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The Rise of Solaris8,103 words
The Fall of Sparkle World7,576 words
Recovery7,509 words
Illustrious8,981 words
Second Chance8,012 words
Super Stable 249,068 words
Monster10,465 words
Celestial Hammer4,459 words
Northward Bound8,617 words
Krogoth Encounter9,012 words

Celestial Hammer

Fallout Equestria: Influx
Beyond the Adventure

Celestial Hammer

30 years after the fall of Equestria

Life was a struggle in Equestria after the megaspells hit. The rising level of radiation and spread of taint made life hard for the survivors. However, there were some places that managed to avoid such devastation.

In a valley beside a river and at the base of a large steep hill, a town of survivors sprung up, known as Riverwoods. The town contained an unusually large collection of ponies from Equestria’s emergency services. The combination of all the different skills available made it a town of survivalists, and they brought it upon themselves to help and train other survivors they encountered.

By the time thirty years had passed, Riverwoods was flourishing. Ponies far and wide became aware of the town and its ponies for what they’ve done. Even as the world grew more and more dangerous, and the chaos gave way to death and violence, Riverwoods persevered and survived. Survived, that is, until one fateful day.

A group of young foals ran through the streets, laughing without a care in the world. One of them held a toy ray gun in his mouth as he chased after his friends. “Pew, pew,” he cried periodically. Eventually, the foals ran out into an open plaza at the centre of town, just in front of an old church. They began to run around in circles, pretending to dodge laser bolts. The foal with the toy gun attempted to jump over an old bench, and his hind hoof caught on a wooden slat.

The foal fell, and as he hit the floor with a thud, the toy fell out of his mouth and clattered to the floor. When the toy came to rest, it beeped and flashed, but it went unnoticed; the others were more concerned for their fallen friend. The foal whimpered, but he picked himself up and retrieved his toy, nonetheless. Once he told everypony he was fine, they all ran about to resume playing, and he aimed and pulled the trigger. This time, a beam of red light short forth, and a red dot appeared on the floor. The foal gasped in surprise when the back plate of the toy lit up and began cycling through different screens. One screen flashed with the insignia of Starlight Industries. Another flashed with an hourglass icon stating ‘Connecting’. The last screen showed a green tick and the words ‘Target Acquired’.

The foals, having noticed their friend had stopped, approached him. As they gathered around, more ponies in the area also stopped what they were doing, for they could now sense a great pressure in the air. Eventually, all the ponies in town looked up as an orange light cast itself down upon the town. The constant cloud cover was soon blown apart to reveal a clear circle in the sky, giving the ponies their first glimpse of Equestria’s blue sky in decades before it was obscured by the unnatural light. Suddenly, a blinding beam of orange slammed down into the centre of town, incinerating the foals and everypony nearby. Those that weren’t too close screamed and scattered. After several long seconds, the rest of the beam came down with a great clap, and an explosion of fire and heat erupted from the point of impact. Fire and death spread and expanded across the town, burning everything in its path.

Within a few minutes, the town of Riverwoods was reduced to nothing but ash and memory.

XXXXX

165 Years Later and 5 years since the destruction of the Production Facility.

Fizztop Mountain, Sparkle World.

Solaris sighed as she looked out of her chamber’s large windows. Her eyes fell once again on the still smoking ruins of what had once been the Wild Zone. The memories of the destruction she caused flashed through her mind, especially those of what she did while under the influence of her Self-Defence Protocol. She was brought out of her melancholy when she felt a weight press against her unarmoured hooves. She looked down and smiled slightly at the infant Deathclaw curling up at her hooves.

The moment was soon ruined when the doors burst open and the masked stallion, Buckshot, stomped into the room. The noise startled the young Deathclaw awake, and he shot up and hissed angrily at the intruder. Solaris chuckled sadly at the cute display and ignited her horn, her golden magic encasing the small creature and lifting him into the air.

“Raven, please take Spike to my bedchambers while I speak with Buckshot,” said Solaris. The mare in question squeaked as the Deathclaw was levitated over to her. She nodded and took the young creature in her magic and carried him out. With that done, Solaris turned and faced her fellow Mark 2.

“What can I do for you, Buckshot?”

“For starters, I want to know what the hell happened out there, specifically that orange death beam,” he responded immediately.

“Ah, the Hammer?”

“Yeah, that. What was that and how was your SDP able to use it? We’re not programmed with any defensive or attack spells if we become unicorn models.”

“You would be correct. We are not programmed with any spells. I’m not entirely certain as to how I acquired this or why my SDP could access it.” She took a simulated breath as she turned back to look out at the smoking ruins. “Having said that and remembering the events of last night, I do know what it is and where I could possibly have acquired it.”

Buckshot walked forward until he stood beside the alicorn. He nodded to let her continue.

“It is called the Celestial Hammer, and I believe that I acquired it a couple of years ago when I explored the area of West Mareginia…”

XXXXX

Two Years ago.

Ruins of Riverwoods, West Mareginia.

Solaris blinked in astonishment. A flat plane of burnt ground lay before her. When she began to walk across it, the ground cracked under her hooves. She’d heard rumours of a town of survivors when she first arrived in West Mareginia, but even though she knew such hearsay could be fickle, she still didn’t expect this. She couldn’t even fathom what could’ve caused this level of complete destruction.

The False Princess came to a stop when she arrived at what appeared to be a point of impact, in the form of a large, deep hole. Curious, she leaned over the edge, and was surprised to see that the bottom of the hole was aglow with residual heat. It was like the balefire bomb impact sites she’d seen before, but she knew that that couldn’t have been the cause because she couldn’t detect any radiation.

Solaris searched her memory systems for any weapon known to the M.o.A that could produce this result. The only thing she could find that bore any resemblance was the Celestia One, but that didn’t seem right either. She knew the Celestia One needed clear skies to hit its target, and the town had to have been destroyed during the last two centuries when the skies were covered, otherwise the rumours would’ve been much different.

“If not the Celestia One, then what did this?” Solaris asked herself. With nothing left of the town, the alicorn had no hope of finding any clues here. Thus, she decided to move on and perhaps uncover the truth elsewhere nearby.

Upon reaching the southwestern perimeter, Solaris gazed at an enormous iron bridge that spanned the valley. Just beyond that, she could see the spire of an SPP tower.

“Hmm. Perhaps its surveillance system is still operational.” Solaris spread her large wings and took off. As she rose higher and passed over the bridge, she noticed that several ghouls were milling about at the tower’s base.

Suddenly, her HUD flashed with a warning of immediate danger. She stopped and hovered while scanning her surroundings, but she couldn’t see anything remotely dangerous anywhere near her. If the danger wasn’t around or below her, then it must’ve been above. She looked up and saw a bright orange light burning through the clouds.

“What the?” She said before gasping when the clouds suddenly parted. Right after, a beam of light came crashing down. Thanks to her cybernetically enhanced reflexes, she pumped her wings hard to push herself backwards and out of the way. She gaped in shock at the sheer amount of heat the small beam produced.

“What the hell was that?!”

The beam stopped almost as suddenly as it appeared, and the clouds reformed to fill in the hole. Solaris remained in her hover as she stared up at the sky. Something had just tried to kill her, but she didn’t know what it was. Her systems also couldn’t recognize it.

“Could that be what destroyed that town?” She asked herself.

She was about to continue toward the SSP tower, but then her threat warning flashed again. She banked hard and beat her wings to propel herself quickly and fly in a south-easterly direction. Thankfully, her pre-war map of the region identified a military base and a neighbouring town named Mutton towards the south not far from her position. She hoped she could find a bomb shelter there that she could take cover in until she understood what was attacking her.

Solaris gasped as another beam came crashing down off to her side and blasted right through the bridge, tearing a hole right through the middle. With ear-splitting screeches, it began to fall apart until nothing but the towers at either end remained.

Solaris grunted with effort. She flew higher to pass over the dead trees as she made her way to the military compound. She tucked her wings in and rolled to one side to avoid another blast. As she looked down at the ground behind her, she saw how much damage the beams were causing.

“This is destroying the region! I need to stop it somehow!”

Finally, she came within sight of the military base, but it wasn’t as she thought it would be. She could see some old buildings, most likely what used to be the recruitment offices, but there was an entirely new section that her memory system didn’t account for. Connected to the old recruitment building was a larger, more modern building with several large satellite dishes. As she got closer, she could see markings for the Ministry of Awesome and MASA.

“What’s this?” Unfortunately, she didn’t have time to ponder; her threat warning flashed yet again. This time, the beam was coming down directly in front of her, and with her momentum, she would fly right into it. She erected her hex shield and tried to perform a tight turn. She barely managed to do so, but just as she was about to move away, the beam smashed right through her shield without any resistance, just narrowly missing her. The alicorn screamed in agony as she suffered a powerful magic feedback loop. With her horn sparking and crackling, she fell out of the sky, but recovered quickly and began to fly towards Mutton. As she did so, she heard shouts and gunfire from below. Just before her view was obscured by the trees, she saw several recognizable figures by the entrance to the base.

“Raiders. Brilliant,” she thought sarcastically.

Solaris barrel-rolled once again to avoid another beam as it came down. Whoever or whatever was controlling this weapon was getting closer to hitting her. She needed to find some form of cover, and fast. In an attempt to throw off her enemy, she did a quick teleport. When she reappeared, she bowed her head, tucked in her wings around her head and smashed through a wall. She grunted in pain and rolled across the floor until she smashed her back against the opposite wall. She found herself inside an upstairs storage room, completely barren. Now that she had some cover, she opened her senses to feel for the weapon, to try and figure out where it was.

XXXXX

Meanwhile, in the MASA Control Room, a group of raiders were tracking and firing their weapon upon the False Princess. Suddenly, the operator tracking her gasped as she vanished from view.

“Shit, I lost her!”

“You lost her? How the fuck can you lose a bright white alicorn?!” The raider boss yelled angrily.

“Um, she just… poofed.”

“FIND HER!”

“Y-yes, boss.”

“We know from a survivor of Sparkle World that she’s cybernetic. Try looking for power signatures.”

The operator quickly tapped several keys as he cycled through multiple scanning frequencies. Finally, he found a large power signature moving further south, stopping inside Mutton.

“Found her!”

“Then fire the Hammer!”

XXXXX

Solaris could hear another beam crash down nearby. She realised it would only be a matter of time before they honed in on her again. Being a Mark 2 Infiltrator, she was programmed with all pre-war civilian and military frequencies in her database, so she decided check for any radio frequencies in the area. Sure enough, she detected one frequency still being broadcasted from the military base, and it was reaching into high orbit.

Another beam lanced down and smashed into the road right outside her cover spot.

“It’s getting closer.”

When the beam came down again, it hit a grassy field on the opposite side. By now, she could feel a pulse in the frequency. Whatever was attacking her was indeed being controlled from within the base.

The alicorn quickly spurred into action as she received yet another system warning. The weapon was about to drop directly on top of her. She turned toward the hole she made in the wall and flew right out of it as fast as she could. It wasn’t a moment too soon, for the beam slammed into the roof right after, and reduced the whole building to a pile of rubble and molten slag.

Not long after that, the raiders shouted in alarm as a white and red blur ploughed through the main doors of the old recruitment building, killing several of their own in the process.

“Oh shit, she’s here!” yelled one of them, turning and running deeper into the building.

Solaris ignored him and brought up her shield again, wincing slightly at her horn’s persistent pain. Now that she was inside the building where the frequency was coming from, all she needed to do now was find the control room.

She looked around as she carefully made her way through. She took note of the raider tags painted on the walls and the various repurposed robots that attacked her every so often. She’d seen these before; she was dealing with another group of Rust Demons.

“Here she comes!”

Solaris caught sight of the raider ducking behind the door and wasted no time in firing a blast of magic at it. The strike blew a hole in both the door and the raider.

“FIRE!”

Five raiders and two ponytrons opened fire. Solaris stopped moving for a moment as her vision was obscured by her shield flashing and rippling from all the projectiles.

“Don’t let up.”

“Kill her, shoot her!”

“Kill, kill, kill.”

Solaris sighed. “Pathetic.”

The alicorn’s horn flashed and she seized a raider in her telekinetic grip, smashing him hard into the wall. She picked up a wooden crate and sent it flying down the corridor, breaking the neck of a raider, and knocking over a ponytron. She grabbed another raider and sent him straight up into the ceiling, crushing his skull. Finally, she fired an intense beam of magic at the last remaining robot and raider. The robot fell immediately but the raider dove to the side. As he got up to resume fighting, however, his weapon was violently yanked out of his mouth, breaking his teeth, and then his own weapon was used to smash his face in.

The raider boss grumbled to himself. He could hear the chaos not far away from his position in the control room. He knew that with the alicorn was now inside and that they would lose control of the weapon, so he decided to end it all now. He turned to the operator.

“Fire the Hammer on top of this place! Now!” he ordered.

The operator whipped his head around and looked at him like he’d gone mad. “Wha-No! That’s suicide!”

The boss growled in annoyance and grabbed his subordinate’s head, twisting it violently until his neck broke. He pushed the dead raider out of the chair and began to tap at the keys.

“Burn in tartarus.” He targeted the military compound and ordered for a full powered blast. With the weapon now charging, he ordered the other Rust Demons in the room to retreat.

A destroyed Mr Hoofty soon burst through the doors and was followed shortly by Solaris. She stepped into the control room expecting a fight, but instead found it devoid of any raiders or robots.

“Something’s not right here,” she said to herself.

The white alicorn walked around the room. She looked for any signs of an ambush, what with her threat detection still glowing. She soon concluded that the raiders here had all left, and what remained of them were somewhere else in the building. Unfortunately, she did find that most of the terminals had been smashed. Probably to prevent her from gaining access to the satellite control systems.

“Smashing the terminals won’t prevent me from accessing the system.” Solaris went to the least damaged terminal she could find. She took one last look around her to be sure there weren’t any lingering threats waiting to jump out at her. Satisfied for the moment, she dropped her shield. Almost immediately as she did, four ceiling turrets dropped down from the corners and opened fire. She let out a cry of pain as she was riddled with bullets across her back and sides. Her left wing suddenly went limp. She quickly reactivated her shield, and with a pulse of magic, four tiles glowed brightly and shot a small beam into each of the turrets, destroying them.

“Argh! Son of a… I should never have let my guard down.” She grunted in pain as she looked at her limp wing. “Bloody turrets destroyed my wing joint. 5.56mm rounds. Not powerful enough to penetrate my armour, but still capable of damaging my weak points. Ugh, I should look into that at some point.”

Not wanting to be taken by surprise again, Solaris kept her shield active while she located the computer’s access port. Once located, she deployed her link. She grunted in light pain as a cable emerged from the back of her neck and snaked around. When it got near, a spike emerged from the end of the cable, and with a sudden snap, it shot forward and inserted itself into the connection port, twisting to lock it in place. Solaris’s red-tinted vision quickly filled with walls of binary code until finally clearing to reveal numerous files, folders, and directories from within the system.

With this information at her disposal, Solaris could finally see just what this place was. It was a satellite uplink station for a prototype orbital energy weapon known as the ‘Celestial Hammer’, capable of both defensive and offensive measures. It worked by collecting solar energy via two large solar arrays, and then feeding this energy into its laser emitter to be fired in a multitude of ways, from precision strikes to widespread incineration. It could be manually controlled with either the control centre she was in or a targeting laser which had been reported lost shortly before the bombs fell.

She also found that the project had been approved by Princess Luna for development, and if the prototype was a success, an entire global network was to be created. It troubled her to know that the princess was capable of such hypocrisy; to refuse the creation of the Mark 1 Infiltrators but approve the creation of a weapon that could potentially subdue the entire world.

Solaris was grateful to find that only the prototype existed, and that she could easily stop anypony else from using it by destroying its control centre. Once she had downloaded the data from the terminal, she retracted her link cable. Moments after, the latest logs came up on her HUD, and her eyes widened in alarm when she discovered the order to fire upon the facility with her still inside.

“No wonder there is no pony here. They were trying to kill me with the Hammer.” She looked at her limp wing and knew right away that she wasn’t going to fly out of there. She needed to teleport out.

“WARNING! DANGER IMMINENT!”

She looked up to the ceiling. She didn’t have long to make her escape. As she charged magic into her horn, her left ear twitched when she picked up a faint sound. Her ears swivelled to try and pick up the sound’s direction, and she eventually turned to face one of the adjacent doors to her left. She gasped when she realised exactly what she was hearing. It was the sound of a foal crying.

Solaris bolted for the door. She released her magic in a large beam and blew the door out. She continued blasting holes in the walls to prevent being slowed down.

“This place is about to be annihilated and you’re running around looking for a Raider Welp!” a cold voice growled in the back of her mind.

“It may have been born a Raider, but it’s still just a foal,” Solaris countered out loud. She stopped and blasted a hole in the ceiling to get to the floor above her.

“Your sentimentality will get you and your ponies in a lot of trouble one of these days.”

“When or if it does, I’ll pay for it.”

“We shall see.”

“WARNING! WARNING! DANGER IMMINENT!” By now, her threat system was filling her vision with the word, ‘Warning’. The danger was rising rapidly.

Thankfully, just moments after, she found an overturned pram at a T-junction; and in a bundle of dirty cloth a few feet away was the infant, squirming and crying for its mother. She quickly scooped the baby up in her magic. She craned her neck back to look down at the foal while gently lifting her right foreleg up to hold the baby in place. She smiled as the big watery eyes of a baby colt looked up at her in wonder.

“Shh. Everything will be alright now,” she cooed softly. “I’m going to teleport us, little one. Everything will be okay.”

“WARNING! IF ACTION IS NOT TAKEN, SDP WILL ACTIVATE!”

“Guess I found you just in time.” Solaris closed her eyes and pictured the road that led to the eastern side of the bridge. In a bright flash, she disappeared.
.

XXXXX

A pair of scavengers gasped as they came to what remained of the iron bridge.

“What the hell happened to the Gorge Bridge?”

“Did one of those orange beams do that?”

They looked further down into the valley that led to Mutton and saw a trail of craters, ending with half of Mutton on fire.

“By the creators, what happened?”

Suddenly, there was a loud thunderous clap and a bright flash of light behind them. They screamed in fright until they stopped and gawked in amazement, for the most regal looking pony they’d ever seen had materialised right before them. They gasped once again, only this time at the alicorn’s injured state.

“Holy shit, are you alright?!” one of them asked. Just then, the clouds over the military base parted, and a large beam of orange light slammed down on top of it.

“What the fuck?!”

The alicorn watched grimly as the MASA satellite arrays collapsed from the energy beam’s power. When the main dish toppled over, the beam flickered and stopped, and as the end of the beam slammed down into the ground, there was a large explosion. The explosion and resulting fires quickly consumed the control centre and spread in every direction.

Solaris allowed a small smile to claim her lips. She could no longer feel any signals from the Celestial Hammer. There was no way the weapon could be used against anypony else now, meaning the ponies of West Mareginia could live in relative peace.

XXXXX

“… After that, I can only conclude that I inadvertently acquired the Celestial Hammer from the data I copied from the MASA Uplink Station before it was destroyed.”

Buckshot nodded in understanding and agreement.

Solaris looked down into the Sparkle World plaza and smiled lightly upon seeing a mare doing her shopping with a young colt. At least something good came from that bad experience two years ago.

“So, if you had the schematics for the laser from the data you downloaded, and you didn’t consciously apply it to be one of your magic-based weapons, how did the SDP use it?” asked Buckshot.

“That, I cannot answer. However, I feel it must be something to do with the SDP’s programming and that it is something locked out of our conscious minds.”

“What do you mean?”

“Right, your SDP was disabled,” she mumbled, turning to face the stallion. “We are machines, and we were programmed to operate in a certain manner. But like any programmed machine, there are hidden files and folders that we cannot access, as they would be important lines of code that determine how we function. In other words, our, or rather my, SDP must have hidden subroutines that could turn things that I learn into weapons to improve its combat efficiency when activated.”

“That makes sense, I guess. So, what can you do about it?”

“With me being unable to see the hidden files there is nothing I can do.” Solaris sighed as she looked down dejectedly. Shortly thereafter, her eyes opened wide in revelation. “If I’m to reprogram myself, or at least my SDP, from being able to do this, then I must go back to the source.”

“The source? Wait, are you talking about the Production Facility?”

“I am.”

“But didn’t it go sky high?”

“It did, or more accurately, it went six feet under. Regardless, the main facility may have been destroyed but the backup drives would have survived. I can look into our development there.”

“I see. Would you need any help?”

“I thank you for the offer, Buckshot, but you are needed here with Havok to train a new team, and by extension, a security force to ensure Sparkle World’s protection from internal and external threats.”

“Of course, your highness,” Buckshot said with a light bow.

Solaris gave an appreciative smile and turned her gaze back out the window, in the direction of the Marejave.

Author's Note:

Short chapter this time around. I hope you have enjoyed this and will look forward to the next chapter.

Two new pictures to share this time.

Princess Solaris by PumpkinPieforLife