After six years of being missing, the CMC, Scootaloo, Sweetie Belle and Apple Bloom have finally returned home to Ponyville, but not without a story to tell.
Six years have gone by after the Cutie Mark Crusaders went missing in the Everfree, and the town of Ponyville has changed. The Elements are all but spent trying to deal with the grief of losing the aggravating yet beloved CMC and the Princesses are tied up in a massive diplomatic battle between the Griffon Empire and the New Changeling Order.
When Applejack is going to visit Fluttershy, she runs across an unfamiliar group of young mares, three to be exact... and they're claiming to be the CMC, and they've got quite the story to tell...
Fallout/MLP:FIM crossover Fallout belongs to Bethesda MLP:FIM belongs to Hasbro and Lauren Faust Story elements belong ta me.
Atomic fire plagued the Earth in the early days of the Great War, millions died from the fallout while thousands escaped below the surface. No one on the surface was spared the wrath of the nuclear holocaust, either turned into ash or turned immortal, becoming Ghouls. Two hundred years have passed since then, and the Earth is in shambles. Humanity escaped below using the fabled Vaults from Vault-Tec, sparing them from the horrors that went on during the war, and for years they lived peacefully.
Years later after the vaults opened people began populating the surface once more, while hundreds broke out into tribes or setting out on their own. Many thrived, while others fell to raiders, men were killed while their women were raped and killed and their children taken and turned into slaves or raiders themselves.
Men, Women and Children had to fight for survival in this hell, no one was spared their innocence... they had to change and adapt to overcome the struggles of the harsh post-apocalyptic wastelands... having to kill, maim and brutalize to survive... no one would ever be the same again after becoming a survivor of the wastes...
Not even three strange creatures from a world afar...
Ponyville Outskirts Near Fluttershy's Cottage
It was midnight in Ponyville when Applejack decided to visit Fluttershy for what felt like the hundredth time this week. Luna's moon was high in the skies making the chilly night feel somewhat better for most of the Ponyvillians. For Applejack, it was just another day without her sister by her side.
Six years ago, Ponyville, like always was under attack by some dangerous creature. Every day or week it was always something, some great evil being unearthed or a magic spell gone wrong, an idiotic duo of brothers or something along those lines. And like always, the Elements were called in. Ah swear me an' the girls do more work round here then th' royal guards ave done in their lifetime!
But as it turned out, this particular enemy was something else entirely. A being known as a Voidling, a creature that resides in the space between spaces. Tall, almost as big as Applejack's brother, if not taller. Covered in dark fur, swirling tendrils of darkness snaking in and around its body like dark flames. And its eyes, redder than an apple during Applebuck season and filled with more malice than Sombra. Applejack remembered her and the rest trying to herd everyone out of the way before they could deal the pesky varmint some damage.
Sad to say, the elements could only do so much damage against it. The creature proved to be too fast for them to use the Elements of Harmony effectively. It caused damage to the town and they had to resort to calling both the princesses to help out. By the time they both got there the beast was gone, and after galloping through town to find it they found it converging on a building...
And to Applejack, Rarity and Rainbow Dash's horror the Cutie Mark Crusaders had been trapped inside that building. The six along with both the rulers of Equestria attacked the beast drawing its attention away long enough for Dash to fly in and get them out, yelling at them to run away and don't look back. The eight fought against the Voidling to a standstill before it suddenly changed tactics, escaping the clutches and chasing after the CMC, chasing them deep into the Everfree forest.
The rest of them gave chase, AJ, Rarity and Dash in the lead. Pushing through the forest mowing down whatever was in their way, only they were too late. Three high pitched screams sounded out seconds later, a flash of light and the earth shook from a massive explosion was visible not too far but once they got there... all they found were scorch marks on the ground and burned trees... the CMC were gone...
Applejack cried for days on end... a three week long search had proved fruitless. No amount of magic or guards turned up anything except Void Magical Residue from the blast... they were dead. Later in the days, there were similar reports of the Voidling re-appearing across Equus, attacking small towns and disappearing. Ponies went missing from all over, including some Applejack knew. Ditzy and her daughters Dinky and Sparkler went missing, and the famous DJ-PON3 the day after.
It was a mystery no one could solve as to why these ponies along with so many more went missing.
Applejack's thoughts turned back to the three fillies, no matter how hard she didn't want to believe it, she couldn't stop thinking of the screams.
"APPLEJAAAAAAAAAACCCCK!" "RAAAAAAARITY!" "RAINBOW DAAAAAAAAAAASH!" the screams of three little fillies, helpless against a monster she wasn't there to stop... it should have been her instead of her little sister.
She shook slightly from a cold breeze, or maybe it was the thoughts of the lost fillies. She didn't know or care, all she cared about now was getting to Fluttershy's house. Ever since that day, Fluttershy has helped console Applejack, Rarity and Dash the best she could. Pinkie helped as well when she could and Twilight also. And both of the princesses helped out however they could, be it moral support or just lending an ear.
AppleJack heaved a sigh as she craned her head skywards. A faint trail of rainbows could be seen leaving the Everfree forest, and AJ knew it was Rainbow Dash. She never stopped searching, all these years she kept flying over the forest despite her friends' protests. She didn't give up she didn't want to give up on her number one fan... a filly she promised to help fly one day. Apple Bloom... I hope wherever ya are, yer' happier then Ah am... she turned back towards the dirt path and starting trudging down it. another cold chill washing over her body like a cold unwelcome blanket
*RUSTLE*
Applejack's eyes shot open, looking at the bushes along the path. Her keen eyes didn't see anything, but that didn't mean there wasn't anything there to begin with. Getting into a stance she carefully started moving forward, her eyes checking to the left and right.
*RUSTLE RUSTLE*
"Alright! Come on out ya varmint!" Applejack yelled into the forest, her eyes locked on the treeline. "I know yer there!"
*RUSTLE RUSTLE RUSTLE*
The orange mare steeled herself for whatever was about to show itself, the bushes rustled once more and then a hoof poked out. An orange hoof with an untrimmed fetlock, piercing violet eyes stared at her through the dark of the forest before emerging completely revealing a young mare with a dirty orange coat and a unkempt purple mane. She stepped out of the bush and onto the path in front of Applejack, letting the older mare see her.
Who the hay is this? she wondered as the bushes rustled again and two more mares stumbled out. One with a dirty light gray coat, light green eyes and a light pink and purple mane that hung from her head down to her legs. The third of the small group was another young pony with dirty light olive colored coat, a long braided red mane and tail and donning a dusty looking stetson on her head. Bright orange eyes peered out from under the hat at Applejack.
It was hard to see who they were, but she could tell they were a Pegasus, a Unicorn and an Earth pony. Curse this blasted darkness, and mah eyes. The apple farmer cursed, stepping back a few feet, eyeing them warily. Who are they? I don't recognize them? She wondered, watching as the three shared a glance before the orange one spoke up in a scratchy voice.
"Applejack?" she asked, stepping closer. Inquisitive eyes searching Applejack's eyes.
"Uh, that's me... do Ah know you three? Are ya lost?" Applejack questioned.
The orange mare chuckled, almost sounding like Rainbow Dash when she laughs. "You should, AJ."
The farmer looked at the three, her eyes lingering on their forms before she looked at the Stetson wearing one. Her eyes slowly widened in realization, her legs shook and a few tears made their way out. "A-Apple Bloom?" she choked out, every fiber of her being desperately hoping it was true.
The mare stepped forward, her own eyes brimming with fresh tears. "Its me, Applejack." she replied, now that she was closer Applejack could tell it was her voice.
Her little sister's voice...
Applejack moved closer to the younger mare, looking into her eyes, those orange colored eyes... suddenly A fell forward into her younger sister's form, sobbing and clutching onto Apple Bloom and holding her tightly against her chest. "A-A-Apple B-Bloom," said mare rubbed her older sister's back, crying lightly into her shoulder as they rocked back and forth. "I missed you so dang much, Bloom." AJ cried, tears staining the younger mare's mane.
Apple Bloom looked up at the other two mares beside her, both with warm smiles on their faces as they watched the two. Apple Bloom smiled at the two. "Its me sis," AB whispered softly. "Ah promise."
Applejack only cried more, shaking and clutching onto Apple Bloom as if letting her go would result in her disappearing once more. The two sat there in the darkness for a few moments longer, Applejack's cries slowly dying down before she found herself pulling away reluctantly. Applejack looked into her little sister's eyes, years of sorrow etched into them like stone. "Where in tarnation have you been?!" Appejack yelled, her voice shaky.
The younger pony rubbed the back of her neck, her eyes hardening and what little happiness that was in them died out. "That's a long story."
0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0
After gathering the trio and galloping back to the Castle, Applejack quickly explained to Twilight what happened and who she found. The alicorn couldn't believe it, but when she caught sight of the three her jaw dropped half a mile before she yelled for Spike, who later would contact the princesses as Applejack proceeded to gather up everyone else.
They were going to get to the bottom of this, no matter what.
As Applejack left after giving her younger sister one more brief yet tight hug, she galloped off into the darkness to get Rarity and Dash while Twilight went for Pinkie and Fluttershy. Apple bloom, Sweetie Belle and Scootaloo all sat in the castle's main room, sitting on cushioned seats as Spike ran around the castle preparing everything for the two regal sister's arrival.
"So," Scootaloo leaned forward, her eyes peering into her friends' eyes. "We gunna tell em what all happened?"
"Of course we do." Applebloom nodded, crossing her forelegs together. "Why wouldn't we?"
Sweetie chimed in. "Would they even believe us? What we went through?" she looked down at her hooves, stained dark brown. "What we had to do?"
Scootaloo sighed heavily, brushing back some of her mane before saying, "Look Sweets, I'm not proud of what I had to do, I know you two are the same... but you know how that place was... we had no choice." She shook her head, "can't change the past ya know, we ust have to move past it."
The light gray mare nodded grimly. "I know..." she said softly, her eyes locked on the floor as the door suddenly smashed open prompting all three young mares to shoot up onto their hooves, instinctively getting into defensive stances and drawing several strange weapons.
The six Elements stood in the doorway, their eyes locked on the three fillies turned mares. What was long await relief and happiness turned into fright at the sight of the weapons they all drew.
Scootaloo was lying prone on the floor holding a long black metal device in her front hooves, her eye blocked by something that to Twilight looked like a miniature telescope as she looked through it. It strangely resembled a small cannon, with an extremely long barrel.
Sweetie Belle stood on all fours, her horn alight with a light green glow as several knives of varying shapes and lengths floated in the air around her and a dangerous glint in her eyes.
Applebloom was, to the shock of the six present, standing on her hind legs and holding a object that looked like a rectangular box with a smaller looking viewing port on top and various other attachments. She was holding it like one would hold a crossbow.
Needless to say, an awkward silence followed.
Sweetie sighed in relief before shaking her head. "I have a feeling that's going to happen a lot." she muttered distastefully before sheathing all of her knives with swift precision, nonchalantly sitting back down as her two friends did the same with their own weapons.
More silence followed before Rarity spoke up. "Sweetie, is it really you?" she whispered, tentatively stepping closer. After that little display with her magic, she was frightened but the prospect of seeing her sister again outweighed the dangers.
Sweetie turned to her sister, getting up and trotting over. "Of course it's me," she said, her voice significantly different but still reminiscent of the filly Rarity helped take care of. "I know I look different, but it's really me... no tricks... no games."
Rarity smiled and gently embraced Sweetie Belle who returned the gesture. "Where on Equus have you girls been?" Rarity asked, her voice soft and laced with sorrow as several tears left her eyes.
Scootaloo piped up from behind the two, looking to Apple Bloom and Sweetie who both nodded. "We'll tell you... but its a long story." she sighed heavily, shaking her head and brushing aside more of her mane. She needed to get it cut when she got the chance. She sat down as Apple Bloom came over to her, nuzzling her lightly as Sweetie joined them after ending the hug with her sister. "You guys might want to sit down, we'll wait for the princesses to arrive then we'll get down to it." she explained when the others took a seat on the opposite side of them.
Now that the three were in the light Applejack could see the three young mares in front of her... were vastly different from the three troublemakers that often caused mischief and mayhem on a daily basis. All three were older, that much was obvious by the tone of their voices and how bigger they were. The three also appeared to be wearing odd forms of clothing and armor and carrying weapons the likes of which the elements have never seen before.
Scootaloo sat in the middle of the three. The clothing she wore was a dull shade of blue with a duller shade of yellow going around the collar that covered the majority of her body like a tight jumpsuit, several dark leather pads were stitched onto her legs and joints with a small metal plate, around her neck was a pair of goggles and a dark brown bandanna stained with red splotches and mud. Her wings were covered up by the suit so no one could see them, and she had two bandoleers wrapped around her barrel with several large pouches containing black cartridges. Scootaloo's face also bore several small scars, with a large one over her left eye that Applejack could now see was a duller shade of violet then the right. Two small objects colored black were holstered on her sides with the larger weapon she had pointed at them earlier was on her back.
Apple Bloom wore the heaviest looking armor out of the three, a large vest of an unknown dark green material was wrapped around her body, with a black tight fabric underneath covering her whole body much like Scootaloo's armor. Two large shoulder pads stood out from her forelegs that wrapped around her, along with small hardened looking plates of armor on her legs that were fashioned to not hamper her movements that resembled something like the leg armor of the Royal Guard. Apple Bloom also donned a large saddle bag crafted out of the same material as the armor she wore, the flaps were neatly shut but Applejack and Twilight spotted some objects poking out through them, some small colored strings and metal parts. Despite the armor's size and considerable weight, Apple Bloom didn't seem fazed by it. Apple Bloom's Stetson was almost like AJ's with the exception it was a dark dusty brown with a frayed brim, and a pair of welder's goggles wrapped around the top. Her orange eyes were sporadically looking around, almost like she was searching for some threat that lie hidden away in the castle. The mare's mane was longer and her bow was absent, the bottom of both her mane and tail was braided and seemed darker than it usually is.
Sweetie Belle was the most changed. Her mane was long, to the point it was hanging down all the way to her legs. Her tail was shorter in comparison however, and seemed clean as opposed to the other two. Sweets wore a light looking armor made of leather. Very small pads made of leather jutted out from her shoulders, her legs were left free as the sleeves of the suit were short, expertly cut by a trained hand. Around her barrel and legs, to Rarity's horror she saw several knives and other sharp instruments of varying sizes strapped to her body, butcher knives, cleavers and others one would find in the Griffon Empire or Minotaur lands. Lashed onto her sides were two large white boxes with the universial medical cross. Her face was pristine of dirt, save for a few red specks near her neck.
All three looked so much different than their younger selves. The three looked stronger, their bodies taut with lean muscle and their fur dirty. But they all shared one thing. Their eyes. Hardened gazes with a fire in them Applejack couldn't discern, and as the three whispered back and forth to each other the tone of their voices were harsh and cold, a bitter tone AJ couldn't believe she was hearing from three of the sweetest filles she ever knew. What happened to ya'll? she wondered, watching as Apple Bloom spoke into Scootaloo's ears about something no one could make out.
"Hello? Twilight?" a warm voiced called out from the upstairs.
"There's Celestia!" Twilight cried happily, dashing off to retrieve both her and her sister should she be there.
Sweetie Belle had gotten comfortable in her seat as she pulled out one of her knives and a whet stone before going about sharpening it, making a *Shink* sound with each pass. Her light green eyes focused on the shimmering blade as the six elements watched with apprehensive gazes.
Not able to take the silence any longer, Scootaloo spoke up. "So Rarity," she started, her voice sounding hoarse as she cleared her throat. "How has Ponyville been since we've been gone?"
The alabaster mare looked up, her eyes finding Scootaloo's. "Uh, Ponyville?" she asked, getting a nod. Rarity composed herself and replied. "A lot has changed since you three went... missing." she muttered the last part softly, but the three's keen hearing heard it anyway. "After the Voidling attacked, other towns underwent a similar fate, more ponies went missing. In fact you're the only ones to have returned so far."
Fluttershy nodded sadly as Applejack added, "that an' international tenses ave been on th' rise past couple o years." she told them. "There's also talk o war and th' like. Th' royal Guard ave been dispatched ta th' borders and there's factories goin' up, no clue what they got goin' on in there."
By then Sweetie had stopped with her knife, her eyes locked on Applejack's form once she had said war. "War?" She mused silently, "I thought..." she murmured to herself for several seconds as Apple Bloom spoke up.
"How big are those factories?" she asked, arching an eyebrow and crossing her forelegs.
"They're reeeeeeeaaaaaallllllllllllly big!" Pinkie said, stretching her forelegs out to impossible lengths. "Giant smoke stacks too, and lots of smelly stuff coming out of them, and they've been hauling a lotta metal and crystals into them... Do you think they're building a massive party cannon?" she asked, squeezing her cheeks together in a barely suppressed squee.
"Somehow Pinks, I doubt that." Rainbow rolled her eyes, shaking her head.
Any further talks about the factories was halted with the appearance of the three princesses. Celestia and Luna hadn't changed much, although Luna looked a tad taller than before. Once Celestia laid eyes on the three mares she smiled warmly. "Scootaloo, Sweetie and Bloom." she looked at the three, "it's so nice to see you back and well."
They all nodded, their expressions neutral as the Twilight took her seat in her original spot while both the princess of the sun and night took up spots on either side of the mane six. Celestia studied the CMC for a moment, eyeing their forms and weaponry with a keen eye as did Luna. Both having mixed reactions on what they were and why they had them... though they kept their mouths shut on the matter, leaving it for another time.
"Tis good to see the three of you are in one piece." Luna said, smiling widely. "We feared thou were lost to the darkness of the void."
Scootaloo looked into the mare of the night's eyes, Luna instinctively shivered for reasons she did not know. "Like we've told the others, its a long story about what happened to us."
"Weren't no cake walk that's fer fuckin sure." Apple Bloom muttered, a slight growl to her voice as Rarity gasped at her use of language, Applejack's ears twitched and Fluttershy hid in her mane.
Before anyone could question that, Sweetie slid her knife back into one of her holsters and said. "This is going to be long, so I suggest getting comfy. We're going to be here all night, maybe longer." she told them, light green irises boring into everyone of the others.
"Care to start Apple Bloom? You were our leader after all." Scootaloo suggested, leaning back and propping herself up with her front hooves.
Said mare sighed, taking off her stetson and shaking her mane loose before running a hoof through it. "Alright." she looked up, placing the stetson down on the floor next to her. She then began her tale...
"Quick, Sweets, Apple Bloom, this way!" a young Pegasus filly named Scootaloo yelled to her two friends, an earth pony and a unicorn came running after her as explosions from Ponyville rang out, shaking the very earth and scaring the three into yelping.
"What do we do?!" Apple Bloom screamed, the three galloping side by side as they ran deep into the forest. Luna's moon was high in the sky as they ran, a chilling wind cascading over their bodies like a cold blanket as the Elements of Harmony fought against the creature of darkness.
"We run you doofus!" Scootaloo screamed back at her, not taking her eyes off of the path. Well, it wasn't so much as a path as it was a hosh posh of broken twigs, leaves and tree limbs scattered about that no one has walked through in years. The howling winds only grew louder as Sweetie lagged behind, not used to running so far so fast in such a short time.
When the youngest of the three looked behind her, she shrieked as her eyes caught sight of the creature "Its coming this way!" she pushed her tiny legs faster and faster until she was running faster than the other two. Screaming in fear all the while.
Apple Bloom and Scootaloo both did the same once they looked behind them. The swirling mass of darkness snaking past trees and over holes and broken limbs as if they weren't there at all. it bellowed a call that sounded like a banshee shriek, causing the three fillies' hearts to skip a beat. The Voidling was closing in on them and Scootaloo could feel it beating down on them with each gallop, its rancid breath causing her nose to crinkle in disgust, the bellowing laughter sending chills down her spine and jagged claws snaking around her neck.
Then nothing.
Little did the Pegasus know she had her eyes closed the entire time, once she opened them she saw her two friends stopped in a clearing, both clearly tired and greedily inhaling air. Scootaloo stopped near them, startling the older filly as she gasped for air. "I think we lost it." she said, sweating dripping down her brow.as her eyes darted around the forest surrounding them. She saw nothing except darkness, and the faint outline of trees and bushes.
A part of her wondered if they would run into Timberwolves, that would be our luck wouldn't it? she thought humorously. Anytime they entered this blasted forest it seemed trouble was always waiting for them around every turn.
And it looked like trouble was rearing its ugly head once more.
Sweetie Belle gasped as the sight of the ghoulish purple eyes glared at her, stumbling back into Scootaloo who barely caught her in time, Apple Bloom stood in front of the two taking a stance as the orange filly got in front of Sweetie. "Just stay behind me, okay, Sweets?" Scootaloo asked her younger friend, looking her in the eye. She got a teary eyed nod as Sweetie ducked down, covering her head with her hooves as Scootaloo stood beside Apple Bloom. "What's the plan, AB?" she whispered.
"Ah don't know." Apple Bloom shivered, her eyes darting around the enclosure they had unknowingly trapped themselves in. "We're trapped trapped in 'er." the pony muttered, pupils turning to pinpricks as the Voidling chuckled, something told her it knew what she was thinking.
No escape.
"That'ssssss right, dear Apple Bloom~" The creature hissed. To Apple Bloom it sounded like a thousand voices all talking at once, distorted, stallion and mare, colt and filly all at once. She ducked down, covering her ears as it continued. "There issssss no essssscape~ Only darknesssssssss!" it shrieked.
The last thing they all managed before darkness engulfed them... was a collective scream.
"APPLEJAAAAAAAAAACCCCK!"
"RAAAAAAARITY!"
"RAINBOW DAAAAAAAAAAASH!"
*KRA-BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOM*
Undetermined Amount of Time Later
The morning sun crept over the hills, its hot rays piercing through the thick clouds and scorching the desert landscape and roadways. Then an explosion rang out not too far from a small farm. Of course explosions were commonplace along with gunfire laser blasts and screaming, so no one gave a shit and went about their day. Assuming there was anyone in the farm to begin with but the farm ain't the focus.
No no no, the explosion is the focus. The smoke from said explosion dissipated rapidly, with only a few scant trees having caught fire. Their two century old bark quickly being consumed by the dark blackened flames of the excess Void magic. Lying on the ground and covered in soot were three fillies, but you already know who they are.
Scootaloo cracked open an eyelid, the bright rays of sunshine burning and making her wince. "Turn out the light, Apple Bloom." she muttered, going back to sleep before she felt of her bed... which wasn't a bed, but instead was dirt. Her eyes shot open, and she immediately regretted it as the sun burned her retinas, she covered her vision with a foreleg squinting as she got a good look around to get her bearings. She saw a barren landscape all around her save for a few dead trees lacking leaves, and dead grass. Looking to her right she saw Sweetie Belle and Apple Bloom lying on the ground, both still knocked out from whatever it was that happened.
What did happen? she wondered, thinking back she remembered the Ponyville being attacked by something... then her and the other CMC took refuge inside a building belonging to Lyra Heartstrings and Bon Bon, hiding under one of the tables as the beast rampaged through the streets. Then it attacked their hiding place, prompting Rainbow to come and rescue them (once again from some creature they had no knowledge about) and then they fled deep into the Everfree... then... It attacked us... are we, dead? she looked at her hoof, then smacked herself in the head.
This proved to be the stupidest thing she's done after waking up somewhere.
She stumbled a bit before shaking her head, wincing at her new injury. "Dang it," she muttered as she looked to Apple Bloom. Walking over she nudged her friend gently, "Hey, AB get up." she said, getting a light moan in response. Scoots sighed then nudged her again, this time not so gently. "Hey, get up!" Scootaloo demanded, frowning as her friend turned over, biting her lower lip and squinting at her.
"Wha?"
"I said get up!" she enunciated with a kick to the older filly's side. "We got a problem!"
Apple wiped at her eyes rubbing away the crust as she stood up, popping her joints and shaking her head as her eyes opened, she first saw Scootaloo waking up Sweetie Belle, then saw the area around her. Barren of any life far as she could see... which was a good long way. Her eyes cleared up and she swiveled her ears, trying to catch any sounds that wasn't her two small friends. A stale warm breeze could be heard whistling around them, the trees creaked under the duress from the wind, far off somewhere to the south she heard cracks of what sounded like lightning but a look into the sky showed no storm was nearing.
Something... ain't right here. The filly thought to herself as a slightly angry Scootaloo and still half asleep Sweetie Belle trotted over to her. "Hey girls, something don't seem right here."
"What do you mean?" Scootaloo asked, tilting her head as Sweetie leaned against her, eyes struggling to stay open.
She sniffed the air, lightly shuddering. "The air don't smell right." she stated, her senses told her something was wrong, screamed at her that everything with this was just wrong. "Can't ya smell it?"
Scootaloo smelled the air as a breeze washed over her. "You're right... it's not... clean? It smells bad, like a swamp but worse." she choked, nudging Sweetie Belle to get her awake.
"Ah don't like this, we gotta get back to Ponyville."
Scootaloo nodded, and started forward letting Sweetie Belle fall over, jostling her awake. Then she stopped, "uh... do you guys know which way it is?"
Apple Bloom thought for a moment. Then the three shared a look, one they always shared when they thought about something like this.
"We're lost." they said collectively, sighing heavily and lowering their heads.
Little did they know, someone was watching them.
When the explosion went off an hour prior, someone was walking along the highways. A tall biped with tanned skin, and donning a suit of armor crafted out of leather with several armored plates over his chest underneath a worn black duster. A belt with pouches was strapped around his waist, and a small backpack was on his back. The biped, known as a human was male watched the pillar of smoke before it disappeared. "Hmm..." he hummed, reaching into his duster he pulled out a small pair of binoculars. Looking through them he guesstimated it to be a good distance away.
"General Lee, Sir!" a robotic voice called out. The human named Lee looked away from the smoke and turned his binoculars over to the right, staring at what looked like a black floating ball with several long arms, one with a small flame on the tip of what resembled a flame thrower, another with a green protrusion and another with a pair of clamps. This robot was the Mr Gutsy Model Military Bot, or as Lee called him. Private Forrest.
"Yes my Private?" Lee asked, grinning behind his specs.
The robot saluted crisply and sharp. "Scanners indicate the area is clear of hostiles for now, but the explosion might draw some unwanted attention from the commies!" Private Forrest growled in his robot voice.
Lee made a tut tut noise as he brought down his specs. "I don't think there will be any commies out here, after all I kicked their asses left and right and up and down and every other direction..." Lee said, turning back towards the smoke which had disappeared. "Come on, I wanna see what went boom." Without waiting for an answer he jogged off towards the area where he saw the explosion.
Private Forrest sighed before hovering off after him. "If you weren't my general I would have left a long time ago." he muttered to himself as he kicked his hover boosters into full gear.
Lee ran up a steep incline, his right hand on his hip holster as he stopped and started crawling. "Private, go into stealth mode." he whispered. The sound of a hiss could be heard as the robot disappeared from sight. Gotta love those Stealth Boy Bots. He mused. Remembering when he found the Private in a military robotics testing facility back east, needless to say Forrest became a lovable companion. Crawling up the incline he peered over the top, seeing the battered trees and the small craters pock marking the ground. "Whoa, something went crazy here." he murmured as he pulled out a black pistol, with the words Sorrow etched onto the side in gold with a pearl grip. He checked it before looking around with his binoculars.
Looking around he saw the trees were on fire.. but the fire was, Black fire, what the fuck? Was that an effect of the nuclear holocaust? or was this something else? He shook his head. Probably just some weird flamethrower or something someone jury rigged.
His thoughts were interrupted when he felt his Pipboy vibrated, looking down at it he read the message that came from the Forrest. "-Sir! Private Forrest reporting in, I've seemed to have discovered three strange creatures resembling Pre-War equines, of course they are unconscious.-"
Lee rose an eyebrow and typed in his reply. "-So what? Horses, what does that have to do with the blast?-"
A minute passed before another message rolled across the screen. "-These particular Equines are... colorful, and strange, Nothing like the pre-war records of equines I have on record.-"
The human hummed in thought. Colorful and Strange? he thought as he scratched the stubble on his chin. Might as well see. he decided as he crawled over the incline and typed up another message. "-Alright, I'll come over and check it out. Stay in stealth mode for now.-"
"-Confirmed!-"
A light chuckle escaped him. The private was energetic for a robot, and he useful. once he made it down he jogged through the burning trees making sure to stay away from the 'devil fire' as he called it until he came to another small hill. He dropped down and slowly crawled up, his pipboy picking up three green dots, (there would be four but Forrest was hidden) once he crested the top he saw them... and his eyes widened.
"... well shit, you weren't kiddin' Forrest." he whispered as he looked at the three fillies. All three of them standing around, looking at their surroundings. He could hear the voices coming from the three, and that made his eyebrows shoot up. They can fuckin' talk?! What is this shit! He grabbed his pipboy and hastily typed in. "-Forrest! Did you spice my whiskey with Jet?!-"
"-Negative Sir!-"
Lee shook his head, smacking his forehead a few times to see if he was hallucinating. He still heard them talking, and saw their mouths moving. I must be going crazy... but then again I am walking around a post-apocalyptic wasteland with a robot who thinks I'm a General in the United States Army. He titled his head at that, the world sure has changed a lot. Lee shook his head once again before staring at the three Fillies again. He saw one had small wings, that looked liked they couldn't hold up shit, and another with a horn. I think, the one with wings is a... what did Lucy call em? Pegasi and the horned one, a Unicorn? Yeah that was it, what Lucy called them from her old Pre-War fairy tale books he bought her.
"Ahm tellin ya we should go this a way!" The olive colored one with the bright pink bow said, her voice reminding Lee of a southern girl he met a while back.
"Why that way? There might be something dangerous that way, I say this way!" The orange Pegasus gestured to the opposite direction, pointing north.
"No way! Ahm th' leader and Ah say we go this way!"
"Nu uh!"
"Yea huh!"
"Nu uh!"
"Yea huh!"
"Nu uh!"
"Yea huh!"
Well, this is annoying... but also kinda funny! Lee laughed silently to himself, watching them bicker back and forth was humorous. The Unicorn seemed to mirror his thoughts, sitting on her rump with a hoof on her face in what he assumed was something akin to a facepalm. Facehoof?
The unicorn then spoke up. "Why don't we settle this with a bit toss!" she suggested, smiling at her two friends.
Both fillies looked at her. "That's a stu-" orange one started before the olive one cut her off.
"That's a great idea Sweetie Belle!" the bow wearing one beamed, reaching behind her mane she pulled out a small golden coin with her teeth... much to Lee's extreme confusion and horror.
What what? How'd she do that?! Just pulled out- he looked closer, seeing the gold gleam from the sun's rays. -a fuckin' gold coin out of thin air... I am flipping my shit right now.
The unicorn named Sweetie Belle took the coin, acting as a neutral party for the toss. She took the coin in her hoof and held it, again making Lee do a double take and wondering who spiked his whiskey this morning. Sweets held it up and said. "Heads, we go with Apple Bloom's plan, tails we go with Scootaloo's plan."
They may be weird, but goddamn it they have some fucking adorable names. He giggled in a totally unmanly way. Then again they are pretty cute horses? Ponies? What's the acceptable term here...
Sweetie tossed the coin up, all three had their eyes on it as it flipped through the air.
"-Five caps on the one called, Apple Bloom.-" Forrest messaged over, Lee chuckled quietly and messaged him back.
"-I'll take your five and raise you ten on Scootaloo!-"
The coin flipped through the air several more times before making its way back down to earth, it hit the ground with a soft *Plink* noise as all three gathered around.
It was heads.
Apple Bloom shot up into the air, somehow suspended for several seconds and yelling out a triumphant "YES!" before falling back down. Lee facepalmed.
"-Damn it, you win.-" Lee told Forrest, grumbling under his breath.
"-Huzzah!-"
The wastelander shook his head once more as he watched the fillies began leaving the area. Okay, they're heading south. He looked up from his position and looked southward. I was headed that way anyway, not for any reason though... might as well keep an eye on these three... something tells me they might need my help at some point. Lee concluded as he holstered his pistol and backed away from the hill and slowly made his way back to the road. Down south is that abandoned town, Axton I think it was called. Assuming there aren't any raiders camping out there, they'll be alright for now.
"-What is our current objective, General?-" Forrest questioned over the Text Message Rely System.
Lee thought for a moment, thumping his fingers against the hilt of his sword he had on his left side, sighing he typed in. "-Current objective is to ghost these three creatures, do not fire on them, that's an ORDER, they're innocents. I want to see what they're up to, as well as why and how they're here. They don't strike me as some kind of mutants.-" he told his faithful companion.
"-Roger sir, Ghosting is commencing.-"
With a nod and a determined expression, he set out! Strutting across the wastes like the king he was.
To adventure.
And glory.
And...
...
He just tripped over a pebble...
The dumbass.
Apple Bloom, along with Sweetie and Scootaloo had left the crater they awoke in and headed north as per Apple Bloom's instructions. The sky above was still covered in clouds and the air still smelled strange, but it didn't stop our three little friends from wanting to find a way home. The area around them remained the same, barren of any life save for the occasional gnat that insisted on hovering around Scootaloo's form, prompting her to swat at it, missing every time and grumbling afterwards.
The oldest of the three, Apple Bloom had decided to think about their current situation. Okay, we're in some weird desert like place, th' air smells weird, weirder than that time me and the girls ventured inta th' Swamp lands to git our Swamp Monster Hunter Cutie Marks, and Ah haven't seen hide nor hair of any other pony round. Apple Bloom shook her head. Ah hope we find something soon, or some place to hunker down. Looking out ahead she could make out several small buildings, and a smile broke out. "Guys, Ah see a buildin' up ahead!" she reported happily.
Scootaloo looked up ahead, and sure enough there sat a few small buildings. "Great! Maybe somepony there can help us out!" she said, buzzing her wings in excitement.
Sweetie cheered along with the other two and began running, followed closely by her friends. The three fillies galloped as fast as they could towards what they hoped was salvation.
Imagine their disappointment when they got there.
Sweetie was closing in on the town's entrance when her eyes took in the sights of the buildings, and their dilapidated nature. her gallop slowed and her smile faltered as the burned skeletons of the structures came into view, looming over her small stature like towers of darkness. Apple Bloom and Scootaloo both slowed behind her, the three of them eyeing the town with cautious gazes. The streets were paved with concrete almost like Canterlot, but it felt different and had small yellow lines down the middle. Light poles jutted out of the ground, most of which were broken or bent. And the majority of stores Apple Bloom saw were boarded up or burned out, their windows blown out or melted.
The light gray filly gulped, shaking as she trotted along. "W-what happened here?" she asked, her question fell on deaf ears as she saw some strange looking metal carriages sitting on the streets. Burned out shells, their wheels gone and windows blasted open. The shape of them was all wrong, and didn't have a hitch for anypony to pull it. That's weird, why are they like that?
Scootaloo, being the daring filly she was walked up to one of the stores and pushed on it. It didn't give, "Think somepony might be in here?" she asked, pointing to the store with a sign overhead that read Radiation King Televisions. The store's windows were intact but it was hard to see through them, as a multitude of soot and disrepair have caked onto it.
"Ah don't know." Apple Bloom shrugged her shoulders and moved over to the windows. She lifted up a foreleg and tried to wipe away at it but all she did was smug it and get it all over herself. "Yuck!" she cursed, shaking her leg.
Scootaloo chuckled and pushed on the door again, "Dang thing won't budge! Sweets, Bloom, help me out will ya?" the Pegasus asked, trying in vain to push to door open. Bloom and Sweets walked over to the door, taking up a position on either side of Scoots. "Okay, on three." She stedied herself, putting both forelegs on the door as the other two did the same. "One..." She looked to Bloom.
The Apple Family member nodded.
"Two..."
Sweetie nodded as well.
"Three!"
With a collective grunt of effort all three fillies pushed on the door with all their might, and the door gave way. Swinging open with a creak as the hinges squeaked and years of flaky rust fell off, the three fillies fell forward in a heap as several smells escaped bombarding their senses. Iron was one of the, and stale food. Apple Bloom shook her head from the cobwebs before looking up, this store was pretty big! Inside she saw several television sets sitting on shelves, most were cracked or broken with a few intact ones sitting around. Posters with a strange creature on them called the Radiation King was advertising the TV's along with radios and other electronic equipment.
She got up from the heap and walked inside as her two friends followed. The shelves were up pretty high, the top shelves too high for them to reach, or anypony for that matter unless you got on your hind legs and reached up. The counter had a register sitting on it along with a lamp, some pencils and clipboards.
"Hello?" Sweetie called out, her voice sounding almost amplified in the empty store. "Is anypony in here?"
They waited... and waited, but no answer came.
"Doesn't look like anypony's in here, Sweets." Scoots said, walking forward and deciding to look around. She stopped in front of one of the televisions and looked at it. The dials and nodes on it looked broken and rusted, the screen was spider-webbed with cracks and the antenna was broken off. "Why would anypony try to sell a broken TV?" she wondered aloud.
Apple Bloom shrugged. "Maybe this shop sells broken stuff and ya can buy it and fix it up." she suggested, looking around behind the counter. She found several bottle caps lying on the floor, along with some old papers and a tin can. "This place needs ta be cleaned up." she muttered, sticking out her tongue in disgust as she found a spoon with some caked food on it, the smell old and rotten. Looking closer at the counter she found a small sliding door, and grabbing it (don't ask how) she slid it open and inside the filly found more of those bottle caps, heck she found a small bag filled with them.
Why would anypony want so many bottle caps? Pushing those thoughts aside for a later time Apple Bloom continued rooting around inside. Pushing aside the caps and small booklets.
The youngest of the three decided to venture deeper into the store. Most of the television sets didn't seem to work nor did they look like they would anytime soon. The ceiling was falling apart, judging from the loose tiles and several pipes and dangling wires. The wallpaper was peeling and the wooden frame was burned in places and rotted, and the smell of rot and mold seemed to get stronger the closer she got to what looked like a restroom. She shivered a she felt a cold draft coming from it.
Sweetie took the time to think about what they were going to do. After all, they were in an unknown place far from home, or so it appeared. In a big town where nopony was around, with stores and carriages that were burned by what Sweetie thought was dragon's fire. Then it hit her... what if nopony was around, because whatever attacked this place... ate them? She shook her head, there was no sign of any bones or anything of the sort. Maybe they ju-
*Clatter*
Sweetie wasn't paying attention to where she was looking and stumbled into a room. It was dark to, no windows for any light. She shivered again, that draft... cold stale air washing over her like a musty blanket. Sweetie closed her eyes and concentrated on her magic, focusing her power into her horn to light it up. Sweetie recalled a simple light spell her sister taught her, it was fairly easy to utilize. She felt a tingling sensation on the tip and smiled, it worked! Opening her eyes she saw the shelves lining the walls, the boxes scattered about and surprisingly enough barrels, tools and other random junk. When the young filly looked down at what she nearly stumbled over, her eyes widened, pupils shrinking into pinpricks as she choked out a breathless gasp.
"AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!"
Both Scootaloo and Apple Bloom shot up from their friend's scream, dropping what they were doing they galloped to the back of the store and skidded to a stop as Sweetie bolted out of the back room. The filly ran past the other two and slid into a shelf, knocking over some small boxes and cartons. Scootaloo ran up to her friend and grabbed her, "Sweets, what's wrong?!"
The light gray filly looked up at the orange Pegasus, terror stricken. "T-t-t-t-there's b-b-b-bones in there!" she squealed in fright, huddling up and cowering under her friend.
Apple Bloom looked back at the room Sweetie fled from, the light from her horn was still alight and she could see the outline of said bones. Gulping down a knot in her throat she started for the room, "Sweetie, could ya make yer light brighter?" she asked, still moving towards the bones.
Sweetie cowered behind Scootaloo but did as she said, scrunching up her face and focusing on making her horn light grow stronger. Scootaloo gasped at the sight of the bones, Apple Bloom just stared.
Lying on the ground was a skeleton of sorts, blackened bones of a creature they've never see before. The skull was roundish, and had an almost demonic appearance to it only adding onto the horror of what used to be a living creature. Apple Bloom saw the teeth, and could make out several canines and flat teeth. She recalled a class she went to with the CMC regarding different species, one of which had both sets of teeth called an Omnivore, meaning it ate both meat and vegetables. This was one of them. It had long legs, and forelegs as well, and on the forelegs Bloom saw it had several digits, five on each like a Minotaur.
"W-what is it?" Sweetie asked, trembling behind a similarly terrified Scootaloo.
Apple Bloom knelt down, examining the bones further. She couldn't tell what it was. "Ah don't know... but whatever it was... its been dead fer a looooong time." she gulped. Apple Bloom had no idea what it was... but she had a feeling.
The Pegasus moved up a little closer, her eyes taking in the sight of the digits. "Hey wait... those look familiar." she said, looking at the paws. "Remember that crazy mare back in Ponyville?"
"... which one?"
Scootaloo chuckled, "the green one, what's her name? Lyra Heartstrings? Ya know the one that Rarity said was a lesbion."
"A lesbion? What's that?" Apple Bloom asked, something told her Scootaloo was saying the word wrong.
"Uh... I heard Rarity saying its when a mare likes another mare in a special somepony way?"
"Uhhhhh... okay..." Apple Bloom shook her head. "Anyway, what did ya mean bout Lyra?"
"Yeah! I remember when me and Dash were visiting her for something, and I was... uh... investigating-"
"You mean you were snoopin'!"
"Pfft! Same thing! Anyway, when I went in there I saw one of those skeletons inside!" the Pegasus spoke, gesturing wildly with her forehooves. "Lyra caught me though but she wasn't mad. But she said she found it a while back and said it was something called a 'hoo-man' or something like that, they were a bunch of weird monkey things she kept going on and on about."
"Huh," Bloom hummed, looking back at the bones. Studying them further. Wait a goshdarn minute... Her eyes shot open before she bolted out of the room and past her two friends before galloping outside.
"Hey! Wait a second!" Scootaloo called out, chasing after her with an eager Sweetie in tow.
Apple Bloom didn't listen, she ran outside of the building and started looking around. For what she wasn't sure, but something, no everything seemed off to her. The carriages, those bones, the buildings. Everything! She turned tail and ran for the way they came in, followed closely by Scootaloo and Sweetie. Apple Boom saw the posters hanging up on the walls, some showing more of those hoo-man's wearing strange armor and clothing, others depicting something called a Vault with more of those same creatures. Nothing added up.
Suddenly she tripped over something with a *CLANK-CLATTER* she tumbled headfirst into some bottles before skidding to a stop. craning her head behind her she saw a sign, and getting up she shook her head as a headache set in as she looked at the sign. It was old and faded but she could still make out what it said. "Welcome ta Axton, Texas. Home of th' Axton Brawlers." Texas?
"Hey Apple Bloom? What the hay's gotten into you?" Scootaloo questioend as she stopped near the sign, looking down and reading off what the apple farmer read. "Axton, Texas? What's Axton? or Texas?"
"Girls..." Sweetie spoke up, shaking from her encounter from the bones still. "I... I don't think we're in Equestria anymore... everything looks too funny, the carriages, the posters..."
"She's right Scoots," Apple Bloom agreed grimly, looking around the town and the sky. "Ah don't think we're anywhere near Ponyville... or in Equestria..."
Scootaloo's eyebrows arched up, "what, you mean... we're like, in another country?"
Bloom shook her head, her mane bobbing left and right. "No, Ah mean... we're not on our own planet anymore. Look around Scoots-" she told her friend, gesturing wildly to their current position, "-we ain't home anymore!"
Standing in town was Lee, in his hands he held his binoculars and a small device with a radar dish on it pointed at the three fillies. He was hiding on top of a billboard behind a blowup doll... because its the best cover possible in his opinion. He hummed to himself as he overheard their conversation with his Voice Capture 6000. "Ponyville, Equestria... oh god the puns are giving me the runs..." he smacked his forehead. "I just fuckin' rhymed didn't I?"
"I believe you did, sir." Forrest piped up from beside him, still cloaked.
Lee Pfft'd in reply. "Well anyway, did you hear what they said? They're aliens! They're straight up, aliens, private. Do you have any idea what this means?!" he asked, his eyes locked on where he thought the robot was, to the right... when Forrest was on the left.
"It means that the possibility of alien dangers do indeed exist and there is a possibility of aliens coming here to enslave the human race and probe you all while studying them?"
"...What? No, that's insane! What are the possibilities of aliens coming here to enslave the remnants of a broken world and probe them for the sake of study?"
Meanwhile, somewhere in the Capital Wasteland stood a lone small yellowish-green creature wearing a spacesuit with a large round helmet made of special glass. Carrying in his arms was a small weapon that its race carried, its large black eyes scanned the landscape for a new subject... it saw a lone figure, a human donning a duster walking the land with a small horned purple creature by its side.
And it was about to go and investigate...
Before it suddenly sneezed.
Back with Lee.
"No! That means that I was right!" Lee declared, standing up. "Aliens do exist! I was right Private Forrest!" he cackled to himself, hiding his mouth behind his hands. "Hee hee hee, I was right all along! Take that Brotherhood of Steel, I have proof!" Lee growled, laughing quietly to himself as Forrest did the robot version of a sweatdrop...
Oildrop... get it? hahaha, huh... okay, anyway.
"Sir," Forrest started, hovering near Lee who looked on the verge of a mental breakdown. "Do you require medical assistance?"
"Pfft!" Lee shot up, his blow up doll deflating as he pointed at the three fillies. "Nope! Objective is still the same. Let's ghost them, and see if we can't learn a little more about them."
The Mister Gutsy nodded. "Roger sir," he then saluted. "Permission to speak freely, sir."
"Sure, go ahead."
"When do we make contact with the three equines?"
The human hummed in thought, closing his eyes in thought. "Hmm... not sure, we'll hang back for now, I'm hungry and I don't think they'll be doing much. They know they're in Axton, but as for what world... maybe not, I'm not sure the last bit got fuzzy." Lee sighed and sat down, putting his gear back into his duster and pulling out a small tin box and opening it revealing some food. "Good ol apples." Picking it up he bit into it, savoring the juicy fruit. "Those caravans sure did have some good food on them, damn."
The robot nodded once again as it set its optics to focus on the three fillies, not really knowing what food tasted like because he lacked any sort of mouth and digestive tract, as well as not needing food or any kind of sustenance to begin with aside from fuel if that could count, he just went along with it. To pass the time, Forrest silently hummed the lyrics to an old song he and like many of his other patriotic brothers, were given to play during fighting against the commies.
Let martial note in triumph float And liberty extend its mighty hand A flag appears 'mid thunderous, The banner of the Western land...
Lee could hear Forrest humming anyway despite his wanting to be quiet. But instead of reprimanding him, he hummed along with him, the faint outline of a smile on his face.
Back with the CMC, the three residents from Ponyville all sat in the middle of the road. Their adorable faces scrunched up in annoyance as a tumbleweed blew by propelled by a whistling gust of wind from the north. Apple Bloom was pushing her brain to the limit, trying to figure out what exactly happened back in the Everfree. All she could remember were those chilling words it spoke to her before everything went black.
Flashback
"That'ssssss right, dear Apple Bloom~" The creature hissed. To Apple Bloom it sounded like a thousand voices all talking at once, distorted, stallion and mare, colt and filly all at once. She ducked down, covering her ears as it continued. "There issssss no essssscape~ Only darknesssssssss!" it shrieked.
Flashback End
Why did this happen to her and her friends? What did they do to deserve this? Being brought to a strange place none of them have any knowledge about, or any clue where they are, or what dangers might be lurking around. All they had to go on was the sign, and those posters they saw, along with some junk. Not exactly good enough ta help us out, that's fer sure.
Heaving a sigh, the flyer (not really) of the group looked around from where she was sitting, unsure of what to do. Usually when they were lost someone (mostly Twilight or Applejack) would come get them and bring them home after a stern talking to about why it was dangerous to do whatever it was they did. But now, there was no one coming to save them this time... Scootaloo breathed out and stood up, walking over to one of the posters depicting a strange character advertising something called a Vault. She didn't have any idea what a Vault was, but judging from what the poster said, they were some kind of safe havens for the humans. I wonder how many of those there are? She thought to herself, they sounded interesting.
"Girls." Sweetie asked, rubbing her foreleg with the other and looking down. Her eyes were misty and she looked depressed. "What do we do now?"
Scootaloo and Apple Bloom looked at one another, both sharing a look before coming to the same conclusion.
I have no idea.
In the ruins of a the town sat a nearby hotel. Its sign advertising it as the finest Texas has to offer in terms of good food and hospitality. Its windows were boarded up, the glass shattered or melted. The front doors were left wide open as a result of them being blown off from the Great War. Fires had burned the outside of the building giving it a blackened exterior, whilst the interior was damaged from similar fires and gunfire after the ensuing war that consumed the entire world.
Standing on the rooftop armed with a scoped hunting rifle stood a man clad in dark clothing with a black apron draped over the front of his pants, splotches of red and brown stained it from years of use. Around his chest and belt were several knives of varying sizes, some as small as a pocket knife to some as big as a cleaver. A psychotic grin was on his face when he spotted the three fillies milling around in the middle of the street.
Oh boy~ Fresh meat!
With the thought of getting some meat, he holstered his rifle and made his way downstairs, drawing his combat knives and cackling just loud enough for him alone to hear.
How will our three adorably small and cuddly fillies deal with this new threat? Find out next time on Vault-Tec Channel 6!
Apple Bloom, unsure of what to do joined Scootaloo as she inspected several of the Vault-Tec posters lining the walls. Most of them she didn't understand, why would these be all over the walls? Maybe whatever happened to this town was the reason for these Vaults. The town wasn't exactly in the best shape, and if those bones were any indication... something bad happened not only to this place, but possibly to other towns and cities too. When the young Apple family member looked around some more she noticed the roads were damaged and cracked, chunks of cement and pavement were missing and piles of trash and burned debris were piled up around the place unattended to.
Holes were opened up in the ground leaving massive craters where murky brown water pooled, skeletons of burned out buildings sat all around, destroyed vehicles and even more skeletons of the hoo-mans Apple Bloom heard Scootaloo called them. Whatever happened here was terrible she realized. She hadn't seen anypony around, no birds in the sky, not even any bugs. It was strange. The land around her seemed... dead, a shell of its former self.
Oh how right she was.
Little did she know somepony was sneaking up behind them, clutching onto a very sharp knife and eyeballing the three small fillies with a psychotic hunger in his eyes. his footfalls were quiet and practiced, like a hunter stalking his prey deep in the jungles. He took extra care not to step on any rubble as he walked through one of the alleyways, brushing past a dumpster. Several bottles were in his path, he stepped over them, tiptoeing much like child would sneaking into the kitchen for some cookies. Once he made it onto the street he quickly made his way over to the unsuspecting light gray filly.
When Sweetie's ears twitched his way he swiftly grabbed her up in his arm, she screamed loudly drawing the attention of her friends.
"Sweetie!" Both of her friends yelled as they turned around, and came face to face with the psychotic creature before them. When both of them saw the face, the smiling face and disheveled dirty blonde hair, and the bloodshot eyes.
They knew what it was... from the posters.
A hoo-man.
But for the sake of words and all of our collective sanity, let's call it a human...
"Who said that!?" he yelled, eyes darting around looking for whoever spoke. The human shook where he stood as the filly in his arms tried to escape his clutches, squirming and fidgeting in his sweaty and smelly grasp. "What the fuck are ya!?" he demanded, his knife arm shaking wildly as he pointed the knife at the two fillies on the ground.
Scootaloo and Apple Bloom's eyes were wide with fear as they saw the knife, and the dried red stains coating it tip to hilt. What is this? Who is this?! Apple Bloom shook with fear, she didn't know what to do! She wished Applejack was here, as the farmer knew how to handle tough situations just like she's always done. Of course she's never had to convince a strange creature in a different world to let her young friend go so it doesn't slit her throat and eat her... Ah don't think she had ta... Apple Bloom shook her head and looked up at the madpony (man) and spoke. "U-u-um, w-we're ponies," she told him, the man's eyes going wide when he heard her speak. "Please don't hurt Sweetie!" she blurted out, shivering.
"What the fuck! You can talk!?" The man smacked his forehead with the butt of his knife, only ending up with a headache. "WHATEVER! I'm still gunna eat you all! Starting with this little runt!" he yelled, he held his knife at her throat and was about to cut into her...
Before an orange blur tackled him in the stomach.
"AHHH!" he yelled when Scootaloo made contact, her head ramming him right in the solar plexus and making him let go of the extremely frightened filly. Sweetie bucked off of him and hit the ground with a roll, tumbling into Apple Bloom who ran after Scootaloo who, in the throes of her tackle didn't think her plan all the way through and opted to scream.
"Run for it!" she screamed, bucking the human in the face once again and bolting off of his frame. The man yelled in pain, clutching his now broken nose as blood spurted out coating his already bloodstained clothing.
"I'll kill you little shits! I'll fucking rape you, then eat you alive!" he screamed, getting up and grabbing his knife which he dropped when the pony tackled him. Once it was in hand he caught sight of the three fillies galloping down the streets at full speed, he growled. "GET BACK HERE!" He bellowed, sprinting after them with a lust for blood. His bloodshot eyes locked on their forms.
Apple Bloom chanced a look behind her, and her pupils shrank when she saw just how fast he was moving. She had to hand it to him. For a biped he moved pretty fast. Dang it! He's gaining on us! She screamed in her mind, pushing herself to go faster but she was already tired from the run back in the forest. Fatigue crept up on her faster then she would have liked, and she felt her legs burn. Scootaloo and Sweetie were the same, both of them were feeling tired and couldn't run for much longer. No! We can't stop now! Apple Bloom pushed the tired aside and ran out in front of her two friends, taking the lead she yelled. "Follow me!" then she hopped over a barrel and down an alley.
Scootaloo buzzed her tiny wings in an attempt to speed herself up, it helped to a degree. She managed to jump over the barrel followed by Sweetie who's eyes were bugging out. Both friends galloped after Bloom into the alleyway, running over the papers and bottles littering it from years ago. Posters were torn down and the fire from whatever burned the town and the damage had gotten worse the further they went in. Buildings were reduced to piles of scorched rubble, the carriages were broken down and taken apart by scavengers and looters, storefronts were pockmarked with small holes and deep gashes.
Signs and walls were desecrated with graffiti and marks. Doors boarded up, and some had been broken into. Smoke rose up from other places in the city with the sound of lightning cracking through the streets. Apple Bloom hazarded a guess it wasn't actually lightning but something else. It was too rapid, sporadic, that and there's no thunder clouds in the dark skies. Chancing a look behind her, Bloom saw the human stumble over the barrel they jumped over, cursing wildly and running after them again. "GET BACK HERE!"
Come on run run run run! Apple Bloom screamed at herself. She could hear the faint buzzing of Scootaloo's wings behind her, along with the *clip-clopping* of hooves on the pavement. The walls around her felt like they were closing in on her, the stained red bricks of the buildings seemingly closing in on her as they emerged in another part of the town. The roads and buildings were more battered the further they went in, cracked steel beams and scorched buildings were scattered everywhere.
Behind them ran Bill (let's call him Bill), screaming wildly and swinging his knives. "I'll catch you! and I'll fuck you up! and rape you! and eat you!"
Apple Bloom was scared out of her mind right now, and so were her two friends. Both of them huffing and wheezing behind her as they tried to keep up with the earth pony. Bloom looked around for a place to hide, but all the buildings were either boarded up or burned down, there was no place to run! Dang it dang it dang it!
"Where are we running to?!" Sweetie cried, trying to catch up to the two fillies in front of her. It was hard, considering she wasn't used to running this much. Her legs burned and sweat matted her brow.
"Ah don't know!" Bloom called back to her, looking around as the human's footfalls sounded closer and closer. Her heart started beating faster and faster, fear taking hold of her mind. He's getting closer!
"Gotcha!" Bill yelled, grabbing Sweetie by her tail and yanking her towards him. She screamed, her hooves trying to dig into the concrete.
"Lemme go lemme go lemme go! HELP!" She cried out. "Scootaloo! Apple Bloom!"
Both fillies turned around, their eyes locked on the human before them. Without a second to lose they both galloped full speed at him and once they got close enough, they jumped at him and smashed their hind legs into his stomach with a combined yell, knocking him over.
"Gah!" he yelped, letting Sweetie go as Apple Bloom turn and bucked him in between the legs, then going for his left leg. She was nowhere near as strong as her sister, but she was stronger than most fillies her age. With a satisfying crack in his leg the man went down, yelling in pain as his leg cracked from the combined force of the fillies' leg power. "You little bitch!" He grabbed one of his knives and threw it at her. Apple Bloom saw the knife coming and yelped as she ducked down, the knife careening off of the wall and landing near Sweetie and Scootaloo.
Apple Bloom was about to turn tail and run but the human grappled her back leg, "Ahh!" she screamed, feeling his grimy hands gripping onto her leg like a vice grip. the earth pony scrambled and kicked at him, only serving to fuel his anger and cause his grip to tighten around her tiny leg. Pain shot through her leg as the human twisted it, causing her to fall down with a cry. "Let me go!"
Bill's eyes bored into her like a predetor's, his teeth set in a snarl. "I'm going to fuck you up you little bitch!" Then to her shock he picked her up, and threw it at the side of a building with a yell. She hit it with a thump as Scootaloo tried to hit him again, only to be punched in the stomach and sent flying back into Sweetie Belle.
Apple Bloom groaned in pain, her head swimming as she heard Bill's growling and swearing. She tried to get up, to run away but she couldn't. her hind leg was burning, and she could tell she wouldn't be walking anytime soon, assuming she lived of course. Shaking her head she looked up in time to see Bill draw one of his knives and hold it up over her. Apple Bloom couldn't move, her vision swam and she felt unconsciousness taking her bit by bit.
"You're dead!" The knife came down...
And darkness took young Bloom into the void.
-ooo000=+=000ooo-
It had felt like hours, but Apple Bloom had eventually started regaining consciousness. The sound of fire crackling was what Apple Bloom heard when she awoke finally. The filly's eyes struggled to open, her body ached and she felt warm. Next to her she heard several voices talking nearby.
"So, what exactly is that thing?" She heard Scootaloo ask. "Looks like a weird suit of armor."
"Its scary!" Sweetie cried, no doubt shivering from what Apple Bloom knew was fear.
Then she heard somepony laugh, it sounded male and old, but not too old. Somewhere around Applejack's age. "Hehehe, he's nothing scary, are you scary, Forrest?"
"Of course not, General Sir!" yet another voice cried, this one sounded old, and... strange, almost like a voice out of one of Scootaloo's old video games. "I only scare my enemies, such as the commies!"
lWho are those two? She wondered, trying to open her eyes. They felt like lead weights over her eyes, but after some struggling she managed to open them. She could see the bright glare of the fire near her, along with the vague shapes of her friends. "S-Scootaloo? Sweetie?" She croaked, shaking her head.
"She's awake!" Sweetie Belle cried, bounding over to her and looking down. "Apple Bloom, are you okay?" She asked, her eyes showing worry even though Apple Bloom couldn't make it out, her vision was still blurry. "Apple Bloom?"
"She's probably still groggy in the head," The male said. "She did get knocked around a lot, give her some time kid."
The farm filly looked up at Sweetie, her eyes squinted from the flame. "Sweets," she looked around, trying to spot the male voice. "Who is that?"
Scootaloo took over for Sweetie Belle, trotting over to her friend's side. "Its one of those hoo-mans."
"Humans, kid, not-" He paused to laugh. "-hoo-mans, hehehe."
Apple Bloom shot up, but soon fell back down with a groan. "Ouch! a Human?! Ya mean like that one that tried ta' kill us?!" She nearly yelled, looking over near the fire as her vision cleared up. She could see the human, he sat near the fire next to a large floating object. This human she saw was extremely different from the one she saw, for one he looked more... clean, calm, and not as dangerous as the human she had been attacked by earlier.
He smiled when he saw her waking up. "Hey there kid, you alright?" he asked, his bright green eyes searching hers.
Apple Bloom was frozen, but she managed to ask. "Wh-who are you?" She questioned, shaking where she was laying as Scoots and Sweetie came over.
"Yeah just who are you, you never told us your name!" Scootaloo added, flaring out her wings as she stared at the human before her who sat calmly on the ground next to the fire.
The human, who we know as Lee said. "My full name is Lee Chang Huo, but you can call me Lee for short." He introduced himself, smiling a friendly smile. "As for who I am exactly... well... I'm a wastelander, like everyone else out here." he gestured to the area they were in.
Now that Apple Bloom could see, she saw they had moved away from the alley and were sitting in an alcove between two buildings. The only way out being a small walkways that was covered up, a single dark yellowish brown dumpster blocked off any way of getting out. Up above she saw the sun was gone from overhead, but it was still day out. It was getting late. Clouds moved across the skies, no doubt a storm was coming. The fillies could smell it, Scootaloo especially.
"Wastelander?" Sweetie asked, rolling the word around. "What's that?" She asked with a squeak, tilting her head at the human.
Lee hummed in thought, scratching the stubble on his chin. "Wastelander, well... that's what I am." He answered, pointing to himself and tapping his chest. "We are currently in the Texan wastelands of North America, just a few hundred miles or so away from the Mojave Wasteland." Lee looked down at the filly, causing her to shrink back. "Well, I can already tell you're not from this world, and if I wasn't so sure of myself I'd probably peg you as some crazy hallucination from being out in the sun too much." He jerked a finger at Forrest. "But Forrest here sees you two, and I know two people, IE a guy like me and a robot, can't have the same delusion. So that begs the question..." He leaned down further. "Just who are you three?"
Something stirred within the three ponies, prompting them to take stand side by side. Apple Bloom stood up on shaky legs and introduced herself. "Ah'm Apple Bloom!"
Sweetie piped up. "I'm Sweetie Belle!"
"And I'm Scootaloo!" Scootaloo introduced herself as all three sucked in a huge breath.
Uh oh. Lee's eyes widened and he could tell by some dark force that something bad was going to happen.
"AND WE'RE THE CUTIE MARK CRUSADERS!" They all cheered as loud as their tiny lungs could produce sound, the cheer echoed throughout the town bouncing off of the walls and alleyways and spreading like a virus... an adorable ear shattering virus.
Lee fell back, ears ringing as Forrest fell to the ground, entering a shutdown state. The human shook his head, shoving a finger into each of his ears and digging around before moving his jaw. Lee had heard many things throughout his life, explosions, rapid gunfire, and screaming and he had survived all of that. But these three fillies combined cheer had nearly deafened them. Sweet buttery Jesus! He thought, he would have yelled it, maybe he did but its not like he could tell. After a few satisfying ear pops he shook his head once more before looking down at the three fillies. "Cutie Mark Crusaders? Dare I ask what that is? and if I do are you going to cheer it?" he asked with a wince.
Apple Bloom, now feeling better decided to speak for them. "Well mister Lee, Cutie Mark Crusaders is what we call ourselves!" She said, gesturing to her flank. "We're all blank flanks, an' so we decided ta form the CMC ta help us find our cutie marks!"
"... what's a cutie mark?" Lee questioned as he looked over at Forrest who was currently knocked out. Cutie Mark sounded weird, but he wasn't going to say that outloud. Is Forrest dead?
"Its what tells a pony what their special talent is!" She cried, flapping her tiny wings generating a buzzing noise. "Which is what we're trying to find out, we want to fid ouut our special talent!"
Sweetie nodded, adding. "Hey! Maybe we can be Cutie Mark Wastelanders!"
All three gasped, and once again Lee was subject to a cheer.
"CUTIE MARK CRUSADER WASTELANDERS YAY!"
Lee felt like he was blasted by a cannon, falling back again he yelled. "SWEET BUTTERY FUCK!"
Sweetie looked at Lee, tilting her head and eyes gleaming with curiosity. "What's a fuck?" Sweetie asked innocently.
Lee didn't answer, only sighing heavily. Lordy luu what have I gotten myself into? he asked the cosmos, popping his ears once more.
-ooo000=+=000ooo-
An hour had passed and Lee's ears still hurt, Forrest had rebooted and was likewise hurting... in his servos, or something. He was watching as the three ponies from another world conversed with each other, again about earning their marks in being a wastelander. He wasn't entirely sure how that was going to work, from what he learned about the Cutie Marks. Whenever a pony did something, like construction or painting and knew they were good at it, they would get a mark on their flank telling them it's their special talent. He foudn the idea ridiculous, but that was the way of their world.
Seems kinda constricting to me, what if a pony wanted to be a writer but instead ended up getting a mark telling them their talent was building sandcastles? He laughed mentally, now wondering what kind of Cutie Mark he would get. Probably something badass, obviously.
"Excuse me," Sweetie asked, trotting up to Lee but staying a small distance away. "Um... do you know what happened here?" She looked around. "I haven't seen anypony other than you and that crazy guy, where is everypony?"
Lee sighed softly. "Well kid, that's a long story." he told her as he grabbed a small stick and tossed it into the fire, causing it to crackle. "I can tell you, but you might not like it."
"Now I wanna know." Scoots trotted over and sat down next to the fire where Apple Bloom was poking at it with a stick. "Can you tell us?"
"Alrighty then." Lee cracked his neck and cross his legs, getting into a comfortable position as Forrest hovered nearby, beeping silently. "Okay, well... where to begin." Looking up into the sky he murmrued something before starting his tale. "Well, as far back as I can remember. This world, was undergoing a crisis." Lee said, remembering what his grandpa told him.
"What kind of crisis?" The grey filly asked, biting her lip when Scootaloo shushed her.
Lee hummed in thought. "Well, there's this thing called Oil. It was used to power this world," he pointed at through the opening where a vehicle sat. "See those? those ran off of Oil and could take you anywhere you wanted to go, as long as you had it." He said, much to the CMC's shock. "You just got in, put in a key and started driving."
Sweetie held up her hoof. "Wait, you mean nopony pulls it like a carriage! That's ridiculous!" Sweetie squeaked.
"I know it sounds crazy, but its true." The human laughed. "We also had boats and ships that used it, and planes."
This time, Scootaloo raised her hoof. "What's a plane?" She asked.
Chuckling slightly Lee answered. "its this big thing made of metal that could fly through the skies," He held up his hand and made a buzzing sound as it circled it around in the air. "There were lots of them."
"Nu uh!" Teh orange pegesus shook her head. "No way, you're lying. There's no way!"
"Uh, I beg to differ little one." Lee frowned. "I am telling the honest truth, there were planes, all kinds that could fly through the air faster than you could blink." He shook his head. "Anyway, the workd ran off of Oil, Cars, Trains and Planes. Buildings and homes, the whole word ran off of it. And eventually, it started to run out."
Apple Bloom scooted closer. "What happened when it ran out?"
"... War happened." He said, like it was the most obvious thing ever. The CMC's eyes widened. "People started fighting everyone else for the last bits of oil on the planet, and prices for oil starting getting higher and higher until people couldn't pay for it anymore. Wars broke out all over, there were talks of World War Three happening. And soon enough it did," He picked up a rock, inspecting it in great detail before tossing it into the fire. "the whole world went to war."
"Everypony fought, over that Oil stuff?" Apple Bloom asked, eyes wide. Why would they fight somepony for something like that? "Why would they do that?"
"Whoever controlled the Oil controlled the world." He shrugged, leaning back on his hands. "The war I'm told, lasted for two hours... thousands of nuclear weapons were launched from missile sites, and billions of people were killed, shot, burned, blasted into tiny pieces, killed dead. The world ended..." His head fell back and he looked up into the sky, watching several clouds fly by. "Two hundred years have passed since that day, and here we are now."
Apple Bloom was speechless, as were her two friends. They had no words to say. Billions... dead... Bloom Shivered despite being close to the fire, her thoughts focusing on the war. Billions died over oil, all of them killed within the short time span of two hours... She was scared, more than she's ever been. This entire world ended, over something she didn't know about.
"People are still fighting today." Lee added, sitting up and looking at the CMC. "Of course its not over Oil, but trivial things. Like control of the wasteland, resources, power, religion, whatever they think they'll profit from. Lots of crazy people are out here, wanting nothing more then to kill anything that moves." he shook his head. "That guy that Scootaloo took out was one of the crazy guys."
The farm filly looked to Scootaloo, She did what?! Apple Bloom looked at her friend, now noticing the small bits of blood on her fur though it was hard to make out seeing how the blood was blending in with her coat. "You... you kill-"
"No!" Scootaloo cried, shaking her head. "I-I only grabbed the knife he had and threw it at his leg, he dropped to the ground and me and Sweets grabbed you and ran. Lee came a short while after we heard the thunder in the alley." She defended herself, shaking her forehooves back and forth.
"I'm the one who killed him," Lee told them nonchatlantly. "I blasted him after he tried to knife me."
That got all of their attention, looking at the human and his robot, Apple Boom asked. "You killed him?! Why'd ya do that?"
"Uh, well... For one thing he tried to kill me, and secondly he tried to kill you. If I let him live he would have come back to try and kill us all," He shook his head. "Actually, He would have raped us, killed us, raped us again and then eaten us. In that order," Lee shrugged. "That's the way of the wasteland, kids. Kill or be killed." He gave them a hard look, one that he didn't give often. "Look... I know you're just kids, and you think killing's wrong. Maybe in your world, its not exactly nescessary for survival... but out here," he stood up, pulling out his gun and showing them it. "Killing is a way of life, and its how I've lived my life since I was just a kid. And I doubt this is going to change anytime soon... if you're not willing to kill then you're probably screwed." Lee told them as he spun his handgun and holstered it without a second to lose.
The Cutie Mark Crusaders sat in silence as Lee took a seat by the fire once more, holding his hands over it as Forrest beeped once more. They didn't know what to say, so they just remained quiet as the wasteland around them.
-ooo000=+=000ooo-
"Well, I think its high time we left." Lee said as he picked up his backpack, shouldering it as the three fillies stretched.
"Um, if ya don't mind me askin' we are we going?"
Scootaloo decided to interrupt any response by asking "Why should we go with you anyway?" She glared at the human, her viloet eyes staring into his green ones.
Lee hummed, tapping his belt. "Well, you don't have to come with me, it just means less mouths to feed." He said, waiting a moment to et that sink in before adding. "And you could stay here and meet up with another crazy guy like Knivesy McGee and get killed." He held up a finger. "Or, you could come with me, which means I'll protect you and keep you outta trouble. Lord knows what people would do with ya'll."
Scootaloo gulped, backing down as Apple Bloom stepped forward. "What would people do ta us? Aren't there any other ponies here?"
The man shook his head. "Nope, there are a few horses I've seen. But they're not like you guys, they're not colorful and fucking adorable~" He sang, cackling, "as for what they would do... lots of nasty things involving needles and shovels." as Apple Bloom held out her hoof. "What?"
"Ah want your word, that ya'll protect us and help us find a way home."
Lee frowned slightly, "I'm not sure I can do that, get you home I mean..." Slowly but surely he bumped his fist against her hoof. "But I'll try kid, I'll try my best." he turned towards the exit and started walking. "Oh, back onto the horses. They do not talk, or squeak, or scream and bust an eardrum while knocking out a robot." He said as he left. With his promise in mind, the CMC followed him as he led them out onto the street. "Stick close to me, and if I tell you to do something, you do it. Alright?" He asked, getting three nods. "Good."
"How good are you at fighting?" Scootaloo asked out fo the blue, much to Sweetie's shock who gave her a look. "What? I'm just wondering, jeez."
"Kid," He looked back to her, flashing a smirk that reminded her of Rainbow Dash. "I'm the best there is."
And so, the CMC set out on an adventure. Following their bloody companion closely as he led them down the road, and into the vast wasteland known as the Texan Wastes.
The CMC have found Lee, and in good time too! Now the five have teamed up, the promise of home sealed with a hoofbump. How will our three adventures handle the big bad wastes?
Let's find out, next time on: Return on Vault-Tec Channel 6
"Hold up, a hoo-man?" Twilight asked, tilting her head in question when she stopped Apple Bloom's telling of their meeting with the creature known as 'Lee' "You mean those things that Lyra Heartstrings is obsessed about? You... it, they're real?!" Twilight exclaimed, the realization that the three ponies in front of her meeting a completely new species exciting her. Then, out of nowhere she produced a quill and parchment. "What do they look like? Do they have any special features? Just who is 'Lee' exactly!?"
To the three's relief, Celestia rose a hoof and stopped Twilight's questions. "I believe those can wait for another time, my student." The princess of the sun then turned to the three, studying their forms once more before adopting a slight smile. "This Lee individual... he helped you? Why is that?" She asked.
"Ah don't know why really." Apple Bloom admitted, scratching her head. More to relieve an itch then anything else. "He coulda left us, but he didn't... we owe him for helping us out when we were almost killed by that crazy human." As she scratched her head, small bits of loose dirt falling off and onto the floor.
Rarity caught site of this, and made a face. "My word! When was the last time you three have bathed?!"
The three looked to each other, exchanging conversation between with other wordlessly before looking back to the others... Silence.
"Like, a half decent bath? We've been gone for... six years?" Scootaloo muttered aloud. "I would have to say... six years since we last had one." She nodded with closed eyes.
*Thud*
"And she fainted, of course." Scootaloo added as both of her friends snickered at the older mare's action, then she smiled. "Good to be back."
"Before we continue this tale, shall we see about fixing you three up?" Celestia offered. "I can tell that ordeal you told us about must have been taxing, as well whatever else you've been through. How about we take a break for now, and see if we can't get you three some much needed relief." Turning to Twilight she asked. "What say we let them shower and eat before we continue."
As if on cue, three stomachs growled in approval, followed by three blushing fillies. "That does sound pretty good right now, I could use a nice hot meal that wasn't irradiated or over two hundred years old." Sweetie added, standing up and stretching as Applejack and Fluttershy gave her a shocked look. "What?"
"Ya mean ta tell me you three have been eatin' food that's over two hundred years old?!" AJ blanched, face growing green at the mere thought of doing such an act.
Fluttershy nodded. "T-that can't be good for you." she half whispered. "The hazards from eating food that old can't be good." She muttered, rubbing her hoof against her foreleg.
"Nope, it is not good." Scootaloo made a face, sticking her tongue out. "Having to eat that crap for six years was horrible, but, eh. It was either that or die."
Sweetie raised her hoof. "Some of that stuff was preserved, remember what Lee told us?" Sweetie asked. "Most of it had special preservatives that keep it from going spoiled. Even the meat they had was that way."
Scootaloo shrugged, turning to Twilight. "This place has something resembling a shower, don't it?" Scootaloo asked, gesturing to the crystal castle they sat in.
"Of course," Twilight nodded, scrunching up her nose as she suddenly became aware of a smell. "You three could use a shower."
"Quite," Celestia nodded with a warm smile as she looked at all three young mares. "You three should take the time to relax and get something to eat before continuing." She stood up, prompting everypony else to do the same.
The three young mares turned to look at each other, the thought of a nice long hot shower sounded heavenly to them. All three smiled and asked. "Where's the shower!?"
With a chuckle, Twilight jerked her head to the stairs. "I'll take you up there." She said, leading the three mares up the stairs as everypony else sat in the main room.
-ooo000=+=000ooo-
Apple Bloom, Scootaloo and Sweetie Belle, after being led upstairs to the shower hung back to talk to each other, just out of ear shot of the new princess.
"Um, Apple Bloom." Sweetie asked, lowering her voice as she trotted next to her friend and leader. Said mare turned her head towards the youngest of the three, raising her brow. "About telling them everything we know... do we tell them... well... everything everything?" She wondered. She could remember everything they went through, some of it she didn't exactly think was right or innocent to tell the others. After all, they've seen and done some things... terrible things while exploring the wastes with their human friend, Lee.
Apple Bloom hummed in thought for a moment, tapping a hoof to her chin in thought as they passed by several stoic faced guards. "Ah know that we did some thangs that we aren't proud of Sweets, but Ah don't feel right keeping anythang from mah sister, or th' others for that matter." Bloom told her friend. "We'll talk about this later, for now Ah jus' want ta get a nice shower." Leaning in closer, she whispered. "Haven't you smelled Scootaloo?" She giggled, making the grey filly giggle as well as the orange mare stared at both of them.
"I can hear both of ya, remember?" She said, tapping her ears which she flicked. "And besides, you both smell just as bad as I do." She smirked as Twilight stopped next to a door.
Turning around to face the three, Twilight announced. "Well, here we are girls." Her horn then lit up with a purple hue and the doors opened up, showing a massive room with several large baths, hot tubs and other basins of water. Shelves filled with all kinds soaps and shampoos sat above just within reach, with others just a little bit higher. The smell of fresh clean soaps and water hit was a nice one.
"Oooooo~" the CMC looked all around the inside of the massive room, taking in the wondrous sight of the crystal bathroom and its luxurious showers and baths.
"You girls can freshen up here, I'll have somepony cook something up for you when you're done." Twilight looked to each of them and their starstruck expression, a humorous smile making its way onto her face. "Have anything in mind you want to for dinner?"
"Anythang'd be fine Princess Twilight." Bloom said, unclasping her armor as the other two did the same. In truth, anything would be absolutely perfect, as long as it was fresh and cooked to perfection.
Sweetie nodded, taking off her knife harness. "Same here, eating two hundred year old food on a daily basis will make anything seem better than that."
Scootaloo also nodded, pulling off her weapon and setting it aside against the wall. However, it was different now than it was before, instead of it looking like a cannon, it appeared to be folded up. "Those Fancy Lad snack cakes weren't so bad," Scootaloo defended, unzipping her suit. "A bit old, but they were pretty good."
Twilight had no idea what they were talking about. Fancy Lad? Must be a form of food on that world they were talking about... oh, the possibilities of learning new things! She shook that thought away, these three had been through a lot and she didn't want to pressure them into telling her about that world... just yet. "Well I'll go and get something ready, you three relax and we'll all see you down for dinner." As she turned to leave, she saw Rainbow Dash standing outside, her having followed the four not too long ago. "Dash?"
"Oh, uh... hey Twi." She greeted awkwardly. "I was just hoping to talk to Scoots is all," Rainbow said, looking at the orange pegasus behind Twilight who was taking off her jumpsuit. "You don't mind, right?" When Twilight shook her head, she stood aside and let Rainbow into the shower.
As Twilight left, Rainbow watched Scootaloo as she took off the suit she was wearing. Rainbow could tell how much the young mare had changed. her coat seemed to be a darker color than usual, her eyes darkened, the left one being darker due to the scar present over it. When Scootaloo's jumpsuit fell off, Rainbow's eyes widened when she saw how much she changed body wise. The young pony's body was, for the lack of a better word... messed up. Her coat below her neckline was covered in dark patches, the reason for that was because of scarring making the coloration darker, and another long dark patch across her neck. Scootaloo's body was covered in scars, large and small. And it appeared she had her Cutie Mark! Which looked like a black crosshair. The most different and shocking however, was Scootaloo's wings, they were blackened, the orange feathers gone and replaced with black ones that reflected the light a little.
Scootaloo... what happened to you girl? Gulping down a knot in her throat, Rainbow trotted forward and put on the best smile she could muster. "Hey there, squirt." Rainbow grinned.
Scootaloo turned to face Rainbow and smiled back. "Hiya Rainbow Dash," Scootaloo surprised Rainbow with a quick hug, then pulled away before Dash could do anything. "What are you up to?" She asked, ruffling her wings as she tilted her head. It felt good to be out of the suit, as it had started to itch.
"I hate to be that pony, but what in the buck happened to your wings?!" She half whispered half yelled at Scootaloo, now that she was closer she saw the wings seemed a bit... off to her, like instead of being downy they were... some sort of black shiny material.
Looking behind her and extending a wing, Scootaloo's face turned dark for a second. "Oh, uh... I'll tell you when we go back to the story." Looking back to Rainbow Dash she added. "Its best if everyone... I mean everypony, heard what happened." She turned around without another word, joining her two friends and leaving behind a confused and slightly skeezed Dash.
Scootaloo... A sigh and Rainbow turned around, trotting out of the showers and back down the hall to her friends.
-ooo000=+=000ooo-
"What did Dash want?" Apple Bloom asked, shrugging off her armor and weapons. The heavy barding she wore hit the floor with a thud, her weapons as well. After getting it all off she took off the black undersuit, unzipping it and folding it once she got it off.
"She was just wondering bout my wings." Scootaloo answered, flexing said appendages before flapping them. Taking flight for a couple of seconds before landing. "I'll have to tell her bout that too..." Scootaloo sighed, not particularly feeling good about speaking to Rainbow Dash about her wings. "Who knew telling a story had to suck so much."
Sweetie nodded, her armor and equipment off and laying off to the side with everypony else's gear. "I know how you feel Scoots, but it'll have to come out sooner or later. Same with our marks," she said, showing her flank which had a mark of crossed knives over a medical cross. "We got ours in... things Ponies don't normally get their marks in."
Bloom sighed, looking at her own flank which bore a mark of a screwdriver and a hammer crossed over a computer screen. "That is true... very true... Ah wonder if anypony in this world got their mark in decapitation?" She mused, getting a dark chuckle from both friends.
"Maybe back in the dark ages, during Nightmare Moon's rebellion, or Discord's rule." Scootaloo said, smiling grimly as the thought. What even would a mark like that look like?
Without any further ado, all three made their way over to one of the showers off to the far side. The inside of the shower they walked into was large, big enough to accommodate several ponies at once. Apple Bloom had to mess around with it at first, as she had no clue how to turn it on. She was used to working different types of shower knobs, but eventually she got it working and soon a stream of hot relaxing water hit the three mares, and they all let out a collective sigh.
"Oh sweet Celestia." Scootaloo groaned as the water cascaded across her back. Her wings extending out and letting the water hit them, the warmth of a long awaited and well deserved shower made her feel six years younger. She opened her maw, catching some of the water before gurgling it and spitting it out. "Ahh, I need to brush my teeth." She spat, shaking her body slightly as the other two mimicked her actions, both looking just as revealed as Scootaloo.
Sweetie had the biggest smile on her face as she regarded her two friends. "This has been a long time coming." She said, her horn lighting up and grabbing a few bottles of shampoo on one of the shelves. "Any requests?" She said, taunting her two friends with the bottles and fluttering her eyelashes.
"Don't tempt me Sweets, or I'll knock you down and tie you up." Scootaloo warned with a smirk, swiping at one of the bottles with her wing and grabbing as Sweetie giggled.
"So violent~" The grey filly cooed slyly, flicking her tail in the orange pony's direction, sending droplets of water onto her muzzle. "You need to relax more, we're home now." She said, opening the bottle and squirting out a bit of the sweet smelling goop onto her hoof before rubbing it into her mane. Sighing at being able to finally get the dirt caked deep into her scalp. "Ooooh that feels good."
And so the three showered, taking advantage of the scrubbing brushes and scrubbing away the six years worth of dirt, grime, muck, and blood. Finally being able to have a nice long hot shower made the CMC feel fantastic, more than they've felt in years. Loose fur and strands of their manes and tails came loose hitting the floor of the shower and being washed down the drain. Eventually an hour passed, and the three were as clean as a whistle, coats sparkly clean and free of any dirt, blood and other sticky nasty things, and they felt ten pounds lighter.
Scootaloo trotted out of the shower, using a towel to dry her mane with. "Damn that felt great." She said, sighing as she dried her mane and tail, taking a seat on a bench as Sweetie and Bloom did the same as she did.
"Ah agree with ya there Scoots," Bloom nodded, tossing her towel away and shaking her mane with a sigh. She truly felt better then she's ever had before. "Feels great ta finally have all th' muck offa mah coat."
Sweetie hung up her towel and looked over at her ad her friend's equipment, pondering something. "Hey... now that we're back... what happens to our stuff?" She cast a look at her knives, feeling a sense of dread about having to give them up. She's had them for a long time, and giving them up... didn't sit right with her.
"Ah ain't sure Sweetie Belle," Getting up, Apple Bloom trotted over to her armor and weapons, nudging them with a hoof before looking back at herself. She felt naked, both metaphorically and literally, and she mirrored Sweetie's thoughts as did Scootaloo. Giving up their weapons, something they carried with them for years that had saved their lives more times then they could count... wasn't something they wanted to do. Equestria or not. "Ah guess we could put em away when we go home, in case of a rainy day ya know?"
"I suppose." With a sigh, Sweetie picked up her equipment and made to put it back on when she caught the smell of dried blood and sweat, cringing she put the suit back down. "Maybe we should get our clothes cleaned too, they smell horrible."
Taking a whiff of her own armor, Apple Bloom made a face. "Whew! Maybe we should, mah armor smells like Deathclaw blood."
"... maybe that's because you killed one?" Scootaloo suggested in a tone of voice that told Bloom that's exactly the reason why.
The apple pony shrugged and put her armor back down. "We can settle th' gear business later, Ah reckon there's some food down below that's callin' our names." With a smirk she bolted out of the shower room, smacking open the shower door and hitting a poor stallion on the other side and sending him sprawling to the ground. The CMC were too busy laughing and running to notice him give them the stink eye.
He watched the three with a quivering bottom lip. "Why am I always getting hit by doors?"
"I dunno, maybe you're a door magnet. Might explain why you're not getting any mares." His partner, a batpony mare giggled with a toothy smile.
"I hate you all..."
-ooo000=+=000ooo-
"So, think they're done yet?" Applejack asked, getting antsy at having to wait for her sister. She knew there was nothing to be scared of in Twilight's castle, but she didn't want to rick losing her sister again.
"I'm sure they're fine AJ." Twilight reassured her friend. "You did see how dirty they were right? They're probably taking their time cleaning up, after all. Six years with no hot water, they're probably taking advantage of the hot water." She giggled, holding a hoof to her mouth.
This got everypony at the table laughing kindheartedly, then they heard more laughing coming from the stairs. Looking up they saw the CMC gallop down the stairs, sans clothing, armor and weapons. They looked like normal ponies now... well... almost.
Luna's eyes widened a fraction when she saw all three of them in the light. The three had been wearing full body armor and clothing, so she couldn't get a good look see at their coats or anything else, but now that it was gone, she could see everything. Scootaloo was different from the skinny flightless pegasus Luna knew of years before. Her wings were fully grown, if not bigger then normal and appeared to be black as night. At first, Luna thought she had something called Black Wing, a coloration defect that appears in a foal pegasi's wings at a later age that turns them completely black. But a closer look at the base of her wings showed two faint scars that went all the way around. Scootaloo also appeared to have a decent muscle mass, akin to that of Rainbow Dash, sleek and strong.
Apple Bloom's body was similar to Applejack's, her legs looked strong, and she had a slightly bigger muscle mass, but not enough to make her look like a stallion or anything, she looked toned and well built. Several scars, mostly large ones adorned her sides and chest which were round and others that resembled slash marks. And when Apple Bloom smiled, Luna noted her teeth were different looking, however she couldn't tell how different from her current seating.
And finally Sweetie Belle, while not as muscular as the other two, she certainly filled out her body in a different way. Her body, much to Rarity's slight jealousy, had given her slight curves and a nice build that would make many young models envious of how beautiful she looked. Her coat shone bright and her eyes glimmered in the light, her mane was silky curled at the bottom much like her tail. And surprisingly, she didn't have many scars, save for a couple of small ones around her fetlocks.
"So... what's for dinner?" Scootaloo asked, wings extended happily as she eyed the table they sat at.
Twilight clapped her hooves twice, then the table was soon swamped by servers and covered in an extensive amount of tasty and scrumptious looking food. Cakes, pies, muffins, salads, and other delicious food awaited them all. "Well everypony, let's dig in."
"Awwww yeeeeeeeaah!" Scootaloo cried alongside Sweetie Belle and Apple Bloom. The three wasted no time in gathering the best looking food and piling it on top of plates, they grabbed whatever was in reach.
"I take it ya'll are hungry?" Applejack asked with an amused grin as she watched Apple Bloom shove two cupcakes into her mouth, chewing it like a hungry wolf.
"Hell yeah we are!" Apple Bloom giggled, grabbing a cup of water and downing it in three huge gulps. She slammed the cup down and breathed out a happy sigh. "Wheeew, that's good water."
Scootaloo nodded. "I used to hate water, even more so when we were on Earth." She lifted up her glass, Sweetie lifting hers up and Apple Bloom refilling hers before lifting it up as well. "Now... I never thought I'd love seeing it as much as I do now."
"Here here!" The three cried, clanking their glasses together before downing them.
Twilight, meanwhile was writing down notes in her small book, which was hidden beneath the table. "How bad was the water on that world anyway, on Earth?"
"It was bad." Sweetie said, frowning as she remembered drinking the hazardous liquid. "Really bad. Like... grow a new limb if you're not careful bad."
Twilight perked her ears up at that. "Was the water always in that shape?"
This time, Apple Bloom answered that. "Naw," She waved a hoof, the other picking at a cupcake and putting pieces of it in her mouth. "Ya see, like Ah said before, Earth was involved in a World War, where every country went to war with each other over a precious resource called Oil."
Rarity tiled her head. "Do you mean something like, Lamp Oil?"
The apple mare shook her head. "Naw, this was different oil." She plucked a cherry off of one of the other foods she had and popped it into her mouth, chewing thoughtfully. "Its buried deep beneath the earth, and ya have ta drill to get to it sometimes. Its used to power earth's war machines, Ah mean, from what Lee told us, it was used to power their entire world once."
"Trains, boats, ships, those cars, tanks, houses, entire cities." Scootaloo added. "All of it was powered by oil in some form or another, maybe not directly but oil played a big part in the humans infrastructure and their daily lives. Without it, lotta things wouldn't work right, or at all."
"You said it powered it once..." Celestia asked, deciding to ask her own question. "What exactly happened to Earth?"
Apple Bloom shrugged. "Everyone killed each other over it."
"Least a billion of so were burned alive or blasted into a bunch of tiny sticky pieces when they didn't get to the vaults underground." Sweetie added, looking down at her plate with a bored expression."Others were just killed before getting underground, or mutated into horrible disgusting monsters that'd kill you soon as they look at you." chewing on her food with a dismissive look on her face. Looking up at Scootaloo she asked. "Can you pass me a cupcake?"
As Scootaloo used her wing to pass one, everypony at the table had stared at Sweetie. Mostly because of the casual way she said that. Everypony, with the exception of the two princesses had gone white at that information. Celestia and Luna just looked... disturbed that Sweetie Belle, the youngest of the three could easily dismiss something as horrible as that.
"B-billions?" Applejack asked. "Billions of ponies got themselves killed, over oil?" The entire idea seemed idiotic, ludicrous even!
Fluttershy, ever the soft hearted and caring individual had tears in her eyes. "H-how could t-they do such a horrible thing?"
"Cause they could." Apple Bloom admitted. "Th' word ran on oil, an' they were running out... everything spiraled outta control and, eventually they started nuking one another. Killing off a good portion of the plane'ts population, both human and animal." She absentmindedly rolled around a pea she found, "Th' people still there are trying to rebuild what they can, but like Lee said."
All three stopped what they were doing, and said. "War never changes."
Twilight felt a shiver run through her body. Why does that sound so ominous?
Luna was next with her question. "How much of the population remains?"
Sweetie looked up, tongue sticking out in the cutest way possible before saying. "There were... close to... I think nine billion humans... and we were in the USA... so... I think... somewhere around a million or so? No one knows how many people are left, its not easy to get across the ocean without a Vertibird or a ship that works worth a damn."
Rarity cleared her throat at the language. "Must you be so, vulger Sweetie Belle?" She asked sweetly.
"... Yep."
Rarity sighed, hanging her head. Just fantastic.
Sweetie leaned over to Apple Bloom, "Should we continue telling the story over dinner?"
Her answer was cut off as Twilight asked. "Could you continue? I would love to hear more about this world and its people."
"Okay... hmm... well, we were following Lee..."
And so the story continues over dinner, the mane six and the princesses now know a little of how terrifying Lee's world is. However, this is only the beginning of the horrors the CMC encountered...
Stay turned next time, for the next chapter of: Return, on Vault-Tec Channel 6
Texan Wasteland - Six Years Ago - Five Hours after CMC Joins Lee and Forrest - Apple Bloom's Perspective
Five hours had passed, and our little group had ventured far down the road, leaving the town of Axton behind. Lee was up with his faithful robot soldier, Forrest. Sweetie Belle, Scootaloo and I were sitting beside the two, sticking together as we looked around the wasteland. The clouds overhead moved on their own, much to the our shock. When Sweetie questioned this, Lee had told them that on this planet, the weather moved and operated by itself.
Scootaloo called bullcrap on that, and Lee had sat us down on the side of the road, and sat down himself. His eyes staring into the sky as the three stared at him, Forrest just floated next to him.
"Why're sittin' here?" I asked, looking at the human warily.
"Your friend called bullshit on the clouds moving on their own, so I am showing you, it is in fact: Not bullshit." Lee replied happily, leaning back on a rock as he watched the skies above. Several graying clouds overhead started moving to the south from a northern wind, Lee watched with a flat face as the wind blew over us and whipped up sand.
Me and the other two, however, watched as the clouds moved by themselves, mouths agape and eyes wide. "How is that possible?!" Sweetie questioned, pointing to the sky.
"It's like in the Everfree, the weather acts on its own!" Scootaloo said, looking to the human and asking. "Is all of your weather like that?"
Lee nodded. "Yep, humans have no control over the weather. I know that some people can predict the weather patterns and such, but actually controlling it? Fat chance!" He laughed, leaning back as his chuckles echoed across the wastelands. "I mean, if the world hadn't destroyed itself, then maybe we might have developed some weird ass technology to control it." He shrugged. "I mean, who would think to develop technology to control the weather?"
Meanwhile, in a different kind of wasteland
"Ah, ah, ACHOOO!" A crystal white unicorn sneezed, rubbing her nose as she looked up. "Why do I feel like somepony is talking about me?" She shrugged, going back to working on her device.
-ooo000=+=000ooo-
Lee just laughed as I crossed my forelegs over my chest. "A machine to control th' weather? That don't sound like no laughin' matter."
"It ain't," Lee told me, mimicking my country accent. "Fact of the matter is, if someone had something like that under their control, chances are the Brotherhood of Steel or the Enclave would be all over those poor bastards." He added, I winced at his casual use of cursing.
I rounded on him. "Do you kiss your mama with that mouth?" I asked him. If Applejack were here she would have whooped his behind by now.
However, Lee laughed again. "Hahahaha! My mom's dead, Apple Bloom," he laughed, my eyes widening as Scootaloo and Sweetie Belle looked at him. "Hell, she was the one who started to, dad as well, the lanky bastard."
"How could ya talk about yer parents like that?" I yelled at him, I had never heard somepony talk so lightly about their parents deaths before, or even laugh and he was doing both! "Didn't they raise you better than that?"
The human just gave me an amused look, raising an eyebrow. "They raised me to kill raiders, to fend for myself, and to look good while doing it!" He chuckled, looking over at Forrest. "I don't know if they loved me or not, but I don't feel like sharing my life's story with a bunch of kids." Standing up, he dusted off his pants and said. "Let's get moving, I wasted ammo saving your butts and I need to restock."
Without another word he started off down the road, me, Scoots and Sweetie in tow. "Where are we heading?" Scootaloo asked him.
"To a town, I like to call, Junktown." He told us, continuing to walk down the road.
And so, we walked. Along the way I looked around the area, for miles it seemed to comprise of nothing but desert wasteland, with a few dead trees, bushes and some wreckage sitting about. It's hard to believe this place was at war... but Axton proved me wrong. Crows soared overhead, their caws making me look into the sky once more before looking out ahead. Some more of those cars were sitting on the roads, tires and windows gone, reduced to nothing more the hunks of metal.
Lee would give them a quick once over before continuing on, the reason for this I couldn't figure out to save my life. They looked useless, but he kept looking. Behind me Scootaloo and Sweetie Belle were looking around, same as I was. There wasn't much to look at, not a thing and I ended up thinking about Lee, and his parents. Why would he talk about them in such a... vulgar way? They should have raised him better than that, but then again, maybe parents are different in this world.
Maybe we would find out, in Junktown.
-ooo000=+=000ooo-
Junktown was... in a word... junky. I mean it, the entire town was, made, built and ran off of junk. When we first came up on it, I thought it was a ruin like Axton was, but Lee walked up to the wall of junk and knocked on it. I was about to ask him why he was, but then the junk slid to the side and Lee started talking to another human behind it, gesturing to us, and his backpack. After a few... curse words, the man stepped to the side and Lee herded us inside.
The town wasn't what I expected, I mean... I've seen some weird places back in Equestria, but this one... was a different one in its own category. The houses... well... shacks were made out of pure junk, more of those vehicles, and whatever else they could find. The entire town was built out of junk, the shops around us carried junk, these people wore junk, they carried junk as weapons...
Whoa...
"This is Junktown?" Sweetie squeaked, getting a few looks from people walking around us.
Lee nodded. "Yep, this is Junktown, home to Junk, junk and oh look!" He kicked a tin can, making it fly forward and bounce off of what looked like a tower of steel. "More junk." He laughed as somepony ducked, shaking at fist at his antics. "Anywho, we're here because I need to get more ammo, that and... other things..." He trailed off, shaking his head. "Um, just follow me." He said, leading us down the trail.
And so we walked through the town, more than a few people giving us strange and bewildered looks as we passed by them. I saw people dressed in weird looking plate armor made of scrap, holding clubs and boards with nails sticking out of them. Everypony here looked uneasy at first, but once they laid eyes on Lee a few of them seemed to... just look away, and go about their business.
"This place is a dump." Scootaloo whispered beside me, having caught up and was leaning towards me.
I shrugged. "It is... but, why don't they leave?"
"There ain't nowhere else to go." Somepony spoke up from behind us.
"Ahhh!" I yelped, falling forward before turning around, Scootaloo and Sweets standing by my side as we looked at the culprit. It was a human, dressed in a hoodie, torn blue pants and boots.
The man looked up at Lee, smirking. "Got some new companions Lee my boy?" He asked, cackling.
Lee turned around, eyeing the man before nodding. "Yep, so what are you doing out of your hole, Tinky?" He asked the man, who was twitching slightly.
"Well a little birdy-" A loud caw sounded in the skies above, "-I mean big birdy told me you found three new little critters, and I just had to see what they were~" His wild yellowish brown eyes turned to lock on my own. "And I have to say, this is right up your alley Lee."
"And what do you mean by that?"
"What I mean is, you're always making friends with weird shit." Tinky told him, making me frown.
"We are not weird!" I told him.
"Yeah! If anything, you're the weird one!" Sweetie chirped from my left as Scootaloo stood to my right.
Tinky tilted his head as several people stopped to watch us, which made me a tad uncomfortable. "Well, yeah I'm weird, if you knew me, but you don't." He smiled. "You three shouldn't even exist here, and yet you do." He looked back up to Lee, turning around and walking away.
As he disappeared into a shack on the far side of the town, I turned back to Lee and rose an eyebrow. "Who was that?"
"That was Tinky," He sighed, rubbing the back of his head with an indifferent expression on his face. "He's... one of Junktown's barterers, a bit loony in the head like Dusty, just... not as much." Lee turned back around, facing towards a large building we had stopped next to. a small sign out front labeled this building as a store, the words Rustbucket's Wares. The outside looked like a shack, but then again every building looked like a shack. "In we go~" He said, opening the door and herding us inside.
Instantly I was bombarded with smells, of some kind of oil, sweat, and smoke, it filled the room and while it didn't seem to bother Lee any, it bothered me and the crusaders a great deal. I coughed, phlegm getting lodged in my throat. I waved a hoof in front of my muzzle, trying to waft the smell away but it did very little good. "What in tarnation is that smell?!" I asked as Scootaloo gagged and Sweetie just covered her nose.
"That's the smell of discovery!" A man yelled from somewhere, something crashed in a room behind the counter and out came another human holding a sledgehammer. "How can I-" he stopped when he looked at me, his voice trailing off into a squeak. "Lee, what in the hell?"
Lee held up his hands as Forrest levitated behind us. "I know I know, just roll with it." He told the older man. "Anywho, I'm here hoping to get some replacement ammo for my 44." He said, pulling out one of his guns, it was jet black in color and I saw it had a weird glowing etching on the handle.
"Ahhh, I do believe I have some around here somewhere." The man said before ducking down behind his counter. "While I look for it, why don't you kids have a look around, maybe you'll find something that'll peek your interest!"
Lee chuckled under his breath, saying, "They're a wee bit young to be fighting I think, but then again I started when I was like... what... six years old?" Lee trailed off, murmuring to himself, he was fighting since he was six?!
"I do believe that is correct sir." Forrest agreed from behind us. "Six years of age when you took the life of your first commie." The robot commented happily, his gruff voice carrying varying tones of pride and distinct happiness.
I couldn't help but frown, is everypony on this world a killer?! I wondered, everypony we've met so far seems to have no problem with killing. I didn't like this place, and the longer we were here the more I was going to hate it. As Lee talked with the man, the three of us had split up to look around, maybe we would find something to help us get back home. Scootaloo looked around one of the shelves with Sweetie, and myself, I was looking around a shelf at the items laying on it. I saw more of those guns Lee had sitting around, some small ones and larger ones, I saw some long barreled guns with scopes, and a few small round balls with pins on them.
Did this store have nothing but weapons? I kept looking through the shelves, and I found some books, but a quick peek through them showed nothing of any interest, in fact most of them were burned and some were blank, with a few faded words remaining on the pages. Some were still intact however, and those were stories I had never even heard of, some with ships, towers, and a group of people taking a ring to a mountain.
But after a bit, I found something that peaked my interest, it was a large book and it was about weapons... a lot of them. Picking them up, I saw the cover was labeled Guns, weapons and more guns! Your guide to warfare! I didn't know what to think of all of these guns and weapons, but if this world ran off of them...
I picked it up, eyeing the cover and feeling the weight of it as I heard footsteps. Looking over I saw Lee walk over to me, "You found something you want?" He asked me, kneeling down and looking at the book in my hooves. "Ooooh, that's a good find you got there AB," He said, patting my head, I swatted his hand away. "You want that?"
I gave the book another look, if we were going to be trapped here for a while, I might as well learn about what might hurt us. I looked up at Lee and nodded.
When the human smiled he plucked it from my grasp and walked over to the counter, Sweets and Scootaloo trotting over to me from behind. "Did you find anything worth getting AB?" Scootaloo asked me.
"All we found was a bunch of junk," Sweetie squeaked, "and some old toys, but those weren't fun to look at."
"Ah found a book that has a bunch of them weapons an' stuff in it." At their looks, I added. "Ah mean, if we're gonna be here awhile, We might as well learn bout them guns and stuff," I shrugged.
Sweetie, however didn't seem to like that idea. "I don't know, Apple Bloom," She said, biting her lip. "Learning about Lee's world and their guns and stuff doesn't sound like a good idea." She said.
"I don't know, it sounds pretty cool if you ask me." Scootaloo retorted, sitting down and rubbing her chin.
"How is it cool?!" Sweetie waved her hooves in the air. "Those gun things are dangerous! Why would you want to know more about them?!"
She did raise a... good point. From what Lee told us while we were on the move, guns were the go-to weapon in the wastelands. Everypony had a gun, or something like one. So why would I want a book that probably had just about every gun in it?
"Ah want ta know more bout em so Ah can know what's dangerous an' what's not." I told her. True I knew next to nothing about all of the weapons in the wastelands, but if I knew more about them then I could tell which was dangerous and what to avoid, and how to protect my friends.
I was about to say something else, when Lee came back over and said, "Better to know what'll hurt ya and not need them, then to not know what'll hurt ya, and pay for it later." He hoofed the book back to me, which I took from him. "Well, I'm done here, we should get going I guess."
With our little store venture done, I balanced the book on my back as we walked out of the store and back into the town. Lee was smiling, hands in his pockets as he whistled an odd tune. Scootaloo kept close to me and Sweetie Belle, we always kept close whenever we were in dangerous places. The town was a bit more lively now, a few people were out and selling some objects, some of it was junk parts and others were... weird parts that looked like they went on something.
Some music played from a place called Trevor Phillip's Bar, where a man in a leather jacket was thrown out by a very angry looking human wearing a small dirty white shirt and a pair of darkened blue pants. "Get the fuck out of here you shit for brains!"
I cringed as we passed by the bar, looking out ahead to where Lee was leading us. "Where're going?" I asked him, eyeing the human.
"Well, I'm done here, so now I'm heading off to see a buddy of mine." Lee told us, heading for the exit, "I'm sure he could help us out a little bit."
"Who would that be?" Sweetie bounded up next to him, looking up at the human as he looked down at her.
"Dusty Strange."
Who is this Dusty Strange? Will we ever find out? Who knows, and Apple Bloom has something new to read, an encyclopedia on human weapons! I wonder why she wanted that?
We'll find out... next time!
Stay tuned next time, for the next chapter of: Return, on Vault-Tec Channel 6
-ooo000=+=000ooo- Texan Wasteland - Apple Bloom's Perspective
It had been an hour since we left the town I guess you could call it, and we were headed down the road going further east. Lee was keeping an eye out, looking around the wasteland we were in with a careful gaze. Sweetie and Scootaloo were trailing close behind me, both looking like they were wishing we were home right now. I knew, because that's what I was wishing right now. My thoughts had trailed off a bunch of times and I was wondering if I was ever going to see my family again.
It had only been, I think three quarters of a day since we came here. I was tired, Scoots was tired, and Sweetie was tired. Lee didn't seem like he was tired at all, and I didn't know if Forrest got tired, what with him being metal and all. Lee had told us we were going to see another human who was called Dusty Strange, and when Sweetie asked who he was, Lee had said Dusty was a sort of Shaman who had a strange way of going about his practices, and he may be able to help us.
I wondered if Dusty was anything like Zecora? He sounded like he was something like Zecora, we wouldn't know unless we got there.
The road ahead of us was dull, long and filled with sand. All around us was a wasteland filled with rocks and sand, and wrecks of those cars Lee told us a little about. The winds cascaded across the land, some of them buffeting us with sand and dirt. We had to hide on the other side of Lee or Forrest when the winds hit us, Lee was unfazed by it, along with his bot. He just pulled up a scarf and goggles and put them onto his face, blocking out the sandstorm.
Sweetie tried casting a spell to block the sand, but only succeeded in setting a rock on fire, somehow. Lee seemed intrigued by that for some reason, but said nothing further on the matter, instead turning on a radio from his... that thing on his wrist, what was that? I don't think he told us what that was.
"This just in from my friends in the Brotherhood of Steel," A feminine voice started from his wrist. "I've heard that there have been sightings of a little green dude wearing a spacesuit, if ya see him, tell 'im Bird says hi~"
"Oh Bird." Lee chuckled to himself.
"In other news, I've been hearing talk of The Enclave forces in the southern Texas Wastes have been up to something, I don't know what, but it ain't good." The girl on the radio spoke, Enclave? What was that? I made a mental note to myself to ask Lee about it later. "So if you're down south and you have something advanced, you best hide it, or run when you see those Vertibirds... cause they will kill you for what you have."
My eyes widened at that, they would kill somepony for having some kind of advanced doohickies!? That was crazy! I wanted to ask Lee about it, but the storm prevented me from saying a lick of anything. So I opted to stay silent for now until we got out of this storm, I had some things I wanted to ask Lee about, the Enclave for one thing.
"This storm is getting stronger!" Scootaloo yelled at us all, mane whipping in the wind. "We need to find cover!" I hope Lee heard her, cause if this storm got any stronger, we might end up getting blown away! I didn't want that. We kept moving through the sandstorm, Lee shielding us from the storm with his coat.
Eventually we arrived at a bunch of rocks, and what looked like a cave of sorts, those cars were sitting out front, along with a bunch of tires and poles sticking out of the ground, helmets and masks with hoses were attached to the poles, along with jackets and other junk sitting around. Weird markings of a mushroom, skulls and faces were painted on the rocks, and strings holding small pieces of brass. The pieces jingled in the wind, filling the area with the sound of metal hitting metal.
A newcomer approaches.
I blinked, looking over at Sweetie Belle. "Did you say something'?!" I yelled at her over the winds.
She returned my gaze, giving me a confused look. "I didn't say anything!" She yelled back to me.
... well, if it wasn't her, then was it Scootaloo? When I turned to ask Scoots, I saw she was looking at the cave, along with Lee. The cave didn't seem really important, but Lee had stopped, and the next thing he said was so quiet, it took some effort from me to hear him clearly.
"We're here."
Without another word, Lee started forward towards the cave entrance, Forrest hovering after him. After a few seconds of being in the storm by ourselves, we followed him inside. I led my friends inside, grateful to be out of the storm. I didn't expect Lee to lead us to a cave of all things, I thought he may have been leading us to another town, or even a house. Instead, we were heading into a dark cave, filled with who knows what! But... he hasn't done anything bad yet, but I'm still going to be a bit wary about this entire thing.
The cave was dark, until Lee turned on a light from his wrist thingy and the cave was lit up. The walls were dark, and dry, sand had been blown inside from storms over the months I bet. More drawings were on the walls, of skulls, humans holding up sticks and throwing things at other humans, these drawings were all over the walls. Sweetie and Scootaloo seemed to notice them as well, and the three of us looked at them as we descended into the darkness.
My thoughts drifted back to my family, specifically Applejack. What was she going through? I've been missing a few times, along with my friends, and we always came out unscathed. We may end up with a few cuts and bruises, but in the end we always got home safe and sound. But this time, I was wondering how long it'd take before we actually got home. I hope its soon...
The time passed by slowly as we ventured further into the cave, and before we knew it the walls had started to change. They became something different, concrete, and above us I saw a few lights that were broken. The floor changed too, had we gone inside a building? Everything changed, I saw big blue doors on either side, most of which looked like they might have been locked. More of those strings with the brass on them were strung up across the ceiling, some of them were tiny and others were huge.
Lee had led us further in until we came to a large double door that opened into a large looking room, where several big looking green things were sittings. The letters USA were painted on the sides of them, with a bunch of numbers on the front below a star. What were those?
"I heard you were coming, General." A voice spoke.
Sweetie Belle's eyes popped open, "A GHOST!" Sweetie squealed in fright, jumping behind me and shivering. Me and Scoots joined her, standing behind Lee as Forrest suddenly lit up the room somehow.
Standing in front of us was a human, another one almost like Lee. The man was sitting inside of one of those... cars? Sitting on a seat and staring at us. He hopped out, hitting the floor with barely a sound. He was different from the others I'd seen. The human was shorter then Lee, and was wearing a pair of torn shorts and sandles, and over his chest was a bag strap with small tubes held onto it. Across his chest, arms and stomach I saw a bunch of black markings swirling over his body in weird looking patterns, body paint?
I knew some ponies did that sometimes on Nightmare night, or on some other kind of occasions. I wonder why he was wearing it?
The human stalked over to us, and I could make out a weird helmet on his head with a big black visor and some spikes on top of it, with more of those weird swirls and such. In his hand he was holding a big staff of sorts, with more of those brass pieces dangling from it. White eyes stared at us from under the visor, and the human got into a sort of crouch. "How long has it been Lee?" The man asked, his voice soft and his eyes unfocused.
"Bout six months." Lee replied, opening his coat and reaching inside, he fiddled around with something before retracting his hand. And in his hand, he was holding something, a big something. "Found this for ya, if you want it that is." He tossed the thing to the other man, who caught it without looking.
The man looked at the thing in his hands, with a satisfied nod he said, "the spirits will be pleased with this." He said, before standing up and walking over to Lee. He lifted up the visor, milky white eyes staring into Lee's eyes. "You need help, am I right?"
"Technically, these three," Lee gestured to us, Sweetie and Scoots coming out of hiding to look at the new human. "I don't need any, not now anyway, Dusty Strange."
This was Dusty Strange?
...
The name made sense now.
Dusty turned his gaze towards us, kneeling down and holding the staff over our heads. His eyes were wide and unfocused, mouth set in a fine line as he poked my nose. "Interesting... ponies..." He muttered, gazing at Lee before looking back at me. "They told me something was amiss... something had gone wrong..." He stood up, turning around and walking towards some stairs.
Wait... what? "Hey!" I yelled at him, cantering after the human. "Lee said you could help us!" I yelled at him as Sweetie and Scoots followed.
Dusty turned around, piercing eyes staring through me. I stopped dead in my tracks, feeling cold all of a sudden. "I am going to help tiny pony..." His eyes closed for a brief second... then they opened again, this time glowing. "~The Spirits demand it.~" I suddenly heard in my head as Dusty turned around and kept going up the stairs.
I was frozen on the steps, how did he do that?!
"Apple Bloom?" Sweetie came to my side and nudged me with a hoof. "Are you okay?" The filly questioned me as Scootaloo stood on the other side of me, Lee and Forrest passing by both of us and going upstairs.
It took me a moment before I was able to nod, "Y-yeah, Ah'm alright." I told them, "Let's follow them."
With combined nods, we followed the two human and robot.
-ooo000=+=000ooo-
I don't know how long we were climbing those stairs for, we passed so many floors, I wondered how high up we were. My legs burned, my lungs felt like they were on fire, and I was winded. We've been walking too much. Lee hung back for a bit, talking with Forrest about something involving Toasters and Explosions. I ignored them, I just wanted to go home, I wanted to go to sleep most of all.
Eventually we arrived at the top, I think, the stairwell ended and there was an open door. Dusty went through first followed by Forrest and Lee, Scoots was next and then Sweetie and myself. When I stepped into the room, I felt a brisk wind blowing in from somewhere, and when I looked, I saw half of the ceiling and wall was gone... and in its place was a city... I found myself drawn to it, my legs moved by themselves, until I was eventually standing near the edge.
I saw a city, a massive city sprawling around the area as far as I could see. I saw smoke rising from parts of it, filling the skies with a black cloud cover, the sun above peeked through, sending down rays of sunshine through the cover. Tall buildings made of glass and steel stood tall, some of them with their tops blown off and others having fallen over onto their neighbors. I saw small bridges suspended between some taller buildings, and the streets themselves were filled with rubble and broken cars.
This building was probably the tallest one, as I had a perfect view of the entire city, its skyscrapers and so on. I've never seen such a city, Scootaloo and Sweetie stood on either side of me, and I could tell both of them were just as entranced by the sight as I was.
"This place..." Scootaloo was breathless, her eyes wide and her jaw hanging open.
"Its massive!" Sweetie squeaked, her eyes darting from one place to the next.
I just stood on the plateau of this building, looking out at the area below. I heard footsteps behind me, and when I turned I saw Lee standing with his arms crossed, his eyes looking out at the mega-metropolis. "What is this place?" I asked him, I didn't even see it on the road we were on! This didn't make any sense.
"Apple Bloom..." He gestured to the city. "Welcome to the City of Steel."
-ooo000=+=000ooo- Texas Wasteland - City of Steel - Apple Bloom's Perspective - Tomorrow
After admiring the ruin of the mega-metropolis, the girls and I had to get some shut eye. We had been walking for what felt like hours and hours... wait, I... yeah it was hours actually. That and coupled with the heat and barely getting any rest, we were plum tuckered out. Dusty was kind enough to let us use a room he converted into a sleeping quarters for travelers and people Dusty deemed safe enough to allow within his walls.
We fell into that category because we were with Lee, I wonder what would have happened if we weren't with him? I didn't want to know.
I had woken up the next day from one of the sun's bright rays shining through the cloud cover for a brief second before disappearing, it burned but, I took that as my cue to wake up. Scootaloo and Sweetie were lying next to me, huddled up on either side of me. Scootaloo had draped one of her tiny wings across my back, and Sweetie had her head buried between my side and her foreleg. Both of them were snoozing softly, Scootaloo's wings twitching occasionally or Sweetie letting out a squeak.
I carefully moved so I wouldn't wake both of them, I moved Scoots' wing off of my back and nuzzled Sweetie out of the way until I was standing up. I tiphoofed my way over Sweetie and onto the floor, and sighed once I was out of the bed. We had to sleep on this old dirty mattress that was sitting on the floor, there weren't any actual clean bed anywhere. That was a crying shame.
Looking around the room, I took notice of most of the rubble lying around. Pieces of concrete had fallen from the ceiling and hit the floor, empty bottles were sitting around in half crushed piles or sitting in corners filled with Celestia knows what. Some other mattresses were sitting around, vacant and covered in odd stains like the one I slept in. Some old posters were pasted onto the walls, some of them depicting a weird human in red, white and blue clothing being helped up by... something in big metal looking armor.
I didn't know what that thing was, but it looked scary.
Sighing to myself, I started towards the door of the room, and exited it. My friends could use the sleep, I was an early riser - sometimes - and I should see if I can get something done. What could I do? I wasn't exactly sure myself what could be done. Maybe I could read that book Lee bought for me, I wonder where he is? That book that I found might come in handy, I wasn't a big reader, but I liked a nice book to read whenever I'm bored.
Walking into the hall, I trotted my way towards what Dusty and Lee referred to as, The View. The View being that area where me and the girls were treated to the view of a torn and ruined city, it was a massive city, and I didn't know anything about it. Only that it was big, and smoky, and the sun rarely ever shone through the clouds. The City of Steel was also a city of darkness it seemed, from all of the cloud cover. I wondered if the people in the city have ever seen light?
Up ahead, I could make out the faint voices of Dusty and Lee. "Have you remembered anything yet?" Dusty asked, remember what?
"... no." Was Lee's reply.
What are those two talking about? Curiosity taking hold of me, I snuck up to the edge of the hall and peered around the corner.
Standing by The View, I saw both humans side by side, Dusty with his staff and Lee with his coat off and hanging on a chair nearby. The shirt he was wearing under the armor pieces was snug and tight against his upper body. "Are you sure? The visions... haven't come back?" Dusty questioned, a faint wind blowing by and causing the Shaman's tattered short strings to move.
Lee shook his head, running a hand through his hair. "Yeah I'm sure... I haven't had anymore dreams or visions for months now..." He turned to face Dusty. "What does that mean?" The man asked the other.
Dreams? Visions? I shook my head, what were they talking about? What dreams was Lee having? And Visions?
Dusty turned his head ever so slightly, saying, "its rude to eavesdrop, Apple Bloom."
My eyes went wide as I stepped out slowly. "H-How did you know Ah was there?" I asked him, I was pretty quiet.
"The spirits told me of your presence," Was all he said before giving a slight nod to Lee and walking away. "I am needed elsewhere, I shall return shortly." He said, disappearing down a hall and leaving me and Lee alone.
I looked up at Lee, who turned back to me with a smile. "Have a good nap?" He wondered, sitting down on a piece of rubble and reaching into one of his pouches for something.
I still can't believe I was caught, Spirits? Were they real? Maybe, who knew? I returned Lee's smile with one of my own. "Ah did, sorta. Kinda hard to have a nice nap when you're sleeping on a dirty old mattress with springs poking ya." I remarked, my flank still hurt from last night and the tussling I had to put up with trying to get into a comfortable situation.
It was hard to do.
"Well, getting a good sleep out here is tough, you have to take what you get sometimes." He sighed, taking out a small box and opening it. He pulled out a small white tube before putting it in his mouth, and pulling out a match he struck it against the side of his boot before holding it up to the white tube and lighting it. A cigarette? "Not everyone can have a nice clean bed, or a decent place to sleep, ya know."
I nodded slowly, thinking about what Dusty and Lee were talking earlier. "Um... Ah'm sorry for being a snoop, but... where were you two talking about?" I asked him as he inhaled deeply, and exhaled, puffing out smoke. "Dreams?"
Lee frowned slightly, and I thought I had made him mad. But he just sighed heavily, eyes drifting elsewhere. "That's... not something I want to talk about," He told me quietly, shaking his head before a smile appeared. "Eh, maybe someday I'll tell ya, but for now... not saying anything." He looked me in the eyes, and I swore I saw something flash across them. "We aren't exactly friends," he stuck out his tongue, "I ain't sharing my life story with a kid."
"Hmmph, Ah was just wonderin'." I told him, biting my cheek and looking towards his backpack. "Do... do you still have that book?" I wanted something to do, so I might as well read that book.
The human nodded and reached over for his pack, and pulling it over he unzipped it before reaching inside. "Honestly, I didn't expect you to want something like this," He told me as he pulled the book out of the bag and handed it to me. "Cute little kid like you wanting a book about weaponry," A tsk sounded as I took the book from him. "Seems odd."
Now that I think about it, I guess it was a... little odd. But... "If ah know more about this world's weapons," I started, putting the book down and looking at the cover of it. "Then... maybe Ah... Ah can..." I frowned thoughtfully, what could I do exactly? "Ah can tell what's dangerous and what's not!" I chirped, smiling as I looked back up at Lee. "Ah don't know a whole lot about your world's guns and stuff, so maybe this book can help me figure that out." I picked up my book in my mouth and trotted away with it, now to see what all was in this thing.
I left Lee by The View and made my way back to the room where Sweetie and Scoots were sleeping, I could read in there. Long as I was quiet, that is. The way back to the room was short, and I found myself inside the room whee both of my friends slept, Scoots had scooted closer to Sweetie and had her wing over Sweets' back and her head laying over her neck, both still sleeping soundly.
A smile appeared on my face as I walked over to one of those lanterns that were sitting around, I sat down next to it, placing my book on the floor in front of me and reaching over to turn on the light. Read this book, I was a bit excited to be honest. I didn't know why either, I guess it was the bookworm in me. Reading about weapons though... I didn't know how to feel about that. Equestria didn't have any weapons like what was on the front of this book, most of these were looked like they were from some kind of sci-fi movie.
Opening the book, I came to the front page, which had weathered words and faded images of weapons on it. "Guns Weapons and More Guns, the Big Book of Weapons and the go to guide for every weapon used by the good ol US of A and the Communist party." I read aloud to myself...
What's a communist?
Sweetie'd probably know. I mused with a grin, she was such a dictionary, and always used big words that me and Scoots could barely understand. I bet she gets it from Twilight or something, or she reads a dictionary before going to bed. A giggle escaped me at the thought of Sweetie doing just that, reading a big ol dictionary before nap time. Clearing my throat softly, I kept reading through the page. It was mostly just an introduction to the book and who wrote it. "Written by, Gerald R. Winchester the third." I read, hmm...
I flipped the page over, coming to a section about small arms. I hummed as I looked over the weapons, I saw pictures of the guns, along with their specifications, I saw small firearms called Handguns and some others called Revolvers, one of them looked like the one Lee carried. There... there were a lot of small arms, a lot of them, from what the information boxes told me, used several different kinds of ammunition.
357 SIG, 9MM Luger, 22 LR, .38 Special, .357 Magnum, .44 Magnum, 44-40 Winchester. My eyes widened as I kept reading the terms of the ammunition, they used all of those?! I shook my head, that was crazy! As I kept reading, I saw more and more types, different calibers, each bullet had a different length and size, some had different strengths over other cartridges, and others were more efficient to use over some.
And this was just the small arms section...
This is unbelievable. I told myself, all of these different kinds of small arms, how many big arms were there? I flipped the page past the small guns section until I reached the bigger weapons, I saw ones called Rifles, Assault Rifles, Combat Rifles, Shotguns, and even some that were called Sniper Rifles. Lots of Rifles, I noted as I saw the many different types, and at the end of the rifles/shotguns section, I saw all of the different ammo types once more.
"Apple Bloom?" I heard from the mattress, Sweetie Belle.
Looking up from the book, I saw Sweetie looking up at me with a sleepy gaze on her face. She smacked her lips as Scootaloo's eyes started to open. "Oh, morning Sweets, Scoots." I waved to them, Sweetie gave me a weak nod as Scootaloo closed her eyes and curled up like a cat would. "Sleep good?"
Sweetie made a grunting noise and yawned wide, pearly white teeth showing before she gave me another nod. "This mattress hurt my legs." She said, rubbing the aforementioned appendage. "They feel sore."
"Feels alright to me." Scootaloo mumbled from under her foreleg where she tucked her face in.
Sweetie pfft'd, "That's cause you're weird Scootaloo." She retorted as the pegasus shuffled where she laid, saying no more. Turning back to me, the unicorn asked, "When did you wake up?"
"Just a little bit before you did." I answered, going back to my book. "Ah've been reading this here book," I tapped the pages, which showed a really big gun called a minigun, from the looks of it, and the information on it, the gun was a big gun that could only be used by really strong types, or used in something called a Vertibird... whatever that was. "Its got some interestin' stuff in it."
"Yeah, stuff that kills ponies." Sweetie remarked, shaking her head. "I still don't understand why you would want to read something like that." Before I could tell her why, she cut me off. "I know you said its because you want to know what's dangerous and what's not... but..." She frowned. "It just doesn't feel right."
I sighed, looking back at the book. This entire thing was filled with extremely dangerous firearms, something Equestria couldn't hold a candle to. I vaguely remember something about flintlocks being used by the griffons. I didn't know the fine details about them, but I did know they were something far more dangerous then the swords, spears and arrows Equestria used in its military. If Equestria had something like what was in this book... "Look, Ah get that, its... not right of me ta read something that got all these..." I waved vaguely to the pages. "But..." I didn't know what to say to her... I honestly didn't have a single thing I could say besides, "Ah don't know."
I don't think she liked my answer, but didn't say anything further, only getting up and trotting over to the door before leaving me with Scootaloo, who was slowly getting up.
"Scootaloo..."
She looked over at me, a curious expression on her face. "Yeah, AB?"
I cast my eyes down, "... what do think about this?" Pointing to the book, I gestured to the many many guns on the pages, flipping through them and showing them to her. "Sweetie doesn't like this, Ah'm not so sure about it myself..." I directed my eyes back to her as she flapped her wings and walked over to me. "But what do you think?"
She made a noise in the back of her throat, feathers rustling as her wings moved. She looked down at the book, sitting down as her eyes examined the firearms in detail. "Well..." she brought her hoof up and started to rub her chin. "I don't read as much as you or Sweets does, unless its about the Wonderbolts or, like, Rainbow Dash." She stuck out her tongue with a smile. "But... it looks pretty cool, I guess." She traced her hoof on the page, specifically the one with Energy Based guns, what made those so different from regular ones? "What's that one?"
She pointed to something called a Gauss Rifle, and I saw a hint of interest in her eyes. I looked down at the page myself, reading the description. "The Gauss rifle, also called a "coil gun," is a device used to propel a ferromagnetic projectile by accelerating it through a process of magnet induction. The Gauss rifle and Gauss gun are named after German mathematician Carl Friedrich Gauss, who formulated mathematical descriptions of the magnetic effect demonstrated by magnetic accelerators." I read aloud. "Used by the United States Armed Forces, and some Chinese forces, it is possibly one of the most powerful energy rifles built."
"Whoa..." Scootaloo awed, "I have no idea what you just said."
"Me neither," I replied.
A sigh, then I heard hoofsteps. "It means it's a type of projectile accelerator consisting of a bunch of coils and stuff used like electromagnets, and that it accelerates a ferromagnetic or conducting projectile to high velocity." I heard Sweetie say beside me.
I gave her a look, Scootaloo did to, both of us confused... I was, anyway.
"Wha?" Scootaloo asked.
Another sigh. "It means it shoots a piece of conductive metal using magnetic forces to launch it really fast."
Scootaloo scrunched up her face. "Ooooh... cool!"
"So..." I started... "Its... like a crossbow?"
Sweetie shook her head. "It tells you what it does on the page," She pointed to the description, and the following numbers and mathematics.
"Oh, that's what those are..." I examined the numbers, I was somewhat good at math. "Hey Sweets,"
"Hmm?"
"What's that word mean?"
A sigh, "which one?"
And so, Sweetie and Scoots joined me in reading the book, Sweetie, because she knew a lot of big fancy words that I couldn't make any sense of, and Scootaloo, because she was both interested, and she was actually pretty good at math and was able to work with both Me and Sweetie in figuring out how these energy weapons worked.
The three of us conversing on firearms and weapons, along with how they work and what have ya, was not how I was expecting to spend my day...
"The City of Steel..." Sweetie Belle muttered, looking down at her empty plate as a few ponies started to clear the table of the empty dishes. "A massive city, bigger then anything we've ever seen..."
Twilight was furiously writing down ever detail to this story, she was so intrigued by it all, and wished to hear more. It was pretty obvious to anyone who looked at her, she was excited about the prospect of learning about this city. Shame she didn't know, all of tis dark and sordid details.
"The City of Steel?" Luna questioned quietly, humming softly in thought. "Prey tell, what is this city?"
Apple Bloom sighed, leaning back in her chair as she thought of the massive city. Images of the burning hell-scape that was the city flashed through her mind, along with the screams of people being killed. "The city... its... its a hell," she said quietly, crossing her arms as Scootaloo fluttered her wings, making a small almost metallic fluttering noise. "Filled with scum and criminals, a lot of bad people that make some of Equestria's filth look clean in comparison."
Everyone was quiet as she spoke, the elements had different emotions regarding what was said, horror, disgust, and interest.
"We had to live there... for six years." Sweetie frowned deeply, straightening out her now sparkly mane as her green eyes looked up at the ceiling. "And no matter what you say, that city... will forever be a hell."
Rarity stared at her sister for sometime, looking at the young mare now, and comparing her to the young filly from six years ago. She could see so much had changed in her, her eyes, along with the other two, held something in them that was... different, cold yet fiery, distant and precise.
"I couldn't help but notice you talking about coils and electromagnets," Twilight mused, looking over at Sweetie, "where did you learn that from?"
Sweetie gave the princess a look. "I remember reading it from one of your books during one of our magic sessions." She explained, flicking her ears forward as Apple Bloom coughed into her hoof. "It was some kind of theory a scientist came up with for making a more effective assault weapon for Equestrian Naval Airships."
Something sparked in Twilight's eyes, interest, more then before. "You understand the Gauss Theory?" She wondered, and her excitment only grew when Sweetie nodded. "This is fantastic! Do you think you could tell me all about it!?"
A nervous look, then Sweetie replied, "As much as I would... uh, love to tell you... I'm kinda tired," She stretched out her arms, titling her head to one side as the other two did something similar. "We've been talking for a while now."
"Yeah, Ah'm beat." Apple Bloom informed the others as Scootaloo yawned her agreement. "Mind if we take a nap before we keep up with our story telling?" She wondered, she was tired, there were bags under her eyes, and the other CMC as well. While she wasn't against spending much needed time with her sister and her friends, she needed to sleep.
Celestia nodded her head, and in a regal tone stated, "Let us rest for now, and we can resume the story in the morning." Everyone readily agreed, the others getting up and yawning, stretching their tired aching limbs and looking forward to a good sleep. Especially the CMC, who were looking forward to taking a long sleep in a warm bed, without having to keep one eye open for once. Everyone steadily got up, stretching aching limbs, popping stiff joints and heading off.
Twilight and her friends all decided to head off to theor own rooms, Celestia and Luna followed Twilight as the servents proceeded to clean up the table with gusto, wiping and picking up plates and depositing them onto the push trays before leaving single file. The CMC were still in the room, slowly making their way towards where they last remembered there were rooms. Rarity had stayed behind as well, deciding to guide them to their rooms seeing how it had been a while since they were last here.
However, once Scootaloo and Apple Bloom started forward, Sweetie was held up by her sister. "Um, Sweetie, do you think... we could... speak?" She asked, looking at her younger sister who returned her look with a small smile.
"Sure, Rarity." Sweetie nodded, waving off a curious Scootaloo and Apple Bloom who left, trotting off towards the rooms. Sweetie, now that Rarity was closer, could tell just how different the little mare was. She was a bit shorter then Rarity by a small margin, with a fine coat of well taken care of fure, a silky smooth mane with beautiful curls that grew out longer, and a horn that was a tad bit longer then usual unicorn horns. Rarity noted her little sister's eyes seemed to have a certain brightness to them...
However...
"Tell me, how did you... I mean..." Rarity looked flustered, sitting down on her haunches as she rubbed at her fetlock. "Oh I am ever so... flustered, my deepest apologies." She sighed, "Its... just been so long since I've seen you last... I'm... I'm sure you understand?"
Sweetie nodded, sitting down in front of her, all the while keeping her smile. "Of course Rarity, I... i get that." The mare nodded her understanding, chuckling as Rarity returned her smile. That was another thing Rarity noted, her smile, right down to her laugh and her voice, they were...
"I must say darling, your voice is so beautiful~" Rarity cooed, tittering to herself as Sweetie gigged. "You have grown so much... mother and father..." She suddenly looked down, any mirth she had suddenly gone. I never told her...
Sweetie seemed to pick up on Rarity's downtrodden tone, her eyes took on a concerned appearance as she scooted closer to her sister. Wondering what was wrong, she asked, "What's wrong?"
The older mare sighed heavily to herself, trying to steel her nerves for what was about to come out of her mouth next. It had been so long since it happened, and she never had the chance to tell Sweetie Belle... mostly because she thought the young filly was long dead, having given up after so long. But now that her sister was back, she could finally inform her of what had happened...
"Several... months, after you disappeared, Sweetie Belle, Mother and Father..." Rarity sighed sadly, running a hoof through her mane. "They've... passed..."
All was silent after she had said those words, there was nothing in the air. Rarity looked up at Sweetie Belle, prepared to console the young mare if she broke down, Rarity had still cried even after they passed years ago, and she had no doubt Sweeite would be the same... however, when she locked eyes with Sweetie, she did not see sadness... she did not see sorrow...
She only saw her flat look... her once shiny eyes, filled with a childish innocence, was gone, replaced with a sort of... blankness...
"They're dead?" Sweetie asked, bluntly, to the point. It was the kind of tone you used for a question when you were mostly curious, like about someone's dinner plans for tomorrow.
Rarity didn't know what to feel at that moment, but she managed to answer. "Y-yes they... they died, five years ago..." Rarity explained, shaking her head slowly as she tried to regain her composure. "T-they were t-trying to find ponies to go into the Everfree to look for you, experienced explorers and rescue teams." Rarrity recalled that stressful month, and the resulting days that followed after their death... it had almost been too much for Rarity, having lost her baby sister and her parents... "But... after they found a team of ponies willing to go in... they followed, insisting on helping, but they... they ran into a Manticore nest, they didn't stand a chance, having no way of defending themselves they... they parished." Rarity finished, sighing as she felt a few tears leave her eyes.
Sweetie Belle just sat there, looking as if she was absorbing what all she was told. Then she nodded slowly, before turning and walking away. "I'm sorry... Rarity..." She told her older sister, vanishing up the stairs, with little emotion showing on her face.
The alabaster unicorn just started cry, left alone at the bottom of the stairs wondering what had happened... to her precious little sister...
Sweetie disappeared upstairs, passing by the Elements who wished her a good night's sleep, something she wondered was even a possibility after everything that has happened to her and her friends. She hadn't slept well in over six years, sleeping on nasty rotted beds, floors, dirt, having to keep her senses alert in case they were attacked by raiders, bandits, or some mutated beast out for their blood. It was hard to think that having a nice nap was possible.
Wouldn't stop her from trying.
As she reached the door to their room, she gave pause. Recalling what Rarity told her... informed her of her parents, and how they parished years ago. How long had she been telling herself she wanted to see them again, how much she missed them. Six years I've gone without seeing my parents... six years I've been telling myself I would see them again, and now... they're gone for good... and yet I don't feel anything. She wondered just how much she had changed over the past six years... to the point where she can't even shed a tear for her deceased parents.
She pushed those thoughts aside, as she entered the room.
Inside she saw Scootaloo and Apple Bloom sitting on their beds, looking downright comfortable to be able to sleep in actual beds for once. Both had obtained their weapons and armor, which were lying by the sides of their beds, Sweetie's were in the only unoccupied bed, she trotted over to the bed as Scootaloo conversed with Apple Bloom.
"Just saying, I'm gonna miss some parts." Scootaloo said, as she idly cleaned her rifle's scope with a small rag.
"Like what exactly?" Apple Bloom questioned, looking up from where she was tinkering with her own weapon, having taking parts of it off to inspect.
"The food for one thing, like those fancy lad snack cakes," Scootaloo hummed, looking blissful almost as she thought of those snacks cakes. They were over two hundred years old, but perfectly preserved thanks to the world's advanced technology. The pegasus' wings fluttered a bit, creating a tiny metallic scraping noise once again, she did not bring any with her, and she regretted it.
Apple Bloom begged to differ. "Ah don't know why you like those so much, they weren't all that good." Apple Bloom rolled her eyes, not understanding in the slightlest why Scootaloo had such an obsession with the, all it took was one and she was on board with finding the factory that made them and finding the recipe... something Bloom wasn't sure if she accomplished or not. "Ah mean, maybe they're good fer eatin' one in a while, but not all th' time."
"Pfft, you don't know what you were missing~" Scootaloo chuckled, watching as Sweetie Bell pulled out one of her larger knives and started to sharpen it. The ten inch bowie knife made a scraping noise as she slid it across a whet stone, making Scootaloo turn to her. "Say Sweets... everything alright? You only sharpen that knife when you're uh... thinking..."
"My Mom and Dad are dead." Sweetie answered bluntly, still sharpening her knife, Apple Bloom and Scootaloo just kept their faces turned towards her, as if expecting her to continue. "Killed looking for me, by Manticores, a year after I was gone..." Sweetie had nothing in her voice to suggest she was sad... no cracking of her voice, no hitching of her breath... just a flat tone, as if she couldn't care less. "Just me and Rarity now..."
"Well shit..." Bloom spoke softly, asking, "Do... ya need anything or..."
"No... I wasn't here for it, there's nothing for me to cry over except headstones." Sweetie coldly replied, making Apple Bloom wince. Sweetie, however continued. "They've been dead for five straight years, what's the point in crying over them?"
"They were family, Sweets." Scootaloo told her, looking at her friend in mild concern. "I mean..."
"Yes... they were family... now they're just corpses." Sweetie replied once again, not looking up as she continued to sharpen her knife.
Scootaloo and Apple Bloom left it at that... not saying anything else as they continued to work on their firearms, before retiring for the night.
-ooo000=+=000ooo-
Morning soon rolled around, wind blowing, birds singing, and the sun shining brightly.
Three young mares soon awoke, and it wasn't a nice awakening either, as they all thought they heard something and sprang up out of bed, weapons at the ready, as they crept around their room, looking for any dangers. Their minds were on full alert, scanning high and low, and suddenly the door opened.
Sweetie in a fit of paranoia, threw several sharpened knives flying, all of them smacking into the door frame on the left side, embedding themselves deep into the wall. Whoever was beside the wall yelped in surprise, and Sweetie turned to see who it was intruding on them...
Pinkie Pie.
Pinkie blinked her eyes, shaking slightly as she had a nervous smile plastered on her face, her baby blue eyes turned to look at the knives that had almost impaled her, noting just how large and sharp most of them were. Some were for hunting, cooking, and some were for chopping up big hunks of meat, that much she knew from a story she heard from a pony traveling into town.
"S-so, n-no breakfast for you t-than?" Pinkie stuttered out, laughing nervously.
Sweetie just gave her a flat look, before quickly pulling her knives out of the wall with her magic, yanking them out and placing them back in the sheathes on her harness on the bed. Which, after she had done, turned to put it on, without her suit, seeing how it needed to be cleaned and possibly repaired. "Sorry, Pinkie..."
"N-n-no p-p-problem!" Pinkie tittered, turning to run for her life, galloping down the halls and down the stairs.
"Called it." Scootaloo said, doing like Sweetie Belle had down and putting her harness for her rifle on, sans her uniform. Apple Bloom did the same, before the three decided to leave the room and go downstairs. Sweetie in the lead, as her two frends hung back a bit, conversing onwhat else would happen, mostly involving some of their old school yard friends... and enemies...
A meeting the three dreaded...
Diamond Tiara, and Silver Spoon.
Two enemies of theirs since they joined school, since they were blank flanks. BUt now that they had obtained their marks, what would the pink filly and her friend think of them now?
What would she think of them... if she knew what the three had gone through the past six years?
They didn't know.
But they would soon find out...
-ooo000=+=000ooo-
"I don't know what to do." Rarity sighed heavily to herself, sitting just beside her friend, Twilight Sparkle. The mare, after hearing what Rarity's little sister told her just last night, and how she reacted towards her parents' death... it worried her greatly, wondering if Sweetie was alright, in both a mental and emotional state.
She wondered if she should call in her step sister, Cadance, to help deal with these emotions.
"I... I'm shocked, Rarity, but... whatever happened to her on that world she was at... it must have been very... painful, turned her emotions inside out, changed her, all three of them in fact." Twilight explained, rubbing Rarity's back. "I mean... the way they told us how they ended up there, everything so far has been pretty tame, aside from the human that tried to... well..."
"Yes yes, I know... I just..." Rarity looked up at Twilight. "I just expected more from her, tears, denial... but she just accepted it, and moved on like it was such a casual thing..." The alabaster mare shook her head, holding it in her hooves. "She just... acted like I told her there was a sale on bread..."
Twilight sighed, looking down at the floor. "I'm... I'm so sorry, Rarity... but, I'm not sure what to do..."
"Ponies live, ponies die... its how life works." A sudden, almost angelic voice spoke up, making both mares look up to see Sweetie Belle standing near them, dressed in her knife harness. "They died, Rarity, yes its sad... yes its heartbreaking, considering they're the ones who raised us for so long... but crying about them, will not bring them back. So its pointless."
"Sweetie Belle!" Twilight gasped, shock lacing her words as she reeled from how blunt, how cold Sweetie Belle sounded.
"Its true, and you know it." Sweetie Belle told Twilight, making the princess flinch from her tone again. "Mom and dad are dead, and I wasn't here to protect them... its my fault they're dead, but you don't see me crying over it." Sweetie started for the room they were in last night, and finished, saying, "I've moved on..." She then disappeared into the room, leaving behind a heartbroken Rarity, shocked Twilight, and two Crusaders who felt awkward, before following their youngest friend.
Twilight hugged Rarity as the older mare cried softly, Twilight whispering, "I'll fix this... somehow, I'll fix this..." She didn't get a response...
-ooo000=+=000ooo-
The CMC had returned to their seats, Sweetie laying on her side as she idly sharpened another knife, Bloom and Scootaloo sitting on either side of her, waiting for the others to wake up and return before beginning their story again. Time passed them by, minutes turned into hours, and the scraping noises had gotten on Scootaloo's nerves, making her get up and walk away from the room, deciding to walk around the castle for a bit.
The pegasus walked the halls of the castle, admiring the decor, which was rather bland. She felt a bit more at peace when she was alone, the silence, and the lonesome feeling may have made others paranoid. But to Scootaloo... it just felt right to her, and she was glad to have it. That's not to say she hated the company of her friends, but every once in a while she enjoyed being alone to her thoughts.
I wonder... if there's a chance of bringing it here. She pondered to herself, her thoughts turning to something she had back in the wasteland of Texas... before she ended up bumping into a pony, knocking them flat on the ground.
The mare hit the ground with a thud, before groaning and going about picking up what she dropped, which consisted of several scrolls and what have you. "Oh jeez, I'm so so sorry, I should ha-" She stopped, looking up at Scootaloo. "Oh... um... hello, are you one of Twilight's guest?"
Scootaloo observed the mare, noting the light purple fur, three tone dark purple, light purple and blue mane and tail, and blue eyes. The unicorn had a cutie mark of a star with two blue lines swirling above it, and seemed to be... a bit skittish. "I guess... you could say that, who are you?"
"Oh... me? I'm uh, Starlight Glimmer," SHe introduced herself. "I'm Twilight's Student of Friendship, um... and you?"
"Scootaloo, Cutie Mark Crusader." Scootaloo told her, wondering if she should have added her other titles. They wouldn't matter here... She told herself, her titles she had gained, along with Sweetie Belle and Apple Bloom mattered little here in Equestria.
"Oh... OH! You're the filly that went missing, six years ago, wow... you're back, that's so great!" Starlight smiled, asking, "Did your friends..."
"They're with me, they came back as well so we're all back, hopefully for good this time." Scootaloo told her, as she started walking, STarlight following behind her.
"Um... pardon me for asking, but... where did you three go?" Starlight questioned, looking curious. "I just... want to take notes, I'm curious if you met anypony and made friends."
Scootaloo gave pause to that. Friends... that's a strange word now that I think about it. Friends, she had friends, Sweetie Belle and Apple Bloom were her friends, having been through so much with them. Shed blood, sweat and tears alongside those two, nearly losing their lives as they tried to survive... no, they did survive. "Friends... Apple Bloom and Sweetie Belle, I have to say are my only friends... friends are people, or rather ponies you can trust not to stab you in the back... ponies you can trust with your life." She looked over at Starlight, who looked confused. "Ponies that you can trust to catch you... if you fall."
With that said, Scootaloo continued her little walk, leaving behind a confused... and slightly horrified Starlight.
-ooo000=+=000ooo-
Eventally, Scootaloo arrived back to where Bloom and Sweetie were, along with the rest of the elements, and both princesses and even Starlight. Scootaloo had found a question lingering at the back of her skull, she found herself wanting to ask it for some time but neglected to for... well.. if you knew, they'd be obvious reasons. The pegasus sat down on her seat, deciding to bite the bullet as it were.
"Okay, so now we get back to the story." Twilight said, her tone determined... she wanted to find out why Sweetie was this way... as well as the other two. But Scootaloo raised her hoof. "Uh, yes Scootaloo?"
"Question, I know this will bite me in the ass... but what are the odds of... getting something to... eat." Scootaloo asked, getting a look from both of her friends.
"You talkin' bout what Ah think yer talkin' bout?" Apple Bloom asked, raising an eyebrow as Scootaloo nodded. "Ah'm wondering that myself..."
"Same..." Sweetie added.
"I'm sorry, of course we can bring some food for you to eat, what is it you would like?" Twilight asked, popping into existence a notepad. "Hayfries? Donuts? Ooooo, maybe some milkshakes and hayburgers?"
"Uhm... actually..." Apple Bloom slowly rolled her eyes to Scootaloo, rubbing the back of her head as the pegasus sighed.
"You got any meat around?" Scootaloo finished for Apple Bloom.
What followed next... was the longest, most awkward silence... to ever grace Equestria...
...
...
...
"Seriously though, got any? I'm hungry... guys?"
Our story continues, as Rarity learns a sad truth about her sister not being so little anymore. The CMC and their cold attitude, and their almost in-equine craving for meat.
Have our three heroines turned into carnivores?
Is Sweetie truly such a cold blooded pony?!
Stay turned next time, for the next chapter of: Return, on Vault-Tec Channel 6
-ooo000=+=000ooo- Texas Wasteland - City of Steel/The Tower - Apple Bloom's Perspective
It had been... maybe a few hours since me and the girls read that book, learning just about everything there was to learn about most of this world's firearms. Handguns, assault rifles, grenade launchers, sniper rifles... everything, of course I'd probably have to read it a few more times to fully grasp and remember the information, but I knew I could if I really put my mind to it, I really wanted to protect my friends... and I was willing to do whatever it took to do it.
I was sitting by the view now, however, Scootaloo and Sweetie Belle by my side on either side of me. The crushed rubble and destroyed wall that was the entire eastern side, gave us the perfect view of the entire city just about. Lee had showed us that the entire northern, southern and western walls were the same, the entire top part of the tower destroyed save for a few rooms and walls. I kept looking out into the city, eyeing the tall skyscrapers, the heavy and thick smoke that covered the skyline for miles around, and the sounds of what sounded like lightning and thunder...
But Lee told me it was something else entirely...
They were gunshots, explosions... the sounds of people fighting in the streets below, over what I didn't know. But it made me sad to think about, that there were humans, like Lee and Dusty, fighting each other... killing each other. What was there to fight over? Food? Water?
Why not just band together and try to rebuild?
It made no sense to me...
"This city..." Scootaloo spoke softly, looking around the skyline. I couldn't tell what was going on in her head right now, fear, sadness for the people down below... "They just fight..."
"Ah know." I replied to her, sighing as I heard Lee behind us, sitting on the piece of rubble he was on a few hours ago. He had one of those assault rifles in his hands, unloading and reloading it several times, why he did that, I didn't know. Nervous habit? Something to pass the time? Didn't matter much, I suppose...
"I... I know nopony really knows but..." Sweetie had started to speak, ears folded back when she saw a plume of fire billow up into the sky from nearby. "W-what do we do now?"
That was a good question... what did we do now?
We were safe, for now I suppose, inside of this tower. Dusty and Lee were kind enough to help us out, but... what now? Do we just sit here, wait until somepony comes for us? When would that be though? We've been gone for... what, three days now? I had no idea if they even had a clue as to where we were, we were somewhere else entirely, a world bathed in nuclear fire...
I didn't know what to do, I was the leader of the CMC... I had always led my friends... but now, I was lost.
I wanted to do something, we couldn't just sit here and wait, the boredom would kill us... well not really, but it wouldn't be any fun... then again, could we even have fun here?
I sighed. "Ah have no idea Sweets." I told her honestly, turning to look at the smaller filly, she was scared, Scoots was as well, even though she was doing her best to hide it. I was also scared, concerned and... bored. I know I should be grateful I'm alive right now, but, being bored sucked. Maybe I could ask Lee for help? Maybe he could give us something to do.
"Maybe... I mean, we don't really know him all that well, could he help us?" Scootaloo asked, shocking me out of my thoughts, I guess I said the latter part outloud.
"Would it hurt?" I countered, I got a shrug in response from my pegasus friend.
Who knows, maybe he wouldn't help... he's already done so much by taking us here and almost getting hurt in return.
We got our answer though.
"Depends... what do you want to ask me?" Lee suddenly spoke up from behind us, making me cringe.
He and Dusty must have super hearing or something, I swear!
"Uh..." I turned around, smiling sheepishly with my friends. "Well... its uh, kinda boring round here, was wonderin' if there was anythin' for us ta do." I told him, turning my smile into a more relaxed one.
The human furrowed his eyes in thought, as Forrest hovered nearby, playing some music that I kinda liked. Lee seemed to be thinking, and I was hopeful he could help us out with giving us something to do. We could have explored, but... I was scared of making Dusty or Lee angry, to the point where they kicked us out.
"Well, I have to head into the city, so I guess you could come with me if you wanted." Lee offered, reloading his magazine for the last time, before pulling back the bolt and shouldering it. "I mean, you're gonna have to stick close, but... eh."
I thought about that, going down into the city itself... the belly of the beast, covered in flames, and what would no doubt be some scary humans... probably something more. Curosity killed the cat, but I was curious and I really wanted to see the city up closer. I nodded my head to the man, smiling brightly. "Sure! Ah bet we could probably find something there to help us get home maybe!"
My friends lit up. "Yeah! Maybe there's like, a unicorn or something in the city!" Scoots suggested, smiling a toothy smile at me and Sweets.
"Or a transporting machine... thing!" Sweetie also threw in, as Lee just sighed at us, I gave him a shrug.
"Well, if you guys are ready, we can head out now." Lee told us, to which I nodded my head, along with the others. The man returned our nod with one of his own, before turning around and grabbing his duster coat and throwing it back on, a sudden flash happened when he did that, and when the blearyness faded from my eyes... I saw his armor was back on...
It just popped out of nowhere! "Whoa..." We all ooed, how did he do that!
Lee turned around to look at us, raising an eyebrow. "Do what?"
"How did you do that?" I asked him, the three of us cantering up to him to inspect his armor. I thought his world didn't have magic, he lied to us! "I thought you said this world didn't have magic?"
"Uhh... pocket space, that's not magic its just technology." Lee told us with a shrug of his armored shoulders before holding up that weird wrist thing he carried around and tapping a few things on it, before something began to... appear in his hand, suddenly I saw a handgun appear out of nowhere, a Desert Eagle if i remember right, that was a rusty looking color. "Just one of he many perks of being someone who's not afraid of digging around irradiated forts and bases for sweet technology."
This thing on his wrist, it was so neat looking, and I knew instantly... that I wanted one. "Hey, can Ah get one of those?" I asked him, smiling a sweet smile.
The man hummed in thought once more, as Forrest came over. "Maybe, but these are really hard to find, and they're expensive as fuck. But maybe you'll get lucky and find one somewhere, I don't know... unless you wanna try getting a job to save caps and buy one somewhere." He told me, once more shrugging his shoulders.
My ears drooped and I sighed, oh well. I told myself. Maybe I can find one out in the wasteland somewhere... assuming I can bring myself to actually go out. Turning towards Lee again, I said, "Okay so... when do we leave?"
"Right now, actually."
-ooo000=+=000ooo- Texas Wasteland - City of Steel/The Tower's Courtyard - Apple Bloom's Perspective
We had left the tower, being followed by Dusty until we came to the exit, and he bid us farewell. The strange guru human waving a bullet over each of our heads and chanting some chant, before wishing us luck on our journey, and asking that if we found anymore Lost Spirits, we're to bring them to him. I wondered what he meant by Lost Spirits, I couldn't see spirits, and I doubt Sweetie or Scootaloo could, I had no idea what he meant, but we agreed and left.
The bottom of the tower was a courtyard of sorts, or at least, that's what it used to be, before... whatever happened here, happened. Dead trees still stood, burned away soil that had dead grass standing, a few burned and twisted benches, along with a very unstable and destroyed walkway that led out into the city which looked... horrible from the ground. The roads looked pretty bad from above, but now that we were actually in the city, we could see how bad the damage was in full detail.
The roads, sidewalks, and alleyways were completely destroyed, piles of rubble from building tops fallen down to the ground and creating blockades and blocking off some areas. Holes had opened up into the underground, where I could see several sewer entrances, pipes spewing brown murky water into puddles which were slowly forming into pools, or just vanishing into a black abyss. Streetlights flickered on and off, some bent or just broken entirely. Buildings all around were thrashed beyond repair it looked like, windows burned or melted away, boarded up and doors blown off, or melted in place.
Signs dangled from above, some that I saw reading off there was an evacuation taking place... evacuation for what? The war or... something else?
As we walked, or stumbled along the road, we had to climb over rubble and slide down some areas, there were no flat places to really walk around the city as far as I could tell. The entire place was completely destroyed, and yet it still stood, somehow. I could hear the steel reinforced buildings groaning nearby, the steel skeletons moaning as they struggled to stand, looking as if they would fall any moment. My mind was reeling from this, what made people live in this city?
Why would they live in such a dangerous place?
I saw some people walking around, dressed in rags that barely covered themselves, carrying pipes, or boards of some other makeshift weapon to protect themselves. I saw better equipped people staying in groups, wearing better armor, carrying better weapons, and looking mean as sin. Me and the girls stayed as close as possible while trotting next to Lee, I saw some of them giving us looks, and I wasn't sure what kind of looks they were.
But they were enough to make me regret asking Lee for something to do.
The people who saw us looked at us strange, some had wide eyes, others were just muttering to themselves about horse meat, or using for relief... I dread what they meant by that, and hopefully we would never find out. The others that looked at me, Scoots and Sweets were twitchy looking, carrying weird... things in their hands before holding them up to their mouths and inhaling it, a shudder escaping them before they scampered away like scared foals.
Lee didn't seem to bothered by it, his face was flat, hands relaxed around the grip of his assault rifle as he climbed around the rubble, me and the girls giving chase. He seemed completely unfazed by it all, as if it were a normal thing to him. I wondered if there was any normal place in this world, was every place like this? I remember what Lee told us back in Axton, but it just felt wrong that everything was destroyed...
This city, everything smelled wrong, felt wrong, you could feel it in the air around you... a dark presence of sorts that lingered like a tick on your backside. The humans, all the ones we passed by seemed to be... desperate, for what I also did not know, I knew little about these humans and why they acted the way they did. For all I knew, Lee was the only sane one, and even then what little I knew of him suggested otherwise.
"Okay, stick close to me now, we're getting into a part of town that's a bit more shady.. and worse." He informed us, as Forrest made some whirring noises, and I saw his own weapons becoming primed as we kept moving forward...
Wait... what!
"Wait, yer tellin' me, tellin' us that this ain't th' shady an' worse part?" I asked him, looking at our human guide in shock. Everything we've seen so far, the destruction, people, and the feeling in the air... it was horrible to experience, and now we were heading into the more worse part of this city!
"Yep." Was what Lee said, "So stick close."
I sighed, my friends doing the same, as I wondered... if coming out here was a mistake.
-ooo000=+=000ooo- Texas Wasteland - City of Steel - Apple Bloom's Perspective
I honestly could not believe it, Lee told us this city only got worse from here on out, which... didn't seem possible, and yet, I could see how it was going to be more... scary looking. The rubble and completely destroyed road stayed the same, but it was the people, places and things among the rubble that was the different. The humans were all scary looking, some of them donning paint on their faces and bodies, openly fighting each other with their fists. Me, Scoots and Sweets watched as two humans fought each other, faces bloodied and blood flowing.
I gasped, they were going to end up hurting each other silly! Heck, they already were! "Hey, stop it!" I cried, galloping over to them to try and stop them. but it only got me thrown to the side.
"Fuck off you piece of shit!" The human yelled at me, eyes bloodshot and body covered in bruises. the other took advantage and grabbed him, and they both resumed fighting. Over what, I didn't even know.
Sweetie and Scootaloo looked ready to help me stop this, but Lee had grabbed the three of us and took us away, jogging away from the scene before taking us into an alleyway. Our hind legs bounced against Lee's own as he ran, jogging into an alleyway before he set us down and sighed, shaking his head as he pinched his nose. "Guys, what the hell?" He asked, and I folded my ears back. I recognized his tone, it was the same tone that Applejack used whenever I did something wrong or stupid... mostly stupid.
"This isn't right." Sweetie told him, shaking slightly, and I knew why. We'd never seen this much fighting before, I could still hear people fighting, firing guns, throwing punches, it scared her... it scared me. "Everypony shouldn't be f-fighting..."
Lee sighed, his look softening as he knelt down. "Look, kid... I know it ain't right, but this is how the world is... its how this city is." Lee told her, looking out behind her as a small shop was set afire making the three of us look back in shock, backing up until we ended up hitting Lee's legs. "This won't be stopping kids... so I suggest getting used to it." With that, the man stood up and continued down the alleyway, and we followed him. Sweetie Belle chancing one last look behind us at the fighting before following, sticking close to me.
The alleyways, it seemed, were less destructive then the streets and buildings. All around us, I could see the tall buildings, massive and extremely unstable towers of steel and glass just waiting to fall over on top of us. Some of the buildings had smoke coming out of them, and i didn't know if those were from campfires, or if somepony had started a fire to hurt somepony... or worse. Some kind of firebreathing monster, I didn't know what kind of creatures humans had to deal with, but I'm sure they weren't... all bad, least I hope so.
I didn't know what was going on in Sweetie and Scootaloo's minds, after the human fight we tried to stop... it broke my heart, and I knew for a fact that Fluttershy couldn't handle this, she'd be trying to stop everypony from fighting... but would it do any good? I knew she had her Stare, but could that power work against so many humans who are out for one another?
I doubted it... somehow...
-ooo000=+=000ooo- Texas Wasteland - City of Steel - Sweetie Belle's Perspective
Maybe... a few minutes had passed since we entered that alleyway and left those humans to fight for whatever reason, we followed close behind Lee, and I could tell what he said earlier was true, the city was indeed getting worse from this point on. I could hear it in the air around us, the gunfire, the explosions and screams of fighting humans. It was like a warzone, and we were right in the middle of it. Lee had held up his firearm, keeping it tight to his shoulder as he led us to... to where ever it was he was taking us to. I didn't know what it was he needed however, maybe he needed a new gun?
We kept moving through the alleyway as gunfire rang out in just about every corner, I heard glass shatter, people scream, and it was scaring me. I didn't like this place, I didn't like this world, and I just wanted to be back home with Rarity, Mom and Dad. But instead, I was stuck in a world filled with weird creatures called humans, who destroyed their own world over something silly, and killed billions. And even after they destroyed their world... they kept fighting and fighting. I didn't know if the entire world was like this, but this city was like that and it... it made me sad.
"Alright," Lee knelt down by the end of the alleway, and I could see people in the streets, suspicious looking people. We stopped by Lee, crouching low near him as he kept his eyes peeled. "We're getting closer, so stick close to me and don't wander off... we're headed into some nasty territory."
"Ah thought we already were in nasty territory." Apple Bloom asked him, prompting me to give him a look that asked the same thing. This part of the city was pretty bad, and it just kept getting worse?
What was the worst part of this city? Was a question lingering in my mind.
"Ehh... the city has... different levels of danger, it just keeps getting worse kids." He told us, before standing up and moving out into the street, we galloped close behind him. The other humans around us looked at he three of us funny, and I wondered why, was it cause we were ponies? Or really colorful? Looking around, I didn't see anything that had any color, everything was dirty, broken... burnmed away. I bet the city looked very pretty years ago, before... before the war.
The street ahead of us was filled with debris, a bunch of those broken down human vehicles that were stripped of their parts, wheels and everything else, except the frame and a few other parts. I saw a few humans lurking around nearby, all of them wearing jumpsuits as they stripped several parts from the human vehicle. I didn't know why they were doing that, maybe they needed the parts for something? Or they were trying to fix up something with them, or maybe even sell them, again I didn't know. Maybe Apple Bloom can get Lee to teach us some things, mostly about how things work aside from guns.
After a time, we ended up at a large looking building, a hotel of some sort that was missing half of the top floor, I could tell because it was currently laying in the street in a pile of smashed rubble that effectively blocked off the road, preventing anypony from heading that way unless you climbed over it. I saw a few humans standing outside, armed with rifles and wearing armor, heavy looking armor that made me scared. They looked scary, is this where Lee wanted to go? If so, why?
I got my answer, when he walked up to one of the guards, and I managed to hear him ask, "Is Mikhial in?" The guard seemed to be thinking, before another turned to Lee.
"Who may I say, is asking?" The other one asked.
"Lee's asking, I need some help." Lee responded, as Apple Bloom and Scootaloo turned to me.
I felt AB stand next to me, and she gave me a curious look. "You alright Sweets?"
Turning to give her my own curious look, I asked, "Y-yeah... why?" I was alright, I mean... I didn't feel sick or... or bad or anything, maybe a little sad because of what was going on but...
Bloom nodded, sitting down and saying, "Ah just wanted ta make sure, considerin' what all's going on an' all." She told me as Scootaloo sat down on my other side, tiny wings fluttering slightly.
"Are any of us alright?" Scootaloo questioned, making me look at her.
"What do ya mean?" Bloom wondered with a raised eyebrow, tilting her head as her bow leaned off to the side. I noted how dirty it looked, now that I thought about it, all of us were pretty dirty, its been nearly three... four days, I think since we last bathed.
"I mean... look at this place." Scootaloo told us, gesturing to the city around us.
Me and Bloom took a look around, the city was pretty bad, buildings were falling apart, some of them were on fire, and others were just leaning in a way that made me wonder how long it would be before they completely fell apart and crushed whoever was unlucky enough to be under them at the time. The smog over the city was thick, thick to the point where it blocked out the sun and the sky for miles all around, the smoke came from the many fires and whatever those huge smioke pillers were.
Jeez, how did these people live?
"Its filled with so much... bad stuff," Scootaloo told us, looking around with a scared gaze, you could tell from the look in her eyes. Wide, twitchy... "So many of those humans want to do things to us, didn't you see them looking at us when we were walking by?"
Bloom nodded her head, and I followed shortly after. "Y-yeah I did... I'm trying not to think about it, Scootaloo." I told her, in truth, I was scared out of my mind about why they were looking at us so funny. Talking about doing things to us, or even eating us! It scared me to think that at any possible moment, we could be snatched up and taken somewhere before getting eaten... or worse.
"I can't help but think about it." Scootaloo told us, fear in her voice. I frowned, feeling bad for my friend, so I scooted over to her and put my arm around her in a hug.
"Don't worry Scoots," I told her reassuringly, giving her a tiny smile. Even though I was also scared, somepony had to keep up my friends' spirits, might as well be me. "I'm s-sure nothing bad is going to happen, we just gotta keep our spirits up! I'm sure everypony back home is trying to find us, so don't worry!" I told her, and Scootaloo gave me a weak nod in reply.
"You're right, I'm just..." She lowered her ears, "I'm scared..."
I rubbed her back a little as AB came over to us. "Ah know... cause Ah'm scared to..."
"Same." I agreed with Bloom, as Lee's voice called over to us.
"Alright, come on and follow me, and don't. touch. anything." He warned us, and we all nodded, with my mostly wondering why we couldn't touch anything. STeeling ourselves, we trotted after Lee, all the while being watched by the humans as we entered the building.
-ooo000=+=000ooo- Texas Wasteland - City of Steel - Mikhial's Pad - Sweetie Belle's Perspective
Now I know why he said not to touch anything.
The interior of the hotel was relatively cleaner then the city, and The Tower where Dusty lived, the carpet was sweeped clean of debris, the walls, while torn and dirty were intact and the holes boarded up, the doors leading into other rooms were fixed up to a degree, boarded up or blocked off entirely. I saw a few old paintings hanging on the walls, depicting oceans, grassy fields with... Saddle Aribian horses? A few others of cities, and some were too faded for me to really see anything on them
Bloom and Scoots were walking on either side of me, as we followed behind Lee who led us deeper into the building. The whole time I couldn't help but feel like we were being watched, but a look around showed nothing was watching us. So I have no idea what it was, maybe I was just being paranoid?
Eventually we came to a large set of doors, both looked like they were made of thick steel, and I could see two... weird things in front of the doors on either side near the wall. They were pretty big looking, colored black with a weird looking glowing red dot on the front of it, with a protrusion on the front of it that looked like a weird laser rifle with wires leading up to the 'eye', various wires were attached to it from behind and it stood on a platform and seemed to swivel. Both of the things perked up and aimed at us, making me back away with my friends.
"Yo! Mikhial! Its me Lee! Open up you russian arse!" Lee yelled, as the machines whirred to life, guns aimed at us as their eyes glared bright red.
"Lee, what are those!" Bloom questioned as she stood next to me and Scootaloo, I didn't know what they were exactly, but I knew they were weapons.
Lee ignored Bloom's question however, instead waiting patiently until a sudden voice spoke up. "Ahhhh, Lee my friend! How are you doing?"
"Just let me in you old bastard."
"Touchy," A click was heard, followed by the weird weapons powering down and the doors slowly opening up. "Come on in my friend!" They slid to the side, and Lee beckoned us to follow him, which we did, despite the machines almost killing us. Yeah they didn't do anything except aim at us, but it was enough! The three of us entered into the room, and we were pretty surprised, I half expected the room to be something else... like a clean room with another human in it, maybe decorated with a few things...
I didn't expect it to be filled with artillery.
All around us, were shelves, tables and gunracks filled with weaponry, tons of it! Half of the guns I saw in that book of Bloom's were all in this room just about, I saw heavy looking rifles, energy type weaponry, knives, hammers, spears and even a few swords and shorter looking blades. I saw some bigger stuff, that I doubted a pony could even use, like miniguns, plasma casters, laser rifles and gatling lasers, rocket launchers and grenader launchers. I saw all of these weapons lying everywhere, I even saw a few that were too big to fit on a table and were instead setting on the floor, big guns that looked way too big to even carry~
This human seemed to like his weapons.
Infront of us, I could see a large row of shelves and tables displaying all kinds of shiny looking weapons, machine guns, energy weapons, handguns, all kinds of shiny looking weapons. But at the end of the row was what drew our attention the most, the shining lights and the weird throne really was... uh, hard to ignore. Sitting in a large 'throne' made out of ammo boxes and crates, was a man, a large one at that. He wore menacing looking armor, which was a bunch of scrap metal built into heavy looking armor. His entire body was encased in it, making him look more like a steel giant then a human.
"Greetings Lee!" The man, speaking in a strange accent as he greeted Lee, as if they were old friends. His voice was odd sounding, as if it were coming from a speaker system inside his helmet. "It is good to see you in one piece!"
"Yeah yeah, good to see you to you giant piece of shit." Lee cackled, as Mikhial joined in, Bloom, Scoots and myself looking a bit shocked by their language.
After a bit of laughing, Mikhial turned to us, and the room fell silent. "Lee, what... is this?" He asked, his armored gaze peering at us, his voice thoughtful and confused.
"They're... uh... my companions, trying to help them out a bit." Lee responded, as Forrest hovered behind us.
"Pre-war equines suffering from radiation is what they are!" Forrest yelled from behind us.
"R-radiation?" I asked, what was that? Were we sick! I could tell my friends were just as worried, if their faces were anything to go by.
"They're not suffering from radiation you bucket of bolts... I don't think, anyway!" Lee quickly said, turning his attention back to Mikhial and getting himself back on track. "I need your help with something."
Mikhial turned away to look at Lee... but I could still feel his gaze lingering on the three of us. "And what would that be friend?"
"I need information," Lee told him, sighing through his nose. "I heard something about a man named Havoc poking around the city asking about... things... I want to know who he is, do you know?"
Mikhial sighed heavily, tapping an armored finger against his helmet. "I have never heard of this man before, but I have heard of people talking of a man trying to find something within the city." The large man told Lee, as me and the girls listened in. I wonder what someone wanted to find in this city, was there some kind of secret hidden in it somewhere?
I wonder if we could get our cutie marks in finding lost treasure?
Cutie Mark Crusader Lost Treasure Hunters! I beamed, smiling a little bit as Lee nodded his head.
"That might be him... any chance you heard where he might be?" Lee wondered, crossing his arms.
"No, I am afraid not my friend, but you may ask... The Dark One, if you wish, if he is still in the Tunnel." Mikhial had a warning tone about him, which also sounded a little worried.
The Dark One? The Tunnel? I shook my head, they had too many weird names for things, all these Lost Spirits, mysterious people and all these strange things in the city. Its so hard to keep track of it all, this entire world was filled with mystery and strange ways. I wondered if there was magic somewhere in this world, I know Lee said there was not any... but I bet that somewhere... there was.
"Shit... well, thanks Mikhial, I'll bring a bottle of Vodka or something next time I stop by." Lee told him, turning around and beckoning for us to follow.
However.
"One moment Lee..." Mikhial told our human friend, halting him as he stepped down from his throne, each heavy metallic thud of his boots sending light shockwaves through the floor.
Lee rose an eyebrow, and asked, "Yeah?"
What the giant said... shocked me a little. "I wish to speak with this one alone." He said, pointing a metal finger at me.
W-what! I stepped back a little, why did he want to speak with me? I didn't know anything, I wasn't important! I turned to look at Apple Bloom and Scootaloo, both giving me looks that said they didn't know what was going on either.
Lee, thankfully came to my rescue. "Hold up, why?"
The giant turned towards him, adopting a hurt tone of voice as he said, "What, do you not trust poor old Mikhial moy drug?"
Lee just blinked his eyes slowly, and my friends stood by my side protectively. "Not with your track record."
Mikhial just laughed, patting his belly armor. "You can trust me, Lee, I only wish to talk to the cute little pony." He said, making me blush.
I wasn't cute.
Lee just sighed however, "Fine fine fine, just... don't do anything that'll make me punch you in the scrotum." He warned the giant, before walking off. Bloom and Scotaloo stayed by my side, looking up at Mikhial.
"Do we have ta leave?" Bloom asked him, to which he gave a nod.
"It will only be a for a moment little one." The man told her, his tone soft and gentle as opposed to the loud one from before.
Bloom bit her lip, and I could tell she was having trouble with leaving me behind. I gave her a few moments to think, before I spoke, "He s-seems nice enough, I'm sure I'll be okay... so don't worry." I told them, smiling as Bloom hesitantly returned it.
"I-if you say so..." Bloom gave me a quick hug, as did Scootaloo before they both slowly trotted off, leaving me behind with the giant Mikhial.
I gulped, as I turned back to him, looking up at the human, he was massive up close, standing at least seven feet tall, if not eight. His armor only made him more intimidating, scary looking, his boot was big enough that if he wanted to... he could crush me. His hands were equally as huge, the man himself... Giant. And it only made me wonder why he wanted to talk to me.
"So, little filly... where are you from?" He asked me finally, after several seconds of tense silence.
I felt surprised from that question, but cleared my throat as my eyes looked around, before saying, "I-I'm from Equestria, I l-live with my sister in Ponyville." I told him, and he nodded his head. Why did he want to know about me? I wasn't anything special.
"In Ponville you say?" Mikhial murmured, he looked like he was thinking deeply about something. "Interesting..."
"What?" I asked him, tilting my head. Now that I thought about it, he didn't seem as bad as I first thought... he was actually quite nice.
"It is nothing little one." Mikhial told me as he stood up "You know what, I have gift for you little filly!" Mikhial told me, making me look up at the metal giant, wondering what he meant. The man lumbered over to the table near his throne, looking through the many weapons he had laying out on display. I just sat down on the floor as Scootaloo and Bloom were with Lee by the exit, waiting for me to arrive so we could leave. I wasn't sure what Mikhial was doing, but I decided to wait, after all I didn't want to seem rude to the rather nice if intimidating russian giant. Eventually after a bit of searching, Mikhial pulled something out of the pile of weapons, before lumbering over to me and kneeling down, holding out the object.
It was a knife, one with a very sharp blade. my horn lit up a little as I gently took it from his massive hand, holding it up. "Uhh... t-thank you?" I said, smiling nervously, why was he giving me a knife?
"It is gift! For being cute guest, it even folds up for easy carry." He told me, taking the knife and doing a deft little trick with his gloved hand, folded it before giving it back to me.
That was pretty neat actually.
"Um... I-I'm not ungrateful or anything, but why are you giving me this?" I wondered, holding up the folded knife.
Mikhial sighed gently, and said only one thing.
Something that was going to stick with me for the rest of my life.
"You will need it for the coming days, little filly."
-ooo000=+=000ooo- Texas Wasteland - City of Steel - Outside Mikhial's Pad - Apple Bloom's Perspective
We had waited for... maybe an hour before Sweetie came trotting out, and to my surprise I saw her levitating a knife with her. When we asked her, she said Mikhial gave it to her as a gift for... being a cute guest. Me and Scootaloo had a little laugh at her expense, but accepted it before moving on, Lee said something about that, saying MIkhial doesn't give out weapons like that to anyone. His exact words.
"He doesn't do that for just anyone, he must think you're special if he gave you that freely."
That seemed to shock Sweetie, as she kept it close to her. Lee said he'd make her something to carry it in, once we got back to The Tower that is. So, after that we started making our way through the city once more. I wasn't sure where we were headed however, I have a feeling we were headed for whatever the Tunnel was, if I had to wager a guess, it was underground... maybe even a part of the city itself, if I had to guess again. I bet I was right to.
But we were not headed towards wherever the Tunnel was, instead we were headed back down the path we took headed from the Tower. Taking a few different paths, but I could see we were headed back to it.
"We headed back to th' Tower?" I asked Lee, trotting next to the human with Sweetie and Scoots behind me.
"Yep, The Tunnel isn't a place for kids," Lee admitted as Forrest hovered nearby.
"Not a place for robots either." Forrest grumbled.
"I heard that!" Lee narrowed his eyes at the bot, making the three of us laugh a little bit as we continued down the road.
A sigh escaped me as we left, the intense and horrible atmosphere lifted for a brief second before it came crashing back down on us again. The laugh and funny moment helped, but it didn't help enough to make us forget the one simple fact that we were stuck in a hostile world, where at any given moment we could be killed, and eaten by some crazy group of humans. But so far, we had met three friendly humans, Lee, Dusty and Mikhial. A strange human General, a Bullet Guru and a Metal Giant.
I wondered who else we would meet? Assuming they were friendly of course.
I didn't get to think of anything else...
When I suddenly felt myself falling.
"WHAAAAAAAAA!" I screamed, what happened!
"Apple Bloom!" My friends screamed as I fell down, down what, I didn't know.
I could see the road above me disappearing as I ended up hitting an incline and started rolling down sharp pieces of rubble that cut into my flanks and back legs and hooves. I cried out from each bit of pain that I felt, eventually rolling down until I hit a pile or rubble, rocks and metallic bits of junk as I heard Lee's voice above yelling at me, I couldn't make out what he was saying though, as I was too busy hurting. My whole body burned, and it wasn't even over yet.
The pile of rubble I was on fell apart, and I started falling down again, sliding down another hill, I screamed again as the darkness around me was illuminated only by a a few weird lights. I passed by hissing pipes, rushing water and other things, I could hear loud explosions happening all around me, and I had to cover my head as everything started to fall apart. Things poked into me, sharp pieces of metal and steel, rocks and wires, and other things before I finally hit the bottom, hard, landing on my side at the bottom of the hill before rolling into something that made a thunk noise.
I couldn't stop the tears from falling, everything hurt worse then I could have imagined. I could feel something warm sticking to my coat, and when I opened my eyes to look, I saw my arm was bleeding, and blood was sticking to my coat. I whimpered, the cut was pretty deep, and it burned worse then that time I sprained my hoof back home. Moving my head to look around, I saw I was in some kind of... area where a bunch of tunnels went off in different directions. It was huge to, bigger then I thought anything underground would be, all of these tunnels were big, and I could see water rushing down them and pooling around the area I was in.
From what I could tell, this was a massive platform, behind me was a great deal of rubble leading up to the street level above. I had fallen underground, into what I guess was a sewer system of some sort. I didn't know much about sewers, heck I didn't know anything about em. But I did know that these tunnels, while over two hundred years old, still worked to some degree, and was filled with a faint but still disgusting smell that lingered in the air.
I could see there were holes above, that showed the street above, heck, I could see in the distance, down one tunnel, that the road fell through and created a way back up. Maybe I could get back up using it?
*Bzzzzzt*
That would have to wait, as I heard a buzzing noise behind me. Eyes wide, I struggled to turn my head, and there, lying in some rubble I saw something... Something round and broken, I didn't know what it was though. It was round, had some antenna on it and some broken bits lying around it, and it was colored a pale white color, with faded blue lines on it in an artistic and jagged zig zag pattern and was covered in bullet holes. On the front, I saw a flickering blue light, struggling to remain lit.
I gasped, what was this thing? Whatever it was, it was broken to pieces, and the noises it was making, made me feel sad. The light continued to flicker on and off, sparks flying off of it as the light seemed to focus on me. It was pretty dark down here, but only just barely, and this thing seemed to have a light on it. I struggled to stand up, my hoof and body hurting but I forced myself to stay upright. I limped over to the thing, and poked it, it made another noise but did nothing except shine its light a little brighter.
Maybe I can use this to find my way out.
Kneeling down, I managed to pick it up, the round thing weighing just a little bit more then Sweetie Belle, before I get it onto my back. It almost rolled off, but I was able to keep it steady. But only barely, I had to look around for a bit before I ended up finding some rope like stuff while old it managed to work out pretty well in keeping the thing from falling off my back. Thankfully I had it keep on my back in a way that kept its light shining a little bit forward, helping me see.
Taking a deep breath, I started limping forward until I found a path that led down one of the tunnels. A rusty looking metal bridge, that was barely hanging on by the supports. "Okay... let's find a way out." I told myself and the thing on my back, before limping down the metallic bridge, it groaning and squeaking with every step.
-ooo000=+=000ooo- Texas Wasteland - City of Steel - Underbelly of the City - Apple Bloom's Perspective
I don't know how long I was down there for, hours it felt like, with the weird round thing on my back helping light the way, all the while making odd noises. My hoof was killing me, as blood dribbled down onto the floor I was walking on. The tunnel I was walking through was filled with garbage and debris, I could see them whenever the light passed over it, rocks and concrete chunks, big shopping carts and boxes, all kinds of things were down here. In the river - I guess you could call it - next to me, I could see some things floating in it, most of which were even more boxes, some trash, cans, bottles, metal parts, I think I even saw...
Y-yeah... that's a body...
Oh Celestia.
I kept moving, turning away from the river as I looked out ahead of me, the tunnel had various intersecting tunnels going off into some unknown direction, where I could see more of those holes opening up into the streets above, pipes causing murky water to flow out into the river below carrying all manner of junk and things down to the center, only to go down somewhere else entirely. I wondered how long these tunnels went on for, and where they all led to, was there a main area they connected to? If so, where was it? I would have liked to know, but I didn't want to be down here any longer then I had to, who knows what was down here!
All the while I walked, I thought about my friends back on the street above, what were they doing?
*Splash*
My eyes widened... as I heard the splash, and the light flickered out...
-ooo000=+=000ooo- Texas Wasteland - City of Steel - Scootaloo's Perspective
"We gotta get her out of there!" I yelled at Lee, as me and Sweetie started to look down the hole, I comtemplated jumping down and gliding, but I don't think I'd make it. Sweetie was looking just as concerned and freaked out, we had to do something!
"Fucking hell," Lee cursed behind us, before turning to Forrest. "Scan the city and try to find another way down, now!" He ordered shortly after.
"Roger that general, sir!" Forrest chimed, as he started to make weird beeping noises.
I gave him a look. "Can't you just climb down!" I asked him, anything could be happening to Bloom down there!
Lee however, only scoffed. "As awesome as I am kid, I can't climb down this without getting myself killed." Lee told me, making me huff in frustration.
All these things humans could do, and they couldn't climb down a rocky incline. It was in this moment that I wish I could have flown, I could just fly down there easy and help her back up... but no... I had to have these tiny little things on my sides, that were practically useless for flying. I couldn't even glide properly, I could barely get off the ground!
I hated them.
Eventually I heard Forrest's beeping stop, and he spoke. "General, I have found an alternate opening exactly one mile west of here, with a tunnel that connects with the one below!" Forrest chirped, and my hopes rose up.
Only to come crashing down soon after.
"Its filled with Mirelurks and Ghouls however!"
Mirelurks? Ghouls? I wondered, as Lee started off down the road, with me, Sweets and Forrest right behind him.
-ooo000=+=000ooo- Texas Wasteland - City of Steel - Underbelly of the City - Apple Bloom's Perspective
I ran, I didn't care that my hoof throbbed in pain, pain shooting up my arm and through my body with each step, I didn't care that tears stung at my eyes from the pain and the fear, I just ran as fast as I could. The air continued to smell putrid, ground was also sticky, soggy and in some cases I stepped in something that splashed, or made a squelching noise. I didn't know what I was stepping in, I only knew that I was running away from something that was swimming behind me in the muck.
I only saw it for a brief moment when it broke the surface, and the light on my back flickered on and off. It was big, and ugly looking, and I couldn't even begin to understand what the heck it was, or why it was after me. The thing looked like a weird frog, and had huge claws and shiny eyes that locked on me, the second it caught sight of my form in the darkened tunnel. It looked hungry to, no doubt the reason it was chasing me through the sewers, it probably wants to eat me!
It'd have to work for its meal.
But at this rate it wasn't going to have to work long, I was growing tired, my limbs ached and my arm burned from the wound I had gotten earlier. I wonder how much blood I had lost from my cut? I didn't know, if I survived this I would know, if I still cared to know that is. My body was slowing down, and the thing on my back was making odd noises, as sparks flew from the weird thing on the end of it. What was it trying to do?
*HOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOWL*
I heard echoing throughout the tunnels, a shrill howl that put a TImberwolf's to shame with the sheer volume, and the chills it sent down my spine. It didn't sound natural in the slightest, what was it and where? I got my answer when I heard the pitter patter of claws on the concrete, making my heart increase its pace as I heard the snarls and growls. I didn't dare look behind me, I was too scared, my heart pounded in my chest, and everything hurt as the growls grew louder, along with screeches.
When I looked behind me, I saw a bunch of weird glowing humans jumping into the water, snarling and growling as they climbed onto the thing chasing after me. They clawed at the thing, all of them, followed by several more humans who were not glowing followed the others into the water, attacking the thing and trying to... do something.
I didn't waste time thinking about it, as I kept running down the tunnel, trying to get away from the things fighting behind me. The tunnel ahead of me thankfully had some lights running through it, but they were not a bright as I would have liked. The thing on my back managed to summon its own light source once again, helping me see what I was running through, it was water, or at least... I think it was water, it was all slimy looking and sticking to my hooves as I ran.
Probably not water then. I told myself, turning down the tunnel headed right. Down the tunnel was the ame as before, darkened black abyss filled with who knows what. Behind the the growls and snarls ceased suddenly, leaving me to tremble in the darkness, with only the metal ball thing on my back for company. It had said nothing and done nothing except make odd warbling noises and sparking, as well as giving me light.
I was thankful for that however, as it allowed me to see, even though I wasn't liking what all I saw down here below the city. It was disgusting, smelled horrible and had scary and dangerous monsters lurking around every corner. I wanted to be back on the street level above, away from this gross sewer system, I shouldn't have asked Lee to help us find something to do, I should have just stayed quiet and read my book. But no, I had to be an idiot and now I'm stuck down here.
After awhile of running through the tunnel, I came across an open door leading somewhere, and figured maybe it had some stairs leading up to the surface. So I turned into the room, the light showing me some steel gray walls with piping leading to a set of stairs going down, and one going up! I knew it! I jumped onto the steps, climbing them as fast as I could, not even paying attention to the warning signs and objects left behind by some unfortunate humans.
I had climbed up... maybe three or four flights of steps before I reached what looked like a small room, I had grown tired by then and couldn't climb any higher. My body continued to ache horribly, my hoof was numb as numb could be. I felt weak all of a sudden, my vision becoming slightly blurry as I stumbled into the room. I could see some tables sitting around, closed doors leading who knows where, scattered papers and pencils, cups and mugs, chairs tipped over and some other items.
But only one thing drew my attention, it was the object lying on the floor, next to... a human's skeleton. The skeleton was small however, and wearing the tattered remains of a blue jumpsuit with a number on it I couldn't identify. The body still had... patches of skin on it, and it was heavily decomposed, but there was no smell. I gulped as I looked down at the object, it was like the one Lee wore, only more bulky, and scratched in places.
As I saw my vision blur, I ended up slowly falling to my knees, before rolling onto my side, the thing on my back falling and hitting the floor with a loud metallic clanking noise. Everything eventually darkened, as the howls from down below continued...
Apple Bloom, Sweetie Belle and Scootaloo just sat in silence, as a few of the Elements of Harmony, Celestia, and Starlight just looked at them in abject horror. What Scootaloo asked them, in regards to getting something to eat was an innocent question, maybe some donuts, hayfries or something along those lines. Instead, they have learned something incredibly horrible about the CMC...
They had tasted meat...
And wanted more.
"I'm s-sorry, I t-think I must have misheard you." Starlight stammered, glumping as she asked, "Did you say... meat? As in... flesh and blood, meat?"
Scootaloo, Sweetie and Bloom nodded their heads, Scootaloo noting the unease on all of their faces. "Yeah, meat, you guys happen to have any lying around?" She asked, as if that were a completely normal thing to ask someone.
Everyone else, begged to differ. "Yo-you a-a-all... e-eat m-meat?" Fluttershy barely managed to say, shaking violently as her ears pinned back against her skull. The young mare hadn't expected to hear such a thing come out of the CMC's mouths, it was... horrifying, disgusting, and above all, went against everything ponies stood for.
"I knew this was gonna happen, ugh." Scootaloo groaned, shifting from where she was laying on her side. "Yeah, we eat meat."
Clearing her throat, Princess Celestia turned to the young mare, and gave her a hard look. "Scootaloo, ponies... do not eat meat, its... not exactly... appropriate."
"We can handle it just fine." Bloom spoke up, as Fluttershy whimpered. "Besides, it being appropriate wasn't something we had to deal with."
"Yeah, just gotta cook it right," Scooaloo added with a little grin, obilivous to Fluttershy's teary eyes. "And besides, shit like hay and donuts weren't exactly are the menu."
"Well... I... I'm sure there were other alternatives..." Celestia started, slightly disturbed with how lightly Scootaloo was talking about it.
"Nope, it was either meat, two hundred year old food, or death." Scootaloo told her bluntly, snorting as she shuffled her metallic black wings. "Why? What's wrong with eating meat?"
"What's wrong?" Rarity started, "What's wrong!? Its meat! Ponies do not eat meat! Its... its atrocious! Its unheard of!" She practically yelled, every one of her friends could tell she was outraged at this. Her tone, her very postue spoke of someone disgusted with the mere thought of eating the flesh of another creature. "How could you even think of doing something like that!?"
"Ah gotta agree with Rarity on this, that's a mite disgusting you three." Applejack agreed with her friend, shaking her head as she took off her hat. "Eatin' another creature... it just ain't right."
Scootaloo just rolled her eyes however, looking over at the apple mare. Fluttershy had gulped, before speaking up, looking between the two. "I... I c-can sort of understand." She said in a meek tone, drawing several sets of eyes towards her, questioning ones.
"Ah'm sorry? You can understand why they've practically turned into cannibals?" Applejack asked, sounding disappointed. "Them eating meat just ain't right Fluttershy."
"Its horrifying!" Rarity fanned herself, as Sweetie rolled her eyes.
The butter yellow pegasus nodded her head, looking between everyone. "I... I can, I m-mean, i-if it w-was done o-out of survival... t-then I can understand." She spoke softly, but loud enough so everyone could hear her. "I've haven't h-heard enough to fully understand but... I'm sure it was do-done purely out of survival..."
Everyone didn't look so sure about it, all except Luna. "I agree with young Fluttershy, in a harsh enviroment such as the one they have described, one must adapt in order to survive... even if it means resorting to cannibalism." Luna explained, eyes calmy looking over at Scootaloo, who locked eyes with her. "While it is not entirely proper, and seen as taboo, our bodies can in fact handle meat to some degree." That last bit seemed a little shocking to some of them.
"Really?" Pinkie asked, tilting her head. "OOooo! That makes me think of a new cupcake idea!" Pinkie giggled happily, clapping her hooves as her friends all gave her horrified looks, except Rainbow Dash.
"Please no." Rarity shook her head, looking and feeling faint.
"That sounds disgusting." Twilight added, sticking out her tongue.
"I don't really see any problem." Rainbow shrugged as Twilight, Rarity, and Applejack looked at her, "What?"
"How can you see no problem?" Rarity asked, eyes wide at Rainbow Dash.
"I've eaten meat before, its not all that bad, sure its kinda stringy and stuff, but you get used to it." Rainbow explained, adding, "Besides, Pegasi burn a lot of calories when we fly for long periods of time, and with all the cloud work we do we need a lot of protein to keep going." The mare sniffled, wings fluttering slightly as her sides. "Sometimes I grab me a fish or two when I'm working over the water."
Applejack stared at Rainbow, seemingly disgusted with what she had just heard. "So you're tellin' me, you eat fish?" She asked Rainbow Dash, who nodded.
"Yeah, like I said, pegasi need the energy reserves for when we're doing a lot of heavy work loads, moving clouds ain't all that easy, AJ." Rainbow told her with a sniff, shifting in her seat. "Flying takes up a lot of stamina and we need to eat a lot and sleep."
"Is that why you're always napping?" Twilight asked, popping a notepad into existence and writing in it.
"Uh... yeah, why? Did you guys just think I'm lazy or something?" The pegasus asked with a laugh... and just got several looks, making her slowly frown. "Hey!"
"Alright, alright, come on guys!" Pinkie spoke up, stopping them before they got into an arguement. "So they eat meat, who cares! They're still our friends aren't they?" Pinkie asked nicely, looking between the CMC and her friends with a smile.
"Well, Ah still don't thin-" AJ started, but Fluttershy stopped her.
Fluttershy held up her hoof, looking over at the apple mare before she spoke up, "While... I... I don't like the idea, I'm sure it was for their own good." Fluttershy looked towards Apple Bloom, who nodded slightly. "After all, from what they told us, that world was... very bad. I know we haven't heard much aside from snippets, but..."
"There were massive food problems in the wasteland." Sweetie told them, green eyes looking up from her knife. "Finding any kind of food that was actually edible was hard... we all had to turn to it at some point. I mean sure, there was other food, even vegetables and some other stuff that the wastelanders grew and sold, but meat was one of the main things on the list."
"Can we please move past this? This is kinda annoying, probably should have kept my mouth shut." Scootaloo groaned, rolling her eyes as she stood up.
"Where're you going?" Sweetie asked, to which Scootaloo just shrugged.
"Out, sick of sitting down." She announced, and the young pegasus soon made her way out of the room and down the hall, eventually making her way to the front door and going outside.
Back in the living room, Twilight looked towards Celestia who nodded her head, and then... Twilight vanished in a flash of white, following the pegasus as Applejack just sighed, then Apple Bloom and Sweetie stood up and followed the pegasus out of the room, quickly leaving the castle. A door slamming told her they had left the building. "Just ain't right."
"I'm sure they had to, otherwise..." Fluttershy said, as Applejack shook her head.
"Look, Ah'm not liking that my little sister had to eat the flesh of another living being, survival or not, just ain't how Ah was raised, Fluttershy." Applejack said, looking towards the front door with a forlorn look in her eyes.
-ooo000=+=000ooo-
The three fillies had gone outside, and begun looking around their surroundings in the daylight. The town of Ponyville hadn't changed much, it looked the same as it did six years ago, the houses all looked the same, the forest still as large and vibrant as ever. The townsponies didn't really stop to look at the CMC for long, only getting a passing glance or two as they continued on about their day, headed to work or setting up stalls nearby, or just meeting with friends.
Apple Bloom chewed on her cheek as she looked around, everybody looked the same... it was as if they had never left Equestria and had been teleported to a world where it was kill or be killed. She had figured someone would have said something about them, maybe someone recognizing the three... however, she heard nothing, in fact, it was like no one recognized the three as they passed them all by. They had become a distant and faded memory, that which no one could remember save for the closest of kin.
It was heartbreaking in a way.
Apple Bloom had grown bored of standing, and decided to start walking, with her two friends following her. The three walked side by side, heading down familiar paths as they passed by shops and stores. They saw Lyra sitting by herself on a bench, looking down at a small magazine with a somber look on her face. Doctor Whooves was walking by a few shops, looking on with a distant look on his face as a small brown colt walked next to him.
The entire town, despite looking bright, seemed solemn. A metephorical cloud of depression lingered over the town, blocking out the rays of Celestia's sun with the smoke from nearby factories. Apple Bloom, Sweetie Belle and Scootaloo all noticed the factories sitting in places where the Everfree Forest had been cleared out acre by acre, twisted trees replaced with concrete fortresses with steel towers spewing black smoke, and the sounds of machinery chugging and metal claning replacing the sounds of wildlife and magic.
The trio had lingered near one of the fences, the buildings were a stark contrast to the subtle farming lifestyle that was Ponyville. Massive complexes building weapons of war, amidst a town of simple farmers, dressmakers and home repair ponies, it was so odd to see such buildings in the town. They had seen a brief glimpse of the weapons being created inside, large metal beasts with cannons, they knew what these were.
Equestria was building tanks.
They were almost crude looking things, boxy iron beasts with small cannons and treads that took up the entire side, and only held two ponies. They were something that made Apple Bloom frown, as well as Sweetie and Scootaloo, they looked horrid, and prone to many mechanical problems. The apple pony recalled what a human had done with a tractor and steel plates back in the other world, they had made a tank of sorts, quite effective, considering how shoddy it looked, but it performed perfectly.
They watched the ponies work tirelessly, building tanks and moving the completed ones into an area where several had been lined up for show. There were a few guards out and about, mostly earth ponies and unicorns armed with strange looking weapons that looked like shoddy laser muskets almost. They patrolled the grounds vigilantly, not paying much attention to the three fillies as they turned and walked away, headed towards AJ's farm.
The road there was different, half of AJ's the farmland, to Apple Bloom's shock had been changed. One half of it had been turned into a barren looking grassland, with sandbags, concrete buildings that resembled human bunkers to some degree, as well as metal towers. Apple Bloom didn't know what was going on, but she didn't like it one bit, everything felt so foreign, strange to her as she ventured to her old childhood home.
The farm eventually came into view, it looked somewhat the same as it always had, save for a few newer things, like more ponies working on the farm. Some had looked over at her and her friends, but she paid them no mind as she walked into the farm. The house was still there, as was the barn, and many of the animal pins. She saw the orchard where their old clubhouse was, and started for it, her thoughts turning back to their old crusades for their cutie marks. It was such a simple thing they all did, sure they caused such a big ruckas, but they were only doing it so they could find themselves... find what made them special.
In the end, they had found out what made them special, even if those talents involved... death in one way or another. It was what made them special, and no one could tell them otherwise.
Eventually, after some walking and passing by many confused workers, they had found their clubhouse. All three sets of hooves stopped once they spotted it, and they had come across quite a sight. The clubhouse had been the site of a mourning, as they spotted several things laying out among the ground and on the clubhouse itself. There were pictures of their younger selves in happier times, old spent candles that had been lit years ago and left. Wreaths and bouques of flowers laid out, dasies and roses, daffodils and lillies all weaved together in an almost artistic display of affection for the three originally lost fillies.
Apple Bloom felt a pang of emotion hit her heart, she felt... touched that so many ponies cared to come out here and do such a thing. The entire area had been decorated with lowers, and pictures, candles and so many other things left behind for them. Scootaloo and Sweetie felt touched as well, as they moved closer to the clubhouse, seeing that despite six years of non-repair, it looked to be in good shape. Bloom took the first step onto the ramp, feeling it creak with her step... she kept moving up however, each creak a reminder of simpler times.
When Babs Seed had become a bully.
The Smarty Pants incident.
When they had first gotten the clubhouse...
There were so few, and yet so many memories in this clubhouse, that it brought the faintest of smiles to her face. Once she reached the door, her hoof touched it, and she turned it before pushing the door open. It swung open with a loud creak, and an old musty smell greeted her upon going inside, she saw their old Cutie Mark planning chart, a map of Ponyville drawn in crayon on the wall, their thinking spot, and the table they all used to sit at and plan their adventures.
So many memories flooded through her mind in those few moments, causing her to become light headed as she sat down. She held her head, taking off her stetson as Scootaloo and Sweetie Belle sat beside her. The three looked around, a strong feeling of nostalgia hitting them like a freight train. It felt so strange to be back inside after so long, a lost part of their childhood they had missed out on for six year, nearly going on seven.
"It looks the same." Scootaloo said, as she walked further in, and spotted an old piece of red wood nearby... with four wheels, and a handle bar. She had a faint smile on her face, when she saw it was her scooter, old as it was... it had stayed there in the same place it had always been in.
Sweetie Belle saw the hooks on the wall, each one holding a small piece of dark red cloth with ablue patch on it, and a faded golden interior. The patch was of a shield, with a rearing filly inside of it, the mark of the crusaders, their own little group to help fillies and colts alike find what made them special. She walked over to them, a hoof running along the aged fabric as she gave a thoughtful frown, they were too small...
Apple Bloom nodded to what Scootaloo had said, as she walked over to the map and gave it a look over. It was one she had drawn, the same one they had used to seek out places in Ponyville to do their crusading. They had been at it for so long, that many places had been crossed out with red X's. Next to the map, was the newest list of their possible talents, the bottom most one being something regarding being good at Apple Juggling. She scoffed, shaking her head, We were so silly back then... She mused, as she spotted the chalkboard, along with the podium where she stood to make announcements. She went over to it, feeling of the aged wood as she went behind it, it reminded her of those she had found in a part of the wasteland with government buildings.
If there was any slight chance... could she have become a leader like those back on the human world?
She had no idea, it was an idea that had appealed to her many times... it even made her want to become a leader, having that much power over a single community, a city, or even a nation made her feel powerful. She liked the idea of it, she mused more about it, as she stood behind the podium, her thoughts drifting.
The group of three stayed in there for some time, remeniscing about time lost, what they would have been doing if they hadn't been thrown into a world where they were forced to fight for their survival against mutated monsters., insane human tribals and groups, and the very elements themselves. They probably would have grown up living somewhat normal lives, with various things thrown in where the Elements of Harmony had to come in and save the day, while they watched on in awe, smaller parts of them wanting to be heroes just like they were.
Ooooh... what being a hero meant... it was no easy thing to do, there was much respnsiblilty to be had when choosing to be a hero. These three, knew it all too well... from their many adventures, and struggles in the world of humans...
-ooo000=+=000ooo-
After teleporting outside, Twilight had ended up losing the three, despite her best efforts to following them... she lost them. She managed to keep following them for a good while, until she lost them at the Tank Factory, something that concerned her. She knew they knew nothing about what Equestria was going through right now, war had been looming for years now, and as such Equestria had to utilize its war funds so they could protect their interests.
It was something that bothered Twilight, but she had said nothing, after the attack on their border from both griffons and zebras.
The mare sighed heavily as she kept walking, keeping an eye out for the three young mares. Her mind drifted as she walked, to when they were so young, and wanting to get their marks. Such an innocent notion, but now they had them, and they were odd looking to Twilight... she pondered what their talents were, and made a note to ask them later... when she found them.
With pursed lips, Twilight looked at Ponyville... So much has changed... With that in mind, she kept looking for the girls.
-ooo000=+=000ooo-
The CMC had left the clubhouse, too many memories had caused them to have flashbacks, making them leave the clubhouse. However, they didn't get far before running into a pair of young mares who were standing nearby looking at the pictures of them all. One was a young pink mare wearing a tiara, and the other was a gray mare wearing glasses. Both were terribly familiar to the CMC...
There was a reason for that. Years ago, they had been bullied constantly by a pair of fillies, the two biggest bulies in all of Ponyville who picked on them for being blank flanks, ponies without Cutie Marks. They had contantly belitted them, insulted them, hated them for who they were, because they hadn't gotten theirs yet.
And now... here they stood, in front of them, older but looking exactly the same. However, instead of scowls, instead of the looks of hate. They were given looks of surprise and shock from both fillies turned young mares, who stared at the three with with eyes.
Sweetie Belle just stood there, staring at her schoolyard enemies, the pink one known as Diamond Tiara... and the grayish one known as Silver Spoon. Her emerald green eyes looked them both over, both mares obviously had changed quite a bit, they had grown taller and filled out. And on both of their backs, they saw a few flowers wrapped up in a sort of bouquet, roses and daises and such with pretty looking bows keeping them together.
With the other two, Diamond Tiara wasn't expecting anyone else to be at the clubhouse, especially three mares that looked exactly like the fillies she had bullied when she was younger, Sweetie Belle, Apple Bloom and Scootaloo, the three were alive... standing before her with their cutie marks.
There were no smiles however, just awkward silence...
Apple Bloom, Sweetie Belle and Scootaloo stared at the two young mares, the shock evident on the latter two's faces. The crusaders were not expecting to see their enemies near their clubhouse... let alone with flowers on their whiters as if they were here to offer them up. There was silence between the two groups for the longest time, neither breaking eye contact or making a move to speak...
But it was broken finally... by Silver Spoon. "D-Diamond..."
"Ye-yeah?" Diamond replied carefully.
Gulping, Silver asked, "Is that who I think it is?"
Diamond slowly nodded her head. "I-it has to be... they look just like them..."
Sweetie Belle just kept her eyes on the two young mares, emerald green eyes peering into the very depths of both ponies' souls with such intensity that it caused them both to move back a few steps. Bloom just huffed, causing some of her red bangs to fly out of her face as Scootaloo just glared. Eventually, Sweetie spoke, "Its been a while... Diamond... Silver." She said slowly, switching her gaze from Diamond to Silver as she said their names before focusing entirely on Diamond.
Her thoughts were a mess right now, she had gone walking with her friends in the hopes of seeing how their clubhouse fared, and perhaps to get their thoughts in order. And so far, she's now in front of two of the worst ponies she could think of, her bullies from school, and she wished they weren't here... in fact, why were they?
"Y-yeah... it has..." Diamond replied to the white unicorn, who merely glared in response.
Silver coughed into her hooves politely, clearing her throat. "I... I thought you guys were-"
"Dead?" Scootaloo said bluntly, "Sorry to disappoint." She hissed out, causing both mares to recoil.
Diamond's eyes went wide. "W-why would we be disappointed?!" Diamond nearly yelled out, looking aghast at what Scootaloo's implying. "We're not disappointed!"
"Yeah!" Silver Spoon agreed, nodding her head rapidly. "We're glad you guys ar-"
"There you three are!" A sudden voice called out, before a thud sounded and Twilight Snarkle Sparkle landed near them. "I've been look-oh... oh my." She stopped short once she spotted the two rich mares of the Spoon and Rich family respectively. "Uhm..."
Bloom stepped forward, still glaring at the two smaller mares. Apple Bloom wasn't by any means a large mare, but she was significantly taller then both of her friends and was filled with plenty of muscle, as well as scars from her time in the wasteland. "Yer glad?" Bloom nearly snarled. "Glad we ain't what, dead in a ditch after bein' raped six ways from sunday an' ripped limb from limb?" Both the former bullies looked at Bloom in horror, even Twilight looked shocked. "Were you hopin' we were? Huh?" She asked, continuing her walk towards them as they both backed away. "Huh? Answer me! 'fore Ah beat th' answer outta ya!"
"Ahhhh!" The bullies screamed before Twilight stepped in.
"Apple Bloom!" Twilight bellowed, glaring at the apple family member with a hard stare. "Stop this!"
Bloom just snorted, nostrils flaring before she huffed and turned away. "Floozies ain't worth it." She muttered, as Scootaloo and Sweetie looked completely uninterested in the entire debacle.
The princess of friendship let out a heavy sigh, turning to look at the bullies, only to see they were gone... only the flowers remained...
-ooo000=+=000ooo-
"Apple Bloom, I can't believe you!" Twilight snapped at Bloom, who just looked down at Twilight Sparkle from where she was standing on the clubhouse balcony.
"Believe what? That Ah was about ta give those two what they deserved?" Bloom asked rhetorically as Sweetie had grown bored, and was throwing her knives at a nearby Apple Tree, and Scootaloo was lounging under the clubhouse ramp in the shade.
Twilight rubbed her temples, sitting down on the ground as she tried to stop her temper from rising. "Apple Bloom... I know they were bullies but that is no excuse to threaten them with physical violence!" Twilight yelled.
"Why not?" Bloom asked, glaring down at Twilight. "Do you have any idea th' shit they put us all through over the years?" Bloom started, her voice rising. "They bullied us every day! Calling us blank flanks, making fun of Scootaloo cause she couldn't fly, or because Sweetie couldn't use magic, an' called me a dirty mud pony!" Bloom yelled, stomping her hoof into the balcony wood and causing it to crack from the sheer force. "Every day! Ah've had ta deal with their shit!"
"Its true." Sweetie said mid throw of her large bowie knife, the knife itself hitting the tree with a loud ka-thunk. "Every day they would meet us at the entrance to the school, and tease us about every tiny detail." She pulled out another knife, this one black and sharp like every other one. "Scootaloo can't fly," She threw the knife, causing it to hit the tree before pulling out another. "She's just a flightless chicken," Another knife was thrown, harder then the others. "Sweetie's just as useless as an earth pony, can't even use magic." Another knife, and another, and another. "Apple Bloom's a nasty inbred hick! Nopony will ever love her!" She said, a bit louder and losing her composure as she threw a bigger looking blade at the tree with so much force it caused the tree to crack.
Twilight winced from the two ponies' words. I... I didn't know it was that bad... She admitted to herself, she knew the fillies were bullies and after the CMC disappeared six years ago, the to had come forward a few months later explaining what they had done, purely out of guilt and regret. They were both punished of course, but for day afterwards... they had turned over a new leaf, and had visited the CMC Clubhouse and left flowers, along with apologies. "S-still... that's no excuse," She told them, getting a sharp glare from all three. "I mean... they're not bullies anymore! They've stopped that after you three went missing!"
A scoff from Scootaloo as she got out from under the ramp, standing up and stretching her black wings. "Pfft, really? I find that hard to believe."
"Its true!" Twilight insisted. "They really have changed, you just gotta give them a chance." She told them, trying to make them see. "Silver Spoon and Diamond Tiara have really changed for the better, they've helped your old classmates do better in class, they've helped out various charities and even helped out Ponyville plenty of times!"
The three just stared at the princess, before Apple Bloom went into the clubhouse, followed by Scootaloo who slammed the door shut. Sweetie however, stayed outside to retrieve her knives before putting them all into her sheathes effortlessly. Twilight let out a huge sigh of disappointment and sadness, eyes half lidded as she looked at the ground with a look of defeat on her face. "What do I do?"
Hearing the soft hooffalls, Twilight glanced up and saw Sweetie looking at her. Her emerald eyes shone, but there was little emotion in them... almost none. "You honestly believe they've changed?" Sweetie asked, raising an eyebrow.
Twilight gave the unicorn a sad look. "Sweetie... I know it may not seem like it but... they really have changed for the better..." Her voice grew quieter as she said, "You just have to give them a chance..."
The unicorn mare looked over Twilight, staring into her eyes deeply as if searching for something. Twilight didn't look away... instead returning the look before Sweetie stepped back. "If you say so..." She said as she turned and started to walk away from the clubhouse.
"Where are you going?" Twilight asked, getting up and holding out a hoof as if to stop her.
"To talk with Diamond and Tiara." Sweetie replied, and before Twilight could ask anything further, she vanished in a flash of sickly green magic.
Twilight's hoof fell back to the ground, another sigh escaping her before she looked up at the clubhouse. Pursing her lips, she trotted over to the ramp and walked up it, before knocking on the door, "Uhm... can I come in?"
"Sure." She heard Scootaloo say, and with no more waiting, she went inside.
The clubhouse was as cramped as she remembered it, but still cozy and was able to fit the three of them along with Sweetie and a few others. Apple Bloom stood behind her podium, looking over something that was on top of it as Scootaloo sat in their trademark thinking spot in the clubhouse, where they got all of their ideas for Cutie Marks. A faint smile made its way onto her face as she recalled how many times they went out in search of them, now they had them...
Odd marks of course but... marks nonetheless.
"Need somethin'?" Bloom asked, looking down at Twilight from atop her podium and stand.
"Uhm... Sweetie went off to... speak with Diamond and..." Twilight said, getting a look from Scootaloo who lingered in the dark corner of the clubhouse before continuing. "I was wondering... seeing how you've told us so much, I figured... maybe I could bring you up to speed on what's happening in Equestria?"
To her delight, both mares looked interested. Not, Oh boy! Interested, but interested nonetheless in what she may have to tell them both.
"Like what's up with those factories?" Apple Bloom questioned. "Ah have a lot of questions, if you don't mind."
"Not at all! Now where to begin..." Twilight smiled, ready to explain.
-ooo000=+=000ooo-
Sweetie Belle walked through the streets of Ponyville, having left Sweet Apple Acres and her friends behind in search of the schoolyard bullies they had called enemies. Her gait was practiced, and given her appearance it drew more than a few looks to her from several stallions who, back in her filly days were mere colts. Of course, they were probably also looking at the many dozens of knives on her person, in the homemade knife bandoleer she donned. She paid little attention to the parents who gave her wary looks whenever she passed by their foals, who also gave her looks of wonder as she walked on by.
She tried to spot Diamond and Silver out of the crowd filling Ponyville, and as she did she noticed just how bigger... the once quaint and small town used to be. Small buildings had grown larger, tiny businesses seemed to draw in more customers and were selling far more items then they usually did, a curious glance at a far away shop caused her legs to bring her towards it. The building was somewhat new, the windows were shiny and crystal clear, showing various items inside that drew her attention, upon moving towards the entrance and going inside she noted the doors didn't squeak like most did.
A look inside, and she knew why it had drawn her attention...
The shop was small on the inside, and smelled of a very distinct powder that she knew of by heart. The room smelled of it, sharp and burned her nostrils slightly as she caught sight of the very powder in question being used by two ponies near what looked like a forge. But beyond the forge, in the shelves and tables with various bodyguards standing around... were none other then firearms, but older models. She walked into the shop, feeling plenty of eyes on her as she looked down at one of the tables. Equestria is manufacturing firearms? A curious glance at the firearms reminded her of the old flintlocks from Earth's history books, used in the golden ages of piracy and further on into history before the six shooters came into production.
There were many flintlocks in this store, some were built in a way that allowed the user to shoot them using some sort of bite trigger near the handle. There were many in the shop, some were just pistols, others were rifles and blunderbuss' odd single shot weapons she found herself interested in.
After a bit more perusing, a stocky looking stallion trotted over to her. "'Ello love, lookin' to buy somethin'?" He asked her in a thick trottingham accent.
Sweetie turned to look at the stallion, noticing his sweaty appearence and disgusting smell, she gave him a shrug. "I'm just looking around, I was unaware that Equestria had working firearms." She told him, lifting up one of the flintlocks and giving it a look over.
However, her magicl hold on it was ripped away as a yellow glow appeared and snatched it from her. "Oi, don't touch th' merch unless yer gonna buy." The stallion told her, sneering. "Ah don't need no stinkin' filly breakin' somethin' she don't know nuttin' about."
Sweetie however, smiled darkly. "I know plenty about firearms, mister...?"
"Surefire," He scoffed. "You know? Ah highly doubt that."
Suddenly a new voice appeared, saying. "Care to put your words to the test then miss?"
"She'll break em though!" Surefire complained to whoever the other voice was.
"Pfft, if she can use em, she can have em." The voice said again, coming out and revealing himself to be a rather well built silver colored unicorn with bright blue eyes, wearing a bandoleer with tools on it. "You always complain about everyone picking one up, saying they're gonna break it... let her try them out old man."
Surefire just glared at Sweetie Belle, pulling out another pistol that matched the one she had picked up prior and giving them to her. "Alright then, if you know so much about firearms, then follow me, let's put yer words to th' test so Ah can call out yer bullshit." He told her, turning and walking towards the back as Sweetie held up both flintlocks and followed him, along with the stallion who helped her out. "And put yer knives away, don't want any of me customers scared of some crazy filly." He told her, and she reluctantly did so with a flash of her magic.
The three ventured towards the back, before going through an open door and heading downstairs. Sweetie Belle was unsure of why they were going downstairs, but quickly made a plan on how to kill both of these stallions should they try to do anything. Knives to the jugulars, snap their necks, take out their legs. And my personal favorite, knife to the family jewels. She smiled sweetly as they went down the stairs, eventually coming across a room that had a bunch of wooden targets set up with bags of sand lining the wall near the back. She recognized it as a firing range, with a couple of other ponies standing around, dressed in royal guard armor.
They made the mistake of coming over.
Three muscular looking guards trotted over, looking over at Surefire, the stallion who clearly wasn't a jerk, and Sweetie Belle. "What's she doing down here?" The guard asked, raising an eyebrow.
"Lil lady wanted to show us how she 'knows'" He made air quotes with the pistols, making Sweetie frown at his lack of firearms safety. "About firearms," He scoffed, "Crazy she is."
Sweetie mentally rolled her eyes as the guard eyed her up. "You want to shoot one of these things? What a laugh!" He and his buddies chuckled, as Sweetie frowned further. "Shouldn't you be at home helping your mother sew a blanket or something?" He laughed, and even Surefire laughed some.
The only one not laughing was the stallion who was standing next to Sweetie, a look over at him and Sweetie saw he was just rolling his eyes at the laughter. Sweetie just smiled however, but behind that sweet smile of hers... was something dark. "Oh? You underestimate my skills gentlecolts... or should I say fillies? Cause frankly, you don't look all that tough to begin with." She said as her magic ripped the flintlocks from Surefire's own magical hold, he attempted to get them back but her magic was too strong to break, merely bouncing off with a crack. "I can sew, but the last time I sewed something... well, you probably wouldn't want to sleep under it~" She said, as she trotted over to the firing range shelf.
Surefire followed, along with the now angry guards and a very amused gunsmith stallion. Surefire was about to tell her how to load it, maybe make tell her how to load it improperly so he could make her pay for the items. However he didn't a chance to as she started effortlessly loading the two flintlock pistols putting in the powder, the padding and the ball before she pulled back both the hammers, before anyone could stop her she aimed and fired at the targets down the range.
Both of the metal balls impacted the wooden target, blasting the wood off into chips and splinters that clattered onto the ground. Sweetie grinned as she gave both guns a twirl and reloaded them again, swiftly loading in the ammunition and firing again, and again, and again. She reloaded and fired as fast as she could with the flintlocks, blasting off the wooden targets piece by piece with pinpoint accuracy before shooting the others in the range, startling some of the other shooters.
All of the ponies below in the range watched as the young mare blasted away all of the targets, eventually grabbing other guns and using them with deadly efficiency. Sweetie relived moments from her earlier years in those few brief moments as she blasted away, fierce firefights, blood flying and the screams of the enemy dying before her blades and guns...
Then she ran out of ammo.
All of her guns, which number six flintlock pistols stopped firing after she stopped reloading.
With a slightly shaky sigh, she held up her guns before blowing the smoke from the tips and looking at the ponies all gathered around her were staring. Wide eyes in fear, admiration, or wonder. The guards looked at her with scared gazes, while Surefire looked nervous, and the gunsmith who was nice to her looked impressed.
"Damn filly." The gunsmith said. "You have some skill... you must have fired one of these before."
Sweetie just smiled darkly. "You... could say that." She chuckled, before looking to Surefire. "So I can keep these right?"
She got a fearful nod in reply.
"Nice~" Sweetie grinned, looking at her new weapons with a smile.
