Citadel, we have a problem
War. War never changes
“Good morning, wastelanders! Three Dog here, how’s everyone doing?”
The sun rose into the sky of the Capital Wasteland as Three Dog’s voice ran through the airwaves. As radios sung his voice to the world, the sleeping life in the Capital Wasteland slowly began to wake and begin their morning routines. From the raiders leaving their camps to look for poor souls to prey on, to the Super Mutants leaving whatever buildings they had holed in to start their usual fights with soldiers from the Brotherhood of Steel. The day seemed like a perfectly normal Tuesday.
“Now for you kiddos living under a rock for the previous hour I, The great and powerful Three Dog, bow-wow-wow, have some news for you. Something big was seen falling from the sky by practically everyone in the wasteland.”
Inside the Muddy Rudder of Rivet City a man was lying asleep on the bar. His dark hair cascaded over his eyes as he slowly began to stir due to Three Dog’s voice.
“Now from what I’ve learned, the thing crashed a bit to the southwest of Old Olney. Sources tell me that everyone’s favorite freaks, the Super Mutants, have been flocking to the crash site for some reason. If you’re heading in that direction I’d advise caution.”
A momentary feeling of weightlessness overcame the man as he felt the bar stool he was sitting on get kicked from under him. Hitting the ground with a thud he turned towards the one who kicked his chair. His ice blue eyes met the face of a blonde haired woman in power armor.
“That’s all for now kids. Here’s some music to pass the time till I get more news.”
Three Dog’s voice finished speaking as music started playing from the radio. The dark haired man glared at the power armored woman as he used the bar to pull himself to his feet. “What do you want Sarah?” His tenor voice echoed throughout the empty bar as Sarah Lyons frowned and shook her head at the man.
“Why am I not surprised to find you here John?” She asked him as she leaned against the bar. The combined weight of the power armor and the age of the metal caused it to groan under the strain of supporting the armor. The man, Jonathan Stone, groaned at her words before grabbing the bottle of whiskey that he had been drinking.
He took a swig and finished off the last of the whiskey before asking the Brotherhood of Steel Sentinel “Are you seriously going to patronize me about this again? This is the third time you’ve told me that.” The blonde paladin sighed while shaking her head.
“I normally would say more about it but my father needs your help.” She told him. Jonathan frowned at her words.
"Why does he need me? I haven’t done a mission for the Brotherhood in months.” John asked her. He thought back to his last mission with the brotherhood. He had to work with several other paladins to hunt down some remnants of the Enclave that had settled down in Delaware. It went well enough, the mission was completed but only one paladin and himself survived the event. Both of them had been severely injured and were admitted to the medical wing of the Citadel for half a month before they were released.
“You’re still part of the brotherhood, even if you’ve been inactive for a while.” Sarah answered. “And besides you’re one of our best knights, dad only sends you on really important missions.”
Jonathan groaned before pulling up the bar stool Lyons had knocked over before and sitting down. “Alright, I’ll bite. What does the old man want me to do?”
His response earned a smile from the sentinel. “Something big fell from the sky earlier. From what our scouts say the Super Mutants have flocked to the area.” She told him. “They also told us that it seemed to have tech we’ve never seen before and that they need an extraction team sent up to get it before the Muties destroy it all.”
“Alright, I get what’s happening but where do I come in?” Jonathan kept his tone level but his curiosity was piqued. Tech the Brotherhood hadn’t seen before would provide a definite edge against the Enclave if they got it.
“You are being sent ahead with the Pride to secure the crash before our Vertibirds get there.” Sarah explained to him. He nodded, but he still had one question left for her.
“How much time do I have to get prepared?”
Sarah stood up before turning to the exit of the Muddy Rudder. “You’ve got half an hour. Vertibird will be waiting for you on the deck.” With that she walked out of the bar. Jonathan stared for a moment at the exit before downing his whiskey and leaving the bar.
Navigating his way through the corridors of Rivet City Jonathan nodded as he passed by Security guards and other residents of the old aircraft carrier. Turning a corner he walked down to the stairwell and began heading down to the lower residential cabins. Getting off of the stairs he walked down to the end of the hallway and entered his cabin.
Bottles littered the floor of the room. Trudging through the mess of empty whiskey, absinthe, and Nuka Cola bottles, John moved to the refrigerator that stood next to his cot. Grabbing some bags that hung on a hook next to the fridge John spent eight minutes picking up the empty bottles from the floor before chucking the bag into a corner.
Moving to the other side of his cabin, John opened the metal crate that sat there and began digging around for his armor. After pulling out his set of MP-47/A medic power armor that bore the crest of the Lyons’ Pride, he began unlatching the seals that kept it together and putting on the power armor.
As the last latch was shut Jonathan stood in his medic power armor with his T-45d helmet under his left arm before placing it on the cot and moving to the refrigerator. Even if people hated him and wanted to kill him, they wouldn’t try and break into his home. Everyone knew he kept the old metal machine fully stocked.
Opening the metal box Jonathan was met with rows upon rows of pistols, rifles, machine guns, and various other implements of ranged death. In the door lay several handguns and boxes of ammo for them. Inside the main section of the fridge lay many rifles and shotguns. Sitting in the corner of the refrigerator sat a rocket launcher with a rocket sitting next to it.
Reaching in the door John pulled out a.44 magnum called the Blackhawk and two hundred rounds of ammunition for it. Placing the magnum in a holster on his right hand side he reached into the gun fridge again and pulled out A3-21’s Plasma Rifle. While grabbing a few microfusion cells, he placed the Plasma Rifle onto his back where the magnetic plating attached the rifle to his armor. After a moment of thought he grabbed the Xuanlong assault rifle, General Jingwei’s shocksword, and some 5.56 rounds.
Shutting the fridge door Jonathan opened the freezer and saw the rows of explosives that he owned sitting there eagerly awaiting their time to be used. Most of them he had looted off of the corpses of raiders and other mercs who went after him except for a mini nuke that sometimes ticked. That he had obtained when he first met Sarah Lyons and the Brotherhood of Steel. After a moment of thought John armed himself with several plasma and pulse grenades and brought a few mines of each.
Finally he moved to a footlocker and pulled out his medical supplies. Pulling out his portable infirmary he opened it and began checking that there was enough supplies to last them. Packing them in his duffel bag he placed some extra supplies in before zipping the bag closed and slinging it over his shoulder.
Grabbing his helmet under one arm Jonathan left his room and made his way to the Vertibird on the flight deck. People watched him as he passed, noting how the drunk from the bar was in power armor. As he made it to the flight deck a young boy’s voice called out to him. “Uncle John.”
Turning around Jonathan saw Bryan Wilks, the boy he had found in the town of Grayditch. “Hey kid, what’s up?” John asked while kneeling down to Bryan’s height.
“I saw you wearing your armor, and there were some Brotherhood soldiers earlier. Is everything alright?” He asked. John smiled and ruffled his hair.
“Everything’s fine Bryan I got called for a short mission. I should be back by dinner.” John said to the boy. He looked calmer after that and smiled. John stood back up and said to Bryan, “I’ll bring you a souvenir.”
Music rang through the cabin of the Vertibird as the members of the Lyons’ Pride prepped themselves for battle. Paladin Glade sat in the pilot’s seat flying the vertibird to the Pride’s landing zone. The other members of the pride sat in the cabin doing various things.
Sarah Lyons, the leader of the Lyons’ Pride, turned in her seat to face the two initiates assigned to the Pride. “Listen up initiates.” She said. The initiates, Roberson and Miles, looked over to the Sentinel. “This is your first combat situation. Listen to your squadmates and I don’t want either of you playing hero. You’ll just die if you try.” She said to them
“Approaching the LZ. Get ready.” Paladin Glade spoke from the front seat. The Pride members grabbed their various weapons and those who hadn’t had them on already put on their helmets. From the few windows on the Vertibird the passengers could see what appeared to be a large disk-like object lying in a crater. Surrounding the crater were hundreds of green specks wandering about waiting for the VTOL to land.
“GO! Weapons hot.” Sarah Lyons shouted as she hopped out of the Vertibird and began unleashing lasers on the Super Mutants surrounding the crash site. Jonathan hopped out next and pulled his plasma rifle off his back and began firing green bolts of plasma at the frankensteins. The initiates followed suit. Miles used his Tri beam Laser rifle to shoot three of the Super Mutants while Roberson used dual plasma pistols to shoot the Mutants. The rest of the pride began to climb out of the Vertibird and attack the muties.
The Super Mutants that survived the initial strike grabbed their various weapons, from nail boards to miniguns, and began attacking the Pride. Waves of bullets hit their armor. Some ricocheted while other managed to break through.
“They’re retreating.” Initiate Roberson shouted as the Super Mutants began to fall back. Their advantage did not last long. Minutes later a cry of “BEHEMOTH!” rang through the air.
The massive Super Mutant stomped toward the Pride. The lasers and plasma coming from their energy weapons did little to hinder its progress. It raised its massive club and swung it at Initiate Miles. He would have been flying through the air would it not be that Jonathan Stone, the lone wanderer, had tackled him out of the way. The Behemoth’s attack left a large trench in the ground. Jonathan grabbed his plasma rifle and pressed a button on his pip-boy.
The world seemed to slow around Jonathan as he engaged the Vault-Tec Assisted Targeting System. Thanks to the VATS, he was able to line up five shots on the Behemoth’s head. When he fired, only two of the bolts managed to find their mark, they did little to the beast save for angering it further.
“Shit.” John said as he saw the Behemoth swing his club once more and smack him across the battlefield.
“John!” Sarah shouted as she watched him crash into the disk-like object. What happened next was completely unexpected. A blue tinted energy field came from the sky encasing the Pride and their Vertibird, the Behemoth, and the object Jonathan had crashed into. Suddenly everything encased in the energy field was pulled into the sky. The last thing they saw was a bright light obscuring their vision, then blackness.
The moonlight reflected off the spires of the Crystal Empire. Most ponies had already gone to sleep. The night patrols traveled down their normal routes through the streets and on the walls.
In the castle at the center of the empire Prince Shining Armor sat in his office staring at one of his greatest enemies, paperwork. When he had been Captain of the Royal Guard he had to face large amounts of paperwork, but ever since he married Cadence and became a Prince he had been given even more to finish.
“You’ll never defeat us, not even Celestia could. You shall fail like those who came before.” The stacks of paper taunted him with their menacing size. Shining glared at them as he worked on some of the papers.
‘No I shall defeat you and have my weekend free.’ Shining thought to himself glaring at the stacks of paper. Their battle continued for several more hours. Both sides had great victories and bitter defeats. Finally Shining Armor set down his quill and stared at the last bit of paperwork. ‘You shall FALL.’ He grabbed the quill in his magic and, after dipping it in ink, he began writing. He reached the last page and, with a final flourish of the quill, he vanquished his foe. He set the quill down and leaned back with a sigh.
A bright light shining from behind caused him to turn and look out the window to see something large heading straight toward the Empire. He saw fire spreading across it as it fell. Acting on the instinct drilled into him by the guard training he had to endure Shining charged his horn with magic and brought up his signature shield spell that encompassed the entire city. The object impacted the shield with enough force to cause shining to drop to his knees for a moment. Looking up he saw that the object had caused several cracks to appear across his shield spell and that the object had ricochet and was sent out into the Frozen North. Keeping his spell up he galloped out the doors to assemble the guard.