Prologue: A Story for the Masses
And this is me, Marcos Guns, bringing you some semblence of the truth, no matter how bad it hurts
Prologue – A Story for the Masses
“So, you want a story, eh? By the looks of your keen, corrupted eyes I’m guessing you seek one of adventure, looting, dismemberment... explosions? Hahah! I know my children too well! Marcos Guns might have just the tale for you! But before I indulge your tainted little minds with the bullet ridden tale of the Vault Hunters, I think a little bit of context is needed; the vegetables before the meat, perhaps? I know children, I know, ‘ponies are meant to be vegetaaaarian Mr Guns’, ‘eating meat is baaaad Mr Guns’ – well grow up and smell the smoke, my fiendish foals... this isn’t the Equestria of yester-year... and a good thing too! What place would an arms merchant have amongst the ‘precious’ my little ponies of old, eh? Turn a world to hell, and certain ponies don’t just profit...we become filthy stinking rich! And you know what, children? I’d rather feel the Goddess’ bucking horn inching its way up my ass than have it any other way! And have you seen pictures of that thing? It’s huge!”
“Now now children, I suppose I can see why you might look at me... unfavourably, after saying that. After all, I’m sure your miserable parents have buttered you up nicely with nostalgic stories of ‘friendship’, ‘tolerance’ and ‘love’. Allow me to disillusion you, before you’re placed into the ovens of Pandora completely unprepared for what lies outside these steel walls of yours. In this new land that your ancestors have eked their living from the only ‘love’ you’ll find will set you back a hoof-full of bits and a good couple of years on your life expectancy, greed has usurped generosity from its namby-pamby rule, lies have demolished honesty, and well... let’s just say that money has stabbed loyalty in the back too many times to count on a hoof! And of course, my children, profiting immensely makes it all complete! Ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-haaaaa......”
“...But fortunately for you, my poverty-stricken friends, someponies out there have remained under this illusion; believing that the ‘old ways’ still mean something, no matter how wonderfully warped the old world has become. These naive sods still trust in the ‘goodness’ in the soul of every pony living today.”
“Ha! Trust Uncle Marcos here children, I have stared into the eyes of many a pony out in the tundra, and have seen only hatred and rage of the most concentrated form. Victims of circumstance perhaps, yet dangerous, lost causes all the same...as well as being endless sources of income for those so inclined! Haha!”
“Yet, as ‘unfortunate’ as it might be, virtue has not entirely died out, somehow ‘heroes’ still manage to emerge...a fact which confuses and delights me to this very day! No! Certain ponies have not succumbed to the values that this ‘new Equestria’ promised. Luckily for me, however, Pandora has developed her own special way of... dealing with these misguided do-gooders! Ha!"
“So! As is the nature of things, virtue has had to evolve to make its place in our grisly grotto that we call home. The Vault Hunters are prime examples of this new type of ‘heroism’. As it so happens, only one of their number actually intended to become a ‘real’ hero in the first place! The founding two members were actually just a pair of mercenaries trying to make a dishonest living in a dishonest world.”
“And the fuel this new brand of beautiful heroes needed? Ammo! And big, big guns! I tell you, my itsy-bitsy friends, if there’s one thing that could ever bring a tear to this stallion’s steely eyes, it’s the amount of moolah those sweet, sweet Pandoran buckers brought in for me in their delectably short period of chaos! Turns out a bunch of trigger happy vigilantes can do wonders for the arms economy! Those wonderful, wonderful bastards...”
‘...’
“My apologies... forgive an old buck for getting caught up in sweet, sweet nostalgia there for a moment... Allow me to meander my way back on topic. One thing you must understand foals, there’s a very good reason why the ‘powers’ above called our home Pandora, and why many of us Outsiders now use this new name instead of Equestria: when They discovered us, when They ‘set us free’ from the grasp of the Shadow of Everfree... they did what any good professional would do, offer the hand of peace and conceal the hand of war. Soon enough, they were ‘forced’ to scorch our earth with raging infernos, and when they did... they discovered something about Equestria that they, and indeed we, had not expected... this lands’, and vicariously our, potential for colossal violence!”
“Our land rose forwards in glorious vengeance and righteous fury! Equestria itself took up arms and became the vicious vixen that we on the Outside know oh-so intimately today, Pandora: ‘The Mistress of the Damned’.”
“From the unfathomable depths beneath the surface of Equestria and the skeletal remains of Everfree Forest rose creatures so colossal and disturbing that their image leaves even I speechless – yes, yes, a truly remarkable feat, as you say!”
“Vast swathes of gruelling, bloody...magnificent fighting coated the Pandoran continent, where ponies thought hoof against gauntlet against claw, pitting themselves against Pandora’s most terrifying of creatures in a frantic struggle for our very race’s survival!”
“But hooves can only go so far, and frankly they tend to be pretty messy, and thus the equine race looked sure to fall...until eventually we wised up and made guns! Lots of big, powerful guns that put our blood encrusted hooves to the most shameful of shames! Ha, and even more useful, our new glorious firepower put an end to any of this fancy schmancy ‘delegation’ business so many had pursued in vain. After all, it’s more than a little difficult to talk to your enemy when you’re mouth’s busy operating the handle of a Jakobs', eh?”
“Pitted against hordes of fully armed equines and the sprawling masses of Pandora’s most fearsome of freaky creatures, the powers above were driven back to whence they came, squealing for their mothers, tail draped shamefully between their legs like that of a cowardly dog! Hah! Or at least, so we thought...”
“At any rate, in their cowering wake they left a continent scarred to a greater extent than even the most unhygienic bandit’s nether regions! Hordes of pissed off creatures, deeply depressed that their favourite play-things had vacated the area, and a population of mentally crippled prisoners that out-numbered the dwindling population of Old World Equestrians! And, well, I’m certain even the likes of you can just about manage to figure out what happened next?”
“...”
“No? What?! Are you inbred and retarded? Well, I guess such things two go hoof in hoof...I weep for the future of Ponykind.”
“Bah! Suffice to say that if you brain-hampered kiddies look at the Outside today and find yourself quaking in your ickle hoovsies, I doubt your tiny bladders would have stood un-emptied for more than five minutes but a decade before!”
“...And yes, a decade is ten years. Congratulations for figuring that out, genius.”
“What is it you say? ‘Quit yammering a lot about nothin’ and get to the darn story already?’ So! Perhaps a few of you do have some measure of spirit, eh? Well, allow Mr Guns to reward you! Here in my hooves I hold a very special book, written by the leader of the Vault Hunter’s himself: the veritable Badass of the Pandoran Wastes – the rather aptly named Nova, one hundred percent unabridged, unedited and un-fiddled with! Heheh, guaranteed.”
“...What?! You don’t trust your Uncle Marcos? Well, as a token of how cruelly honest I can be, have a piece of information entirely free of charge! You’re all adopted! Congratulations!
“...Especially you.”