Fallout Equestria: Far From Home

by CaravanColors

Beautiful World

The vinyl player stood tall on top of an unorganized stack of timeworn album covers. The record spun in place with its needle pressed down firmly against the groves as the horn amplified its beat-heavy track. The rhythmic beat of a drum bass pedal and a simple guitar lick fills the room along with the sound of a soft brush rubbing against metal. A dull-blond coat stallion sat on the edge of his seat while holding onto a brush. “Boom boom boom boom!” He sang while brushing the nooks and crannies of his left metal prosthetic arm. “Bang bang bang bang!”. He paused. “Haw haw haw haw.” He continued to brush his prosthetic in a rhythmic fashion that mimicked the track of the song.

Enjoying himself, the stallion cleaned his prosthetic with no inconveniences. After a few minutes, the stallion placed the brush on the table and flexed his prosthetic. He frowned and stood up from the table. Restlessly he walked, jumped, and butted his prosthetic arm against various objects; his face becoming visibly more annoyed as he fidgeted around. Eventually, the stallion screamed and grabbed the brush in frustration. Swapping from his right hoof to his mouth, he repeatedly tried to move the bristles of the brush behind his upper arm. However, no matter what position he tried, the brush was just shy of the spot. The stallion continued to jerk his limbs around to find a position to allow the brush to reach the area. Unknown to the stallion, just beyond his door, a guest had arrived. The guest grabbed onto the bottom of a wind chime and rattled it before walking into the stallion’s room. A brown feathered gryphon with a red bandana tied around his neck peeked in. “Hey Birdie! Where you?-“ He abruptly paused. Birdie laid on his back as he stared at the gryphon with the brush in his mouth. Both the gryphon and stallion had been frozen in place as they stared at each other.

The gryphon laughed, breaking the silence. “What are you doing?”.

The stallion, Birdie, spat the brush from his mouth and stood up. “Don’t you know how to knock before entering! For gods’ sake, I could have been naked!”

“You’re always naked.” The gryphon snarked. “Besides, I rang the chimes before I came in. Anyway, what are you doing? We’re going to be late!”

Birdie rolled his eyes, “Celestia, Bassline we still have like, an hour.” he then continued to try and reach the area with his brush.

The gryphon, Bassline, sighed. “I know, but I know you always take an hour to get ready!”

Birdie laughed. “I know!”

Bassline chuckled and shook his head. He wandered around the room and fiddled with a few objects, while he waited for Birdie.

As Bassline wandered around his room, Birdie turned to him and held out the brush. “Do you think you can get this area for me? I took a sand bath a few minutes ago and I can’t get the sand out of my joints.”

“Sure.” Bassline replied as he grabbed a hold of the brush. “Where do you want me to start?”

“Behind my upper arm.” Birdie replied. “It’s somewhere underneath my shoulder.”

“Here?” Bassline placed the brush under his shoulder and scrubbed the metal. Birdie nodded and stood still as Bassline brushed the area. Once Bassline stopped, Birdie took a step forward and flexed his prosthetic. He smiled, “That’s the spot! Man, that was driving me crazy! I could feel the sand grind against my joints every time I moved it”

Bassline chuckled, “That’s good. Now hurry up! We gotta get going!” He placed the brush down on the table and made his way to the door. “I left my fiddle outside, so ill wait for you out there.”

Birdie nodded and shuffled around his room to grab a few of his accessories. He then trotted towards a flat polished sheet of metal wall and stared at his reflection. In a hurry, he donned his earrings and placed a bluish/purple bandana around his neck. Tightening the ends of his bandana he admired his appearance and ran his metal talons through his hair. “Birdie, honey?” called out an older mare. “Bassline is waiting for you at the door!” Birdie’s ears drooped as he let out a sigh. “Alright Auntie! Tell him to hold his horses!” He trotted away to exit his room and grabbed his guitar case before walking to the main exit. He yelled out his goodbyes to whoever was inside the house and opened the door to the outside.

The piercing hot sunlight had temporarily blinded him, but within a few seconds his eyes adjusted to the brightness. Laid before him were the familiar sight of sand, rocks, and dilapidated homes. Chipbowl, just residing within the northern part of the Badlands, was a safe haven for many soldiers, prisoners of war, slaves, and fleeing families during and after the Great War. However, since the fall of Appleloom, Chipbowl has not seen any new refugees for more than a century. Thus, returning Chipbowl to its former use as a mining town. Today Chipbowl has open trades with the New Canterlot Republic for exchange of basic living necessities.

Bassline had been waiting next to the door, balancing a variety of instruments on top of his body. With a sigh of relief, he looked at Birdie. “You ready to go?”

Birdie laughed and pointed at his head. “You know that’s a tambourine and not a crown, right?”.

Bassline frowned. “Well maybe I wouldn’t wear it like a hat if you would help me carry this around!”

Birdie laughed again and grabbed the tambourine from Bassline’s head and placed it upon his own. Together they began to walk down the disheveled log path, greeting many of its residents as they walked by. “Everyone seems to be in good spirits today.” Birdie stated while waving at a mother and her foal.

Bassline looked up at the sky and squinted his eyes. “I would imagine so. Its been about a week since we’ve seen the sun out like this. It’s a shame that we won’t be around that long to enjoy it”

Birdie rolled his eyes. “You talk as if we are going to be gone forever. We’re literally going to be gone for about a day or two.”

Bassline folded his ears, “Yeah...” He paused for a moment and looked towards the ground. “…But aren’t you worried about what it’s like out there? I mean, you heard the stories. What if we get trapped out there or get lost? Doesn’t that worry you, even a little?”

Birdie shrugged. “I try not to think about it. We’ll worry about that when we cross that road.” He turned his head to Bassline and chuckled. Bassline stopped in his tracks and looked at Birdie with disbelief as Birdie kept walking. Bassline shook his head disapprovingly and continued to follow him.

Eventually, the pair walked towards an open area that had been crowded with Chipbowl’s residents. The smell of dry alcohol and toasted sand filled their lungs. Accompanying the welcoming scent, was a loud, but rhythmic ear candy, of the local band playing. Birdie and Bassline walked to an open table and placed their instruments upon it. Together they sat down across from one another and enjoyed the music. Occasionally, they would lean over the table and gossip about the other residents who arrived. Sometimes a small group of colts and fillies would bother Bassline by asking him to give them a ride through the air. Meanwhile, Birdie would be playing a game of non-consensual-tug-of-war with his prosthetic arm with the child pranksters of Chipbowl. However, minutes passed as the pair grabbed their instruments and walked to the side of the platform where the current band was playing. They unloaded their instruments from their cases and began maintaining them. Birdie held an unlabeled acoustic guitar in his arms as he plucked the strings to check its tuning. Another instrument Birdie would wield is a harmonica that suspended itself in front of his mouth. Bassline was surrounded with a variety of percussion instruments, but he focused on tuning his violin.

Birdie strummed all six strings in unison then smiled. He stood up from the milk crate and placed his guitar within the case. “I’m going to the bar to get something to drink. You want anything?” He asked.

“Anything’s fine…” Bassline replied. “…But no alcohol.”

“I know you don’t really drink”

Bassline raised an eyebrow. “I was talking about you.”

Birdie inhaled deeply and turned away. “Alright, so nothing for you? Got it.” He began to walk away.

Bassline’s feathers puffed slightly. “Wait! Birdie!” He called out to him, but Birdie was seemingly ignoring him. “I-No! Hold up!” He placed his violin into the case and flew towards Birdie. When Bassline arrived next to Birdie, he had discovered Birdie had been chuckling at his reaction. Bassline glared at him and followed without saying anything.

The two walked towards an open canopy where a brown donkey stood between a makeshift countertop and a bookshelf of assorted alcoholic bottles. Birdie smiled and waved at the donkey. “Hey Creed! Can I get two steins of water? Ice if you could?” He asked.

Creed raised an eyebrow, then chuckled. “You’re asking for ice from a bartender that is located in the middle of a desert town?”

Birdie nodded.

“Well, you’re in luck.” Creed leaned over and reached underneath the counter. “I just so happened to have gotten some ice underneath the counter right here.”

Birdie raised an eyebrow. “Really?”

Creed then pulled out two steins and placed them on the counter. “No.” He replied, chuckling after the thought.

Bassline joined Creed as they laughed together. Birdie bit his tongue and folded his ears from embarrassment.

“Boys. If I had the power to chill your drinks, I would. But until that day comes, I hope you two are alright with room temp.” Creed poured water from a pitcher and served the two. “Anyway. Is today the last day you boys are going to be playing for the town?”

Birdie shrugged as he gulped down his drink.

“It depends.” Bassline answered. “We planned on adventuring out tomorrow, but we don’t know if we are going to leave or not”

“Is that so?” Creed stated, as he wiped a glass with a clean rag.

Birdie exhaled as he wiped his mouth. “We’re having trouble deciding on where to buy a wagon or something to hold our equipment when we travel. We thought about going to the New Canterlot Republic, but my aunt said we shouldn’t.”

“Well, that’s a thinker, isn’t it?” Creed paused as he looked over the two. A line had begun to form behind them. He frowned. “Listen, we can talk about this a little later if you like, after your performance. I do get a lot of ponies waiting to get a drink.”

Both Birdie and Bassline jolted up from their mugs as they turned around and saw the line that formed behind them.

Bassline’s cheeks turned red. “I-Sorry Creed!” He then tugged on Birdie’s elbow, motioning them to move.

The two began to move, but Birdie’s ears perked up as he remembered something. He quickly shifted back to the counter, cutting in front of someone. “Sorry!” He then looked at Creed. “I forgot to ask. What’s for lunch?”

Creed shook his head, then smiled. “Well, a little someone told me you two were leaving tomorrow morning, so they asked if I could whip up some radgator pie”

Birdie’s eyes flew open as he slammed his hoof on the table. “WELL, WHAT ARE WE WAITING FOR? COME ON!” He screamed as he grabbed a hold of Bassline’s wing and pulled him away from the canopy.

Bassline yelled. “H-hey! Don’t grab me like that! Birdie?! Stop! It’s not even our turn to play yet!” He continued to yell at him as Birdie kept pulling on his wings.

Creed laughed and waved goodbye to the two, continuing to serve the long line that had formed.

The pair walked back to their spot beside the stage and sat down next to each other as they watched the current band perform. Only a few more minutes before Birdie and Bassline take the stage. As the band wrapped up their final song, Birdie and Bassline stood to the side of the stage. When the band had finished, the pair took to the stage and pulled out a stool just in front of their microphones. Birdie sat to the right of Bassline and licked his lips, focusing on the microphone. Just beyond the microphone, displayed the entirety of the open area; the bar, tents, tables, and ponies, lots of ponies. This was the village square where every family, drunkard, traveler, and just about every living thing that populated Chipbowl had gathered. Birdie and Bassline looked at each other, then smiled. Birdie readied his instruments and closed his eyes. Birdie plucked the strings on his guitar, allowing his talons to fret the board. Every guitar lick he played; he had followed up with a light slap on the face of the guitar. He did this repeatedly, playing the rhythm of the song with the strings, followed by the percussion of the slapping of his guitar. He then leaned forward and blew into his harmonica to accompany himself. Bassline had also closed his eyes, swaying back and forth in his seat while he listened to Birdies playing. After a while, Bassline readied his violin and played when his verse came in. The two played in harmony together as they enjoyed the sounds of their instruments as well as the audience who had cheered them on for the rest of their performance.

Author's Note:

Hope you enjoy the first chapter of "Far From Home"! The I'm going to try and post a new chapter every week or so, but it may depend on my work schedule. The person who did this chapters art was a fellow bandmember, @AzusaBeScuba on twitter. While you are at it, if you want more Caravan content come check out our twitter, @CaravanColors. There I will be posting updates to the story, artwork of scenes, and original/covers of Caravan music! Hope to see you again!

Comments

[EverfreePony]

A short note before I dive in: The short description of this story is pretty good and caught my eye. The long description is a bit off-putting with how long it is though. In general, note that it should just elaborate a bit more on what the short description says. It shouldn't be longer than a short paragraph or two. (Not counting editor and cover artist credits and other small notes.)

EDIT: Finished reading the chapter, so here are some thoughts on it . All in all, the premise of a FoE story focusing on (soon to be) travelling musicians is interesting. Truth be told though, that's what I've already learned from the descriptions, so I'd expect to learn something more from the first chapter. Don't get me wrong, we got to see the town and the characters, but so far there's no real hook that'd make me eagerly await the next chapter or that'd give the audience a hint of the story's direction and driving conflict.

Regarding some more technical issues I've noticed, the most obvious and recurring one is punctuation in direct speech and the capitalisation of associated dialogue tags/beats. I'm not going to go in detail here, but I can give you some tips on how this should be handled if you wish. The rest of the issues that I've noticed (some missing punctuation, missing apostrophes, one slip into present tense in the very first paragraph, et cetera) seem to stem from inadvertence rather than your lack of skill. May consider getting an editor to weed these out in this one as well as the future chapters.

Furthermore, watch out for the large block-of-text paragraphs. They are unnecessary and oftentimes even incorrect (see the "one speaker, one paragraph" rule), and, most importantly, they are pretty hard on the eyes. These are also the ones where you like to dump a lot of information in rapid succession. The result is that your readers may have a hard time remembering the information or imagining how something looks (If it wasn't for the art at the end of the chapter, I'd have a hard time imagining how Birdie looks, which shouldn't happen. The art is great, but the story should function without it.), plus it takes away the atmosphere of the scene. I'm sure that the musical performance could have been great, if given more time and space in the story.

[CaravanColors]

Thanks for the feedback! I'll keep an eye out for some of these issues for the next chapter

[EverfreePony]

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Don't forget to click the '»' button on the comment you're respoding to if you want people to be notified of your response.

And you're welcome! Also note that fixing only the following chapters is not the best course of action. If the first chapter is faulty, then most readers won't stick around to see if the story improves later on. They'll instead wander off to read something else.