Return to Sender

by Chemtest

Savior

He rushes through the forest, his moving like a blur, yet not complicating his breathing. Even as burned leaves turn to ash and get all over his boots, he continues onward.

The screaming grows louder and louder, with five red marks appearing on his compass, surrounding three yellow ones.

He lunges into a clearing, entering into VATS and blowing off the head of a manticore.

The four other manticores all face him, growling and charging him.

He looks to the three foals, and sees their eyes already looking wide at the dead manticore, “Close your godamm eyes, I will not be held accountable for traumatizing you!”

The three listen, yet the distraction was enough for the manticores to get close.

He rolls backwards as a stinger launches towards him. Yet, as he rolls, he grabs ahold of the stinger. His roll and his iron grip cause him to flip the manticore over. It impacts the ground quickly, and it’s skull breaks instantly.

He tears the stinger out of the body as he comes out of the roll, and throws it at another manticore. It hits the manticore’s eye, and he follows it up with an explosive bullet to the other.

Another manticore lunges at him, yet it doesn’t expect him to lunge back. The Courier whips out a knife, and makes sure to go right below the manticore. He holds his knife up as he goes under, gutting the creature.

He lands behind the rank corpse, and faces the final manticore. It swipes at him with a paw, yet is caught off guard as he catches it with his hand. With a twist, the paw breaks, and the manticore yowls in pain.

The Courier takes advantage of the open mouth. He takes out a grenade, and tosses it into the beast.

After a few seconds, the beast explodes, and it’s innards go flying around the clearing.

The manticore with a broken skull twitches about. Yet it’s twitching is ended by another revolver shot.

He looks towards the foals, “You can open your eyes, though I wouldn’t recommend it.”

All three of them open their eyes anyway, and balk upon sight of the carnage.

The Courier looks at his hands, and wipes some fresh blood on his duster. He smiles at the kids, “I recommend we get out of here.”

‘Brown Dusk:

Find Deversorium after the sun sets.

Deal with the Manticore pack.

Inform Deversorium of your accomplishment.

Platinum.

Find out what the visions are.

Save the screaming children.

Return the foals home.

Rectify your mistake.’

The foals look at him, and try to avoid getting near the corpses as they walk closer to him. The orange one looks up to his eyes, “Uh, thanks for saving us, I guess.”

He nods, “Let’s just get you three home. Where is your home anyway?”

The orange one speaks again, “Oh, uh, you don’t have to worry about that for me. Just bring me back to Ponyville and I’ll go home myself. Oh, I’m Scootaloo by the way.”

Then the yellow one, “I’m Apple Bloom. Applejack’s gonna be angry for this one.”

Finally, the white one, “Sweetie Belle, and yeah, Rairty isn’t going to be pleased.”

He laughs a bit, “Oh, you all look so worried. What, you think I’m going to snitch on you?”

They all look at him in unison, “You won’t?!”

He nods, “Oh yeah, why would I do that? You almost got killed, why would I want to add more punishment than permanent mental scarring?”

They all smile, and Apple Bloom speaks, “Thank you, Mister!”

He looks down at her, “Courier. I’m the Courier.” He suddenly looks all around him, “Oh shit.”

Apple Bloom tilts her head, “What was that, Mister Courier?”

He reaches into his pocket, and draws three grenades, “Alright you three, it’s time to learn some self defense. You take this thing, you pull this thing, you wait three seconds, you throw at what you want dead.” He tosses the grenades to the three, “Don’t hold it for any longer than three seconds, and don’t play around with it.”

Sweetie Belle catches her, “Why do we need these, Courier?”

“Grenades, they’re called grenades.” He takes the cigarette out of his mouth, and tosses it onto the leaves. He then takes out a Molotov and does the exact same. His eyes look all over, not liking the hoard of red on his compass, “We need to get out of here, now!” He points where his quest marker is, “Go! Run!”

The four start to run, their pace only increasing as they hear howls behind them. Yet, as the Courier runs, he notices the three of them are very, very slow. He growls, and scoops all of them in his arms.

He growls down at them as he runs through the brush, “When I say run, I mean run for your fucking lives you idiots!” He barely manages to take a machete out of his pocket, “Bloom, cut down any fucking bushes that get in our way!” He looks at the other two, “You two best yell your fucking heads off if you see anything!”

He looks forward again, dodging every branch in his way. Yet he focuses his eyes more as he hears the other two scream.

A Timberwolf stands directly in their path, “Bloom, hold that machete up! If you falter, than we are dead!”

She does as he asks, holding the machete straight up. This allows him to slide underneath the Timberwolf, and the machete cuts right through it’s belly. However, with the speed of the slide, the acidic blood doesn’t get on any of them.

He gets back up from the side, digging his heels into the dirt. He continues his run without losing any speed.

The Forest seems to get thinner and thinner, yet the hoard of manticores, timberwolves, and even a hydra grow ever closer.

He runs quicker and quicker, using his 10 Agility stat to it’s fullest. Even then, a Timberwolf is close enough as to where it lunges at his back.

———

Rarity rushes to the front door as a knock rings out on it. She opens the door swiftly, “Sweetie Belle!” She looks up, only to see something that clearly is not Sweetie Belle. He towers over her, and with the darkness, it’s almost impossible to see his face. He wears some long coat, with a bite taken out of the end. She smiles, and laughs nervously, “Oh, uh, can I help you?”

Sweetie Belle rushes past the Courier’s legs, and hugs Rarity.

Rairty looks down at the foal clinging onto her leg, “Oh, Sweetie Belle! It’s so late, you’re in trouble!”

The Courier smiles, “Actually, Miss Rairty, it was entirely my fault that Sweetie Belle here was out so late.”

Rarity looks up at him, “And who are you?”

He nods, “The Courier, we haven’t met. See, I was new in town, and needed a guide. But when I asked for help from this one pink pony, she simply gasped and vanished into thin air. So, hearing my plea for help around, Sweetie Belle decided to show me around. It seems the time got away from us.”

Rairty looks down at Sweetie Belle, “Oh, well, I suppose that was the right thing to do.”

He looks around, “And as we were on our tour, she was accosted by some other pink foal. Now I made sure that ruffian of a child won’t bother again by giving her quite scathing remarks on how rude she was being.”

Rarity smiles, “Oh, you took care of Diamond? Well, thank you. Sweetie has been complaining about her for a while.” She looks at him again, “Tell you what, how about you come in for a bit, and I’ll take care of your duster for you.”

He shakes his head, “A kind offer, but I’m afraid I have to postpone it. It grows late, and a lady needs her sleep.”

Rairty nods, “Well, yes, I suppose you are correct. Have a good night, Courier.”

As she turns around and shuts the door, Sweetie Belle gives the Courier a wink. In response, he just gives her a thumbs-up.

Apple Bloom walks up to him, “You sure that’s gonna work on my sister? She’s the Element of Honesty and all.”

The Courier nods, “Don’t worry, I know the perfect story for her.”

———

“See, I was wandering through the Everfree until I was surrounded by a group of Manticores. With that situation, I shouted for help, and tried to keep the creatures back however I could. You see, my knife was on the other side of the clearing, so I couldn’t do anything. That’s when your sister comes on through, and starts kicking all the critters. With enough time to get my knife, we were good enough to defeat three of them and high-tail it out of there.”

Applejack narrows her eyes, “You’re telling me that you and Bloom here fought off three manticores with nothing but a knife and a few kicks?”

The Courier meets her eyes, “That’s the truth.”

She smiles, “Well I’ll be, I didn’t know that little Bloom was already that strong! Alright, well, I suppose she’s fine then.” She looks at the Courier, “You wanna come in? We got a spare room, and you probably need somewhere to stay after that.”

He shakes his head, “No, but thank you for the hospitality. The hotel owner is an old friend of mine.”

Comments

[ponyreaper1]

Good shit my dude

[HB_DS2013]

Whoa, the Courier passed Applejack’s Speech check.