridium mine...or Sanctuary. And without Sanctuary, i wouldn't have my jobs...i wouldn’t have met the doctor...i don’t know where i would be. Plus, i got to meet you. So i’m glad, besides it matches my bubbly personality, right?”

I smile at her.

Someone as optimistic as Derpy is rare to find in the Pandora. It’s really refreshing. She would’ve liked Secret Tale.