Chapter 13
Chapter 13
The day dawned like all of the others that he’d spent in the Equestrian Wasteland, ie: overcast with a chance of showers. Ethan looked at the sky through the window of the fortified shop entrance and frowned as he nudged the fire they’d made. Sleeping next to each other across from him were Day Kicker and Holly. He wasn’t sure when they’d sought each other out for warmth in the night, but they had and were now snoozing comfortably, the mare’s head resting against the stallion's back as he unconsciously covered her side with a warm wing.
Ethan smiled at the display, not for the first time, and brought out a frying pan that he’d found in the back of the shop. God alone knows what it was doing there in the first place, though judging by the fact that there was what appeared to be blood caking the underside he had a pretty good idea. With extreme care the man held the pan over the fire with his biomechanical arm and waited for it to warm. Once it was warm enough he took several pieces of meat that he’d bought from a griffin vendor before leaving Tenpony tower and began to slowly cook them.
As the sizzling meat cooked the man went over his conversation with Holly and Day Kicker the night before. When he’d made his radio address he’d had one clear goal in mind, put the fear of God in Red Eye... now however he was having second thoughts about his original plan to retrieve Sarah. His first plan had been to go in guns blazing and kill every slaver in between himself and Sarah. Of course, now that he thought about it, Red Eye had probably moved Sarah to the most secure place in his little city. That meant Ethan would have to get through an entire army and while he knew that he could probably do it, he didn’t want to risk Holly and Day Kicker’s lives so pointlessly.
So, he needed a new plan. He’d already had one in the back of his mind, kind of an emergency one if he did something stupid which he’d long ago learned would happen every once and awhile so it was good to keep something like that in reserve just in case. If Red Eye was anything like Ashur, which he probably was if Ethan’s previous experience in the Equestrian Wasteland was indicative of anything, then there was bound to be a loophole that the man could exploit. What that loophole was Ethan didn’t know, but he knew he’d find it.
“A bit for your thoughts Ethan?” Eddie asked quietly from his arm, being careful to avoid waking the sleeping ponies across the fire.
“Oh, I’m just thinking about Sarah,” Ethan replied equally quietly.
“The mare that we’re rescuing?” Eddie asked.
“Yes, though I think she’d prefer to be called a woman,” the man told the AI with a small smile.
“Right, I had forgotten about that,” Eddie replied.
“It’s no big deal Eddie,” Ethan said with a small shrug while still keeping his voice shushed.
“So... what are you thinking about her?” The AI asked tentatively.
“About how much I’m going to apologize to her for getting her into this mess in the first place,” the man replied. “Even though I don’t remember how I did it...”
“Ah, I see, don’t worry, I betcha that she’ll forgive you! Especially if you mean the same thing to her that she means to you!” Eddie told him enthusiastically.
Ethan smiled. “Yeah, I think so too, though she’ll probably punch me in the stomach once or twice,” he added with a low chuckle.
“Organic romantic relationships are odd like that... I remember talking to one of my old handlers about her relationship and all the trouble that she went through to get with the mare she loved,” Eddie replied.
“Oh?” Ethan inquired.
“Yeah, she had to sort her way though a love-pentagon,” the AI replied with a mechanical chuckle of his own. Then he paused and remained silent.
Ethan picked up on the AI’s mood change. “What’s wrong Eddie?”
The AI let out a sigh. “It’s just that... everypony that I knew is dead... or worse and I’m all alone...” he said despondently.
“Hey, you’ve got me, and Holly, and Day Kicker,” Ethan said reproachfully. “You’re not alone Eddie, and like I’ve said before, I won’t let anyone take you away from us.” His voice had hardened into a razor sharp edge.
Eddie was quiet for a moment before he spoke again. “Thanks Ethan... that means a lot to me.”
“Any time buddy,” Ethan replied. Any further conversation was interrupted by Day Kicker waking up.
The pegasus yawned and slowly opened his eyes, it only took him a moment or two to realize that Holly was lying against him and his eyes widened in surprise. However, instead of pushing the mare away he gently eased himself out from under her while using his wing to gingerly place her head against the ground. Oddly enough once he’d completed that his wings stiffened and to Ethan’s surprise he blushed as he attempted to quietly smooth them.
“Morning Day,” Ethan said with a smirk.
“Good morning,” Day Kicker replied quietly as he continued to fight against his wings to no avail.
“Having problems over there?” Ethan inquired as he watched the amusing sight. “Need me to lend a hand?”
“No, I’m fine,” Day Kicker snapped in annoyance.
Finally, after around twenty seconds of struggling the stallion managed to regain control of his wings and sat back down beside Holly as he eyed the man’s cooking interestedly.
“What are you making?” Day Kicker asked him.
“I’m pretty sure that it’s squirrel,” Ethan replied.
“Ah, I’ll have some when it’s ready then,” the buck said with a nod. Ethan simply smiled.
“Good, I’ve made enough for all three of us,” he said. “And it’s just about done I think, wake Holly up please.”
Day Kicker nodded and gently nudged Holly in the side with his foreleg, the mare wrapped her forelegs around it and hugged the limb while murmuring something. Ethan raised an eyebrow as Day’s wings began to make another vertical ascent. Day Kicker frowned and pulled his leg out of her grasp and poked her on the nose. The mare jerked back from the sudden contact and sleepily opened her eyes.
“Oh... good morning,” she said drowsily.
“And the same to you,” Ethan said with a grin. “Want some meat?”
The mare glanced at him in confusion for a moment before rapidly shaking her head to clear the fog of sleep from it and nodding. “Sure, I’d love some.”
Ethan grinned again and started to hand out pieces of meat on ‘plates’ made out of broken pieces of plastic. The two ponies shared a small skeptical look as they simultaneously remembered that neither of them had actually eaten anything that the man had cooked before. Added to that if he cooked anything like how he acted, the meat was bound to be burned and oddly spiced.
However Holly shrugged, figuring that it couldn’t be worse than the fried radroach she’d had once. So with a small amount of trepidation she moved the piece of meat up to her mouth and took a careful bite. Her eyes widened in total surprise... it... it... it was amazing! Without a second’s thought to manners or grace the mare stuffed several more pieces of meat into her mouth and began to chew.
Day Kicker raised an eyebrow at the mare’s reaction but shrugged and sampled his own piece. His eyes lit up and he gazed at Ethan who sat across the fire, a smile on his face as he ate his own pieces of squirrel. Day Kicker returned to his meal, savoring each piece until there was nothing left on his plate but greece.
“Where... where the hell did you learn to cook like that?” Holly asked him.
“Oh, you know,” Ethan said as he vaguely waved his hand around. “If you travel long enough you pick up a few random skills. One of mine just so happens to be cooking, although growing up in a Vault helped a bit too.”
Day’s head cocked to the side and he made a mental note to ask more about the vaults at their next stop.
“So, when are we hitting the road?” Holly inquired.
“Oh not too long, I spent most of my watch making sure that my weapons are all still good and that my armor that Day patched up is still in one piece,” Ethan answered. “You did a good job on that by the way,” he added with a smile towards the pegasus.
“Thank you, though it wasn’t very difficult, it’s not the first set of armor that I’ve had to mend,” Day Kicker replied with a small shrug. “Though it was easily the largest.”
“Really? I thought you Enclave types only used power armor, or those outfits like you’re wearing. When did you get a chance to repair combat barding?” Holly asked with an inquisitive look.
Day Kicker snorted. “Power armour needs training, that and there’s not enough suits to go around. So we keep a lot of old sets of combat barding around just in case.”
“Ah, that makes sense,” the mare said with a small nod.
“Anyways,” Ethan cut in, getting the conversation back on track. “We’ll hit the road as soon as you two are ready to and hopefully get a few miles before some giant robots show up and demand that I give them Eddie.”
“Giant robots, really?” Day Kicker asked with a raised eyebrow.
“Hell, it’s the Wasteland, you never know what’s going to happen next,” Ethan replied with a shrug. “Though I really wish I had some pulse grenades now that I think about it...especially for when those Brotherhood posers eventually show up again...”
“Pulse grenades? You mean EMPs?” Holly asked.
“Yeah, whichever,” he replied. “Something to short out their armor would do nicely. Nothing that I like more then shooting power armoured bastards in their frozen cans.” Then he looked over to Day. “No offense.”
“Huh? What for?” Day asked.
“Oh, it’s just that most of the ones who I’ve shot have been Enclave personnel,” Ethan replied.
“Ah yes, but I believe we had this discussion, your Enclave and my Enclave are not the same group... not to mention that yours are an entirely different species,” the pegasus said with a shrug.
“Good points,” the man said. “Yeah, so we’ll hit the road and try and avoid trouble.”
“I predict that the likelihood of that is at about 4% and dropping,” Eddie said casually from Ethan’s wrist.
“Well, fuck it. Either we run into trouble, or trouble runs into us, and I’d prefer to be the one doing the running,” Ethan declared.
The two ponies exchanged a glance. “Remind me why I’m following him again,” Holly said with a slight sigh.
“Something about friendship I think,” Day Kicker replied as he rose to his hooves.
“Right, that’s what it was,” she agreed. “Whatever...” she paused for a moment before frowning. “So yesterday it was griffins... and the day before that it was Steel Rangers...”
“So today we get raiders, or slavers,” Ethan finished for her.
“Great, can’t wait,” the mare said sarcastically. “Oh well, at least I’ll get a chance to try out this anti-machine rifle.”
Ethan paused in his packing and gave her an odd look. “Holly, it’s anti-materiel rifle, not anti-machine rifle.”
“Not here it isn’t,” she replied.
“She’s right, they were developed to kill power armored soldiers and war machines, thus anti-machine,” Day Kicker added.
“This place...” Ethan said with a shake of his head. “Confound you ponies and your similar names for everything,” he added with a light chuckle.
“Huh, I was just thinking the same thing about you,” Holly said with a small smirk. “Now come on hurry up, I want to get on the fucking road again.”
“You’re certainly eager to go trudging along the dusty road,” Day Kicker said with a raised eyebrow as he fiddled with his gauss rifle.
“Yeah? Well I just want to get moving, staying in one place for too long like this makes me nervous,” the mare said with a weary look around the room. The pegasus nodded slightly.
“I see... I have a similar problem at times,” he said.
“Heh, you two aren’t the only ones,” Ethan agreed as he pulled on his duster and brought up his shotgun. “Let’s hit the road.”
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Alright I seem to have missed a few things. 1. Biomechanical arm? When did he get that? and 2. I may have missed it earlier but what is the armor he has on so I can properly visualize it in my head.
Finally finished Fallout Equestria so I can read this.Long chapters are nice and all, but FUCK YOU FALLOUT EQUESTRIA AN YOUR 50k CHAPTER! Sorry, had to get that out, Keep up the good work. Love your stuff.
yup cooking will be a skill that anyone with a bairn can laern and use in the fallout world.
You know fallout is good but if it happen now the guns and the world tech would be alot like the metro games but mix with other tech like how the apple use the pip boy 3000 and than turn it into something that everone wants or make it into a PDA
Thank you and hopefully Dark Wandering is 1 on that list that would be cool
3178813
1. Covered it awhile ago, he got it chopped off by a deathclaw in vegas and the followers (plus the brotherhood once he got back to D.C. ) made it.
2.Riley's Ranger's armor topped with regulator's duster
Ethan is a failure at being a grammar nazi!
Well I like anti material rifle better also
3179508
holy balls man, i dont remember anything about his arm getting chopped off. i thought it was a biomechanical skeleton.
3181604
That may have been my fault so no biggie, and yeah, this Ethan got his arm chopped off
3181973
well shit son, had to hurt like a bitch then.....
3181980
Oh yeah, and he had to drag his ass back to the Followers all the way from quary junction
3182081
ok, now im just laying here thinking,"How in the blue hell did that happen?"
3182081
oh wait, quary junction. death claw mother and alphmales right?
3182102
Yeah... he was too used to the Capital Wasteland deathclaws... and lost an arm because of it
3182259
hmm......well shit.
I require another post sir.
Good chapter, shame he isn't packing a Saturnite reinforced Titanium Carbide Katana, then he'd be truly feared. That or a Protonic Inversal Axe, coz fuck armor.
Want. New chapter. Now please....
3344261
Most of the time yeah
3344290
So what happened to the courier in this?
3345852
One chapter states he had a nice night in Vegas and the Courier left a note on the nightstand.
2652450
>2013
>Criticizing a fanfic without reading everything
>ISHYGDDT
I read up to 13.. will murky be mentioned in this or will he play a "small" part in this or he is not included in the story at all?
3405717
Well, he's already made one appearance so far back on Sarah's first day of 'work'.
Only one chapter left... BALLS! //criez//
Nice chapter man, nice chapter!
I SHIP IT!