Prologue: Audiologs
Prologue
Audiologs
They say you are dead when you can’t feel pain anymore. Whoever “they” are, “they” sure haven’t heard about painkillers. All I could feel now was the waves of pressure my heart sends through my body with every beat. It is as if it wants to make its last beats count, and although pressure is not pain, I am quite certain I’m not dead. Not dead just yet at least.
My entire life I have been under the impression I couldn’t make any decisions; As if my life had been predetermined at birth, and it is my life I want to tell you about. Now, obviously, nopony had say in whether or not somepony was born a unicorn, has a light brown coat and a blonde mane and tail. Or that these genes happen to be born inside Stable Eight.
As I was a filly, I had to learn the same profession as my mother. It’s simply how the stable works, there was no decision that was taken away from me. The stable would be endangered if somepony wouldn’t do their job properly.
I ended my train of thought and shifted into a more comfortable position and accessed the memory of my PipBuck. I filtered by audio files and the creator being myself. I have listened to my own audiologs a few times already and deleted the insignificant ones.
“Audiolog! November 5, 1236. First Entry! Hi! My name is Aideen and today is my birthday! I am ten years old now and Mommy gave me a PipBuck and said I should make this audiolog-thingies. Tomorrow she tells me my first Responsibilities in maintenance. Just like her, I will keep the Stable Eight running!”
At the age of ten, every foal starts with taking on simple tasks in the stable. It’s our first step into adulthood. We also get our PipBuck. Everypony in Stable Eight has a PipBuck, and with our tenth birthday we become “part of the group”, most of my life I simply thought the PipBuck is nothing more than an useful tool.
Oh, and; ten years old and I said big words like “responsibility”. How cute is that?
And how did that cute filly become... something like me?
“Aideen's Audiolog. November 6, 1236. Mommy led me through the whole stable and made me note down all the numbers different terminals showed into my PipBuck. It took four hours!”
Boring. Even for an adult this wouldn’t just be “usual boring”, this would be “advanced boring”.
I figure I should probably tell you what a PipBuck is exactly. PIP is an abbreviation for Personal Information Processor. Against common belief the PIPs have not been invented by Stable-Tec, the company who had built the stables. Stable-Tec, however, were the only ones who mass-produced their PipBucks and provided the most common Operating Systems for them.
With the PIPs being useful for all kinds of branches, the PipBucks gathered a few quite weird features for a simple utility tool. In Stable Eight, most ponies probably only use the radio and the built in calender and clock. Maybe a few of them use their task list and, like me, the audio recorder as a diary and notebook. But a PipBuck is capable of doing so much more.
The device itself is partially embedded into a foreleg and it constantly measures our health and helps administer healing potions and other medicines. It analyzes everything in our saddlebags, and even expands the space inside them. We can stuff pretty much anything in them as long as we can carry the weight. With an extraordinary amount of stuff in them, the PipBuck also assists in organizing them; and with another spell it provides we can pull out every object we want. It also has a lamp and a few other insignificant features.
Coming from military operations are features like the "local map" showing, well, a map and your location in it; but it was not a preinstalled image with sensors where you are. The PipBuck has a sonar sensor that effectively paints every location you are at. The "Eyes-Forward Sparkle" (E.F.S.) shows on a compass where ponies or creatures are and gauges whether or not it is hostile; and the "Stable-Tec Arcane Targeting Spell" (S.A.T.S.) aids you for a brief moment in fights.
But enough about PipBucks for now. Let's let our hearts break over a small ten year old filly.
“Aideen's Audiolog. November 12, 1236. I know every place where I should go and write the numbers down and Mommy didn’t accompany me.”
Aww... All alone and bored to death. At the moment I was also alone, but my brink of death was for an entirely different reason than boredom.
“Aideen's Audiolog. November 18, 1236. After school all the others can play and I would have had to run through the entire stable... I didn’t do it and just made numbers up.”
Ten years and no cutiemark; but I was well on my way of breaking bad.
“Aideen's Audiolog. November 19, 1236. Mommy didn’t notice it but I’m really scared. I’ll write them down (for real) today.”
“Aideen's Audiolog. November 22, 1236. It’s not like anypony really looks at the numbers I write down.”
“Aideen's Audiolog. November 23, 1236. The numbers change hardly everyday. If I note down the numbers of today I’ll use them for next week. I can make up all in between on a line with some random modification.”
Oh, yes. Lazy and smart, means inventive on how to do as little work as possible. But quite surprising the kind of criminal mastermind I was with age ten.
Of course there is a reason to write those numbers down. Sadly, the most truthful ones were outdated a week. And sometimes by chance accurate, but... well you can imagine something bad happened.
“Aideen's Audiolog. August 5, 1237. Today a waterboiler exploded... Somepony got hurt and it is my fault. Had I written down the pressure everyday somepony could have prevented it. What is the worst: I didn’t get caught.”
Who has a conscience with ten? In the Equestrian Wastelands, probably nopony at any age. Usually foals only feel bad when they get caught.
“Aideen's Audiolog. August 6, 1237. Miss Rosy was always nice to me, now she has really bad burns. I have to do my duty properly!”
“Aideen's Audiolog. August 13, 1237. This is so exhausting. Skipping every second day wouldn’t hurt, right?”
Well, I managed a whole week, didn't I? And everything that can explode in a short amount of time could also explode within the 24 hours that should lie between my checks.
“Aideen's Audiolog. September 15, 1237. I was invited to play with the other fillies of my class but today I should write down the numbers again. I’ll just do it tomorrow.”
“Aideen's Audiolog. September 18, 1237. Usually I should write the numbers down again but I don’t want to ruin my original 2-day schedule of writing down on odd audiolog-entry days. I will do it tomorrow again.”
Everything has to go exactly according to schedule! My schedule (of not making my actual schedule properly) has to be perfect. It always made me laugh. I instantly regretted laughing as it turned coughing.
I still couldn't feel the pain I should be feeling, but blood spattered on my PipBuck before I could cover my mouth. Oh, great. Bloody coughs! One of my broken rips must have punctured my lung and I’m bleeding internally. Let’s add drowning because of my own blood seeps into my lung on my mental list of possibilities I die today. I tried to wipe my PipBuck clean, but as my barding and coat are dirty with blood, I only managed to blur it.
My PipBuck and my Audiologs were important. They will live on after I am dead, as evidence of a pony named Aideen having actually existed at one point in time. My recordings are also a documentary of the things I did together with other ponies; and they might be stuff for history class in the distant future once Equestr... I mean: Once Gaia has healed. (I’m referring to Gaia, the planet, of course.)
Is it considered weird when I care less about me surviving than my PipBuck being clean? It is (or at least it is supposed to be) an artifact of history.
“Aideen's Audiolog. September 21, 1237. Every third day should be sufficient.“
I honestly have no comment to that.
“Aideen’s Audiolog. November 5, 1237. It is my Birthday! I’m eleven years old now and Mommy showed me more how to operate the terminals and I have more responsibilities now. For my birthday I had a nice party and I got...”
I stopped the recording. The rest of my eleventh birthday is not of any importance. What I was learning from now on however are not.
“Aideen’s Audiolog. February 18, 1238. I managed to modify each console monitoring our stable to connect to my PipBuck and send me the data I need. Yay!”
Hold your applause, please.
“Aideen’s Audiolog. March 28, 1238. A colt whose father works in maintenance had his tenth birthday yesterday. Today he and his father walked my route and did my job...”
Well, shit happens.
“Aideen’s Audiolog. April 5, 1238. Cog Work wasn’t accompanied by his father anymore and I thought about letting him run his route every day, but I told him it wasn’t necessary as I have all the values.”
“Aideen’s Audiolog. April 6, 1238. Cog Work and I spent the time he would have needed to walk his route together. He’s weird, but nice, I guess... for a colt.”
Anyone else feeling a foal-romance coming up?
“Aideen’s Audiolog. April 9, 1238. Cog and I got into trouble for not doing our rounds. He actually told his father he wasn’t doing them. And eventually they figured out that I didn’t do my rounds for a while too.”
The ninth and deepest circle of hell is reserved for traitors. So much for your foal-romance. This was the first real decision that was taken from me by another pony. I tried to be nice to him, for goodness sake! You can imagine the betrayal I felt back then.
I didn’t realize it at the time, but I disrupted Stable Eight with the program I wrote. Every colt and filly from now on will know about it and will think the task they have to do until somepony younger comes along is utterly unnecessary. Earlier I told you the stable was endangered if somepony wouldn’t do their job properly, and now I started a rebellion. A new system needs to be thought of. What do maintenance-foals need to do during their first years?
At least they didn’t need to think about it a long time...
“Aideen’s Audiolog. May 9, 1238. Our stabledoor opened.”
“Aideen’s Audiolog. May 10, 1238. Everypony is really excited about leaving the stable. I don't know why. They knew the stable would open up at one point.”
Children are under the impression the world focuses around them. From infant solipsism where one thinks no other pony has a mind of their own, over the impression the world focusing around you and you being the only pony who can think and feel.
The time outside ones own lifespan is something completely abstract for a child; while the past is something that has already happened as the concept of “I can remember”. And the war 200 years ago is just as unproven as the time adults can remember.
And the future is something one can look forward to. So the stabledoor opened; no big deal. Everypony had said the stabledoor is going to open in the future and I had no doubt it was going to happen in my lifetime.
But I believe at this point some further explanation is in order. What is a stable? I already referred to a war two centuries ago. It started as a war about resources diamonds and coal. Or that’s how it started out at least. The Stables were built by Stable-Tec, the same company that mass-produced the PipBucks, to keep ponies safe in the event their worst fears came true.
Ponies and zebras fought... no, scratch that. The Kingdom of Equestria and the Zebra Nation fought against each other and in the end they used the worst weapons even imaginable. Stable-Tec had the foresight to build enormous underground shelters where ponies could survive for a seemingly indefinite amount of time.
The Stable’s door can be opened by either the Stable‘s Overmare or the sensors of the Stable. In our case the Stables sensors deemed the outside as inhabitable again and opened up just according to protocol.
“Aideen’s Audiolog. May 19, 1238. Of “our new friends” Crimson is the nicest. He has an awesome scar on his left shoulder. He told me it comes from a sword fight. I don’t believe him.”
My first mention of one of the outside-ponies specifically. There was a camp not far from stable. At that time we didn’t know what that implied. Stable-ponies can be so naïve...
“Aideen’s Audiolog. June 7, 1238. Crimson spends a lot of time with us in maintenance and he got to know about what I did. He then entrusted me a secret!”
Crimson expertly played on my feeling of betrayal. But I was under the impression of us being friends then. And as he was merely seven years older than me I didn’t think of him as an adult at that time. Little did I knew about years in the wastelands maturing you differently than in a Stable.
His secret was that he manipulated the sensors on the outside, telling them everything is okay and the door will open. At that point he said he just wanted to talk to us, and stablefilly-naiveté made me believe it.
“Aideen’s Audiolog. July 13, 1238. Mommy finally agreed on going outside to look at the places they offer us. A lot of ponies already moved out and only a few ponies came back, but they say it’s really nice out there.”
“Aideen’s Audiolog. July 17, 1238. Colt’s Well is a strange place. It’s not as dirty as everything else out in this ‘Equestrian Wasteland’; But the hotsprings are sooo comfortable. My PipBuck made slowly clickclick, but Crimson helped me turn the sound down.”
“Aideen’s Audiolog. July 27, 1238. I overheard Crimson talking with some grumpy looking stallion. He said I wasn’t for sale. I don’t know what he meant by that, you can’t buy ponies.”
And the grand scheme begins to unravel. Unless you’re a naïve stablepony, that is. It was ingenious, and in retrospect, I really admire Crimson for pulling it off. Step one: Find a closed Stable. Step two: Make the ponies inside trust you. Step three: Sell them as slaves. Step Four: Profit!
It’s an good plan, simple to memorize, but it needs ingenuity to perform. Everypony involved had to play their role, but if only one pony knows the whole plan there is only the one pony benefiting from it.
“Aideen’s Audiolog. September 4, 1238. Mommy is late today again.”
“Aideen’s Audiolog. September 4, 1238. Mommy didn’t come today. The other fillies weren’t picked up by their parents either and Big Momma said we could stay with her for the night.”
September 4, the day all the dominos were in place and... no wait, that’s not an accurate metaphor. Dominos falling over indicate a series of events. What would be a good metaphor for when they all fall over at once? Well, that’s the story of how the Crimson Company was founded, with the money from a stablesworth of slaves.
Big Momma isn’t exactly a name a teacher would choose for herself. While most perverts in the wastelands just want to get off, it’s not like there are a lot of pedophiles or hebephiles. And although they would pay a good price the Crimson company-policy clearly says: no foals under fifteen.
So until I was ready to have my flower plucked they treated me really well and I even got an education in computer science. The idea was using my special talent to hack terminals and open electronic safes. The Company trained us to be good scavengers.
I’ll spare you the sob-story about me crying for my mother when she didn’t come back. I’ll also skip the years until I turned fifteen. It’s a part of my life and it shaped who I am. But most importantly it is my story and I decide how I tell it.
“Aideen’s Audiolog, December 11, 1241. I’ve been fifteen for a month now. I know there is a high price on me, but somepony just paid it. I have already put two portions of Med-X into my PipBuck to inject them when... it should start.”
“Aideen’s Audiolog. December 11, 1241. I had so not cared about what was going on and that guy was freaked out. It’s kind of like ‘I wish I had been there’ to laugh at him.”
“Aideen’s Audiolog. December 12, 1241. Big Momma was not pleased with my ‘performance’. Sadly they can’t make any more money with my virginity as it is gone and I’m... free to be defiled. I know what is going to happen and I put another Med-X in my PipBuck to be prepared.”
“Aideen’s Audiolog. December 14, 1241. Yeah, took them a while to teach me a lesson. It lasted longer and the Med-X wore off but I remained limp, no reason for them to enjoy it, whether it’s begging for mercy, trying to defend myself or praising them for doing a good job. They won’t get more than physical relief from me.”
I got my price drastically reduced. Cost/performance ratio and such. But I kept limp, I endured. Most of the perverts are regulars and after a year or so almost nopony paid for me anymore and I was free again. Sure, I suppressed a lot of pain and emotions, and from time to time I had a regular who tried to mentally break me, but I always won. Won... like, it’s a game.
“Aideen’s Audiolog. April 7, 1243. Me being on Lusthouse-duty obviously doesn’t pay off for them anymore and I am up for rent now. Rent-a-slave, what a business concept. Now I’m basically a portable hacking device, up for rent for freelancing or self-employed scavengers.”
Of course hacking into terminals wasn’t the only thing I was used for when I was rented. But as weird as it sounds (not the rent-a-slave thing), I believed I was happy. I could do what I liked most, working with computers while proving my skill in the field.
Time passed on, and I reached the point where I can start my story. The important stuff comes now...
*** *** ***
Footnote: Starting out! Distribute 40 S.P.E.C.I.A.L.-Points:
4 Strength, 6 Perception, 6 Endurance, 6 Charisma, 8 Intelligence, 7 Agility, 3 Luck
Profession Tag: Stable Maintenance – You gain 15 points into Building and Science.
Skill Note: Building has reached 25.
Skill Note: Science has reached 25.
Special Perk: OWNED! – You have unique dialogue options with slaves, former slaves and slavers and deal additional 10% damage to slavers.
Profession Tag: Hacker – You gain 15 points into Science.
Skill Note: Science has reached 50.
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2394485
head -> wall
yeah, highly likely I meant "during"
I am available as an editor and prereader. To be honest I have no prior experience but am somewhat of a grammar nazi and read a ridiculous amount
Good so far. Nothing much to say.
Oh, yeah, one thing: if you aren't going to be much more graphic about sex, the "sex" tag is unnecessary. It's mostly for clopfics and very graphic scenes.
The dialogue is a bit stiff, but feasible.
I would probably read more if I liked Fallout a ton, but I can say it's better than the average FoE spinoff fic, so good job. You could use a bit more contractions to make the dialogue a bit more smoother, but so far it's fine.
Ye Celestia how is it good to have some time to read again, so no I have not forgotten about this, there have just been a lot of pre-reading around my ears, and now onwards to the REVIEW TIME! Last time many times longer than the chapter, this time half as long!
So... A little question to start it all of with, do you have a pre-reader? Because there are not only many tense mistakes, there are so many that I am still in doubt right now if you had planned to make this a present tense story or a past tense one. The present tense story would actually be a rather interesting take on this story since the main character seems to be rather mortal, somewhat delicate even with her tough outer shell and with an uncertain future. All points that would be 10 times more interesting if we knew that the story wasn´t set in store, that the character actually could die (even if it is rare to end a story in that way, although if it ends as that will I take my hat off for you). It would somewhat make it more real... even if her situation is a rather unreal one.
And before I go on. I must say that this does look intriguing with how you have set you scene for the story. That we meet slavers that actually are smart instead of just a bunch of psychotic limb chopping maniacs that some others write them as. That we also meet a charming slaver, this Crimson who apparently owns a company, is also a smart touch. The world of Fo:E needs more charming and charismatic "villains", and yes I know that it is a bit early to call him that, but that he sells a whole stable is a rather clear proof that he ain´t a mommies colt. The only sad or bad thing is how the slavers have this focus on sex sale, wanting to sell all instead of just a few does it seem. I don´t know why, but it does simply just sound odd to me to take 90% (it is MLP still in a way after all) of your goods and keep them stocked up so you have to feed on it. I can understand why they do it with the young ones, a skilled labor would sell better than a non skilled one, and learning them things would give them a meaning in life and to a degree happy over something. But the rest of them, the un-numbered amount of mares that it sound to be, sorry it does just seem odd. Beside that does the game show (if we follow the logic of the game) that a slave is way more valuable than a prostitute.
I know this is a nitpick, and one of the bigger ones because it don´t actually infects with the story at all, but the name Aideen to a pony? Sorry I have never heard of an item or thing called an aideen, and yes I know that I am nitpicky now. I do just want to have my pastel ponies have pastel pony names, and not human ones. I can actually get into the same nitpicky mode when people name their pets human names.
So... Gaia we meet again. Last time I read about you was when I played Final Fantasy games, but I see you peek your head into the picture again. I know that there ain´t any official name for the planet that our pastel colored friends live on, but I have heard the fan made Equis many times by now, and do somewhat think that that would fit better than the Greek Gaia. Not that I have anything against it as such, it is just really really odd for me to read this Greek name when I know where it comes from, and to a certain point also the story about the titan whose name it is. I know that this is maybe a little late to say, and rather hard to change if this would want you to change the name, but I can really not see Gaia and ponies mix in this way. Sorry to say it.
I would say that it is odd to find something from the Divine Comedy in this story, both because it is a pony story, and so far I know do they not know anything of Christianity or any poets that got inspired therefrom, and because you use the Greek mythology when you call the world Gaia. Actually does the show take much from the Greeks, with both their hydras, manticores, seaserpents (okay they could had come from many places), pegasi, Cerberus guarding Tartarus and seaponies (even if they haven´t been shown in this generation.), but that is a whole other thing. What I just wanted to say just that it is rather weird for a pony to have a perspective of death that was made by a guy from Firenze, coming from the Cristian folklore, when said pony have had gods walking on the same planet as them. I know that it is odd to say that Greek mythology are fine and dandy, but the Cristian ain´t, but that is just my view on it. Beside that would I think that Hades or Tartarus, take your pick, it is almost the same after all, have worse places to put people than in a frozen river right beside a demon that noms on those that are to close to him.
As a Dane is it somewhat fun for me to think on others that see eighteen year olds as kids, as you turn into an adult with all the responsibilities and such thereof as eighteen here in Denmark and many other places here in Europa
Sorry I do not buy that she don´t know what the clicking mean. She is in maintenance where they have many somewhat radioactive machines, or purifying ones at least, or they do so in many other stories. Beside that does she need to look out for any irregularities, and radiation would be one of those would I personally mean. I am not saying that she can´t be written naive, but saying that she don´t know what that means would be stepping over the line would I personally mean. But I am also nitpicky at times.
As the last thing before I go to the nitpicks... But what happened to the plot about the time saving program and the rebellion between the generations? The plot got mentioned, and sounded rather awesome and enough to build this story on, but as soon as the big stable door got opened was it like that rebellion was forgotten. I know that this is the prologue and you can´t make them all to long and put all that have happened in the past into them, but I would still mean that it was a somewhat waste of amazing plot to stack this up, poke at it so it almost fall over in a spectacular way, just to hide it under a blanket named next plot.
And now that we are somewhat into the theme of what to have and what not to have in this. Would it not be overall smarter to take the disposition about the war and remove it from here and add it to the Introduction chapter? After all have you already begun telling the tale of the pre-war times, so it would not be weird to add the disposition from this chapter and move it to the one before. Because beside gathering all your disposition one place would it also mean that this chapter flows better, because I must admit that Aideen ain´t the best story teller as such at this moment. But maybe was that intentional choice and are reflecting her character.
Nitpicks:
Normally would I point them all out, but this time where I rather uncertain at times, mostly because there are so many jumps between present and past tense. So I have only pointed those out that I know with certainty are wrong.
"All I could feel now was the waves of pressure my heart sends through my body with every beat." You have some tense shifts here
"As if my life had been predetermined at birth" Either should this start with lowercase, or your ; before it are wrong.
"most of my life I simply thought the PipBuck is nothing more than an useful tool." You need a past tense was instead of is.
"The device itself is partially embedded into a foreleg and it constantly measures our health and helps administer healing potions and other medicines." Would one's not fit better instead of the a at "a foreleg"
"The "Eyes-Forward Sparkle" (E.F.S.) shows on a compass where ponies or creatures are and gauges whether or not it is hostile" You used plural here so you can´t use the singular "it"
"Everything has to go exactly according to schedule! My schedule (of not making my actual schedule properly) has to be perfect." You have two has here that should be past tense had.
"I instantly regretted laughing as it turned coughing." Are there not missing an into in this sentence?
"You can imagine the betrayal I felt back then." Would a better wording not be "You can imagine how betrayed I felt back then"?
"It started as a war about resources diamonds and coal." Are you not missing a comma after your resources?
"Little did I knew about years in the wastelands maturing you differently than in a Stable." You should use a present tense know here.
"But the hotsprings are sooo comfortable." You have a capital letter after an ; here.
"And the grand scheme begins to unravel." Should it not be a past tense began?
"I had so not cared about what was going on and that guy was freaked out. It’s kind of like ‘I wish I had been there’ to laugh at him." I am normally good at finding the head and tail in things, but this makes no sense at all to me.
So all in all would I say that this is a bumpy ride, but a good ride none the less with something good in the horizon.