Tales of a Cloud

by Cloud

Rating: teen
Tags: Gore, My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic, Dark, Alternate Universe, Original Character, Sex
Length: 3102

Everypony has a story. Not all of them a glamorous, with great heroes and villains on display, but they are stories none the less. Stories that still need telling.

These are stories of the wasteland, as gathered by Gentle Rain, in her long stay above the wasteland, and just below the cloud curtain. Each chapter is self-contained, detailing the life and times of various ponies after the Great War. Writing quality and tone will vary considerably, as well as its subjects.

Contains scenes that may be considered disturbing or ideologically sensitive. Read at your own risk.

Published 2013-07-26 16:00:01 UTC
Last updated 2014-10-16 07:06:56 UTC

Gentle Rain

Hello. I believe I have need to introduce myself. My name is Gentle Rain.

I don’t know who you are, or how you found these records of mine, but I do know I most likely will be gone by the time you do. I… Am the only one left on this solitary cloud. I have been for some time, but even as I record this, the ground seems farther away than it ever has. Even the clouds above seem colder.

Things are happening around me. Great changes are beginning to take place in the world I have always been content to merely watch, and I fear that they may even destroy my own private world. However, that is a story for another time, and I shall tell it one day… If I am to see its end.

The story I wish to record here is my own, however.

When the pegasi closed the cloud curtain over a dying Equestria, not all of them were of a singular goal. Most retreated to the remaining cities, a great many clustered around the Single Pegasus Project towers, as though the ivory towers themselves could save them from balefire. Some feared the stripes would continue destroying out cities, and split away from our own kind – taking small clouds as homesteads, hiding away from the world.

I was born on one such cloud – as were my parents, and their parents before. As time passed, many of these small communities vanished, or returned to the then-forming Enclave. But not ours. Our small cloud stay suspended between the twisted landscape below, and the impassive curtain above. Caught in limbo, the denizens of this cloud simply watched the world change around them. Watched – and wrote.

I was born in a small cloud shelter by the edge. By that time, my family was one of two that remained on the cloud. By the time I could fly, we were the only ones. I spent my youth peering at the ground below – the miniscule ponies going about their tiny lives below. Living, loving, dying, it was all a strange and wonderful puppet show in my eyes.

By the time I earned my cutie mark, I began exploring the abandoned homes on what was left of the cloud. I found many things that intrigued me – notes, recordings, even small books, all recording things that happened on the soil far below me. I recall the time I came across a stack of maps one time, carefully rolled and stack next to a set of binoculars. I consumed all of these notes with great voracity, obsessed by the world below, and the lives of those therein.

I realize these days, with much sorrow, I never did bring joy to my parents with this obsession. The only time I could remember my mother’s smile is when I received my cutie mark – accidentally coaxing rain out of a ball of cloud I had been playing with. As I descended into the past, they descended into a dark depression.

Unaware of my parents’ slow fading, I set myself to the task of recording the notes I had gathered into whole and comprehensible stories. My mother passed as I recorded the unfortunate last days of a young zebra. My father grew ill, descending into an old and pain-wracked wreck as I recorded the strange tale of a rusting ship.

When I recorded the tale of a stable, wrapped in darkness, I faced my most painful decision. To end the life of my father. It was to be a mercy kill – he was no longer able to eat or drink, and my home was filled with the moaning of the wind and my father’s constant pain. It was supposed to be quick, a broken neck… But something… Went wrong.
I’m sorry. It was a dark day in my past, and I can remember the rain mixing with my tears as I heard my father choking to death.

It is not a point I like to reminisce on, but it is my story, and it must be told.

I did not mourn him. Indeed, I had read and written the tales of so many that went unnoticed and unmourned, it seemed unusual if one were to be properly given their last rites. So, with the heartless flick of a knife, I cut the last pony I knew from the cloud, and retreated into my notes.

I was alone, caught in that eternal purgatory of the cloud. I saw the world, but I did not interact with it, nor did it affect my own life, as I continued to make my records.

But now, my tale comes to a close. I have run out of notes to compile and stories to record. So I leave this as a final note – an author’s biography, on the last page of a book – as I look to record the world around me. As I speak, Fillydelphia is being rebuilt. The pegasi are slowly gathering above. Power changes hooves in Dise as Hoofington’s unearthly glow gains a new, and dangerous, vibrancy.

Things are changing, and I intend to live out the rest of my life chronicling these final stories. Because that is what I was born to do.

My name is Gentle Rain, and this is my story.

Author's Note

...And thus begins Tales of a Cloud. This should set the scene nicely, as most stories hereafter will be similar in tone. Short, personal tales of the wasteland - and almost always depressing. I take a very dark approach to the Wasteland, so happy endings are not to be expected.
I do not intend to reach FO:E: Project Horizons - level gore and sex, but following stories will not shy away from dark elements either, so take caution when reading if you are sensitive to the like.

The next chapter will be a personal favorite of mine; A quiet dialogue in a Stable, deep underground...

Breath

Buried deep below the barren Equestrian Wasteland, lay the Stables. They were shelters from the all-consuming balefire above. Ponies live in some of them still. However, not all the Stables turned out so well.

There was a snick-snick of a lighter, and the Overmare’s office was lit briefly by a single flame. The round window overlooking the atrium, the large, gaudy promotional posters, the terminal bank sitting behind the desk – all lit by the flickering firelight felt… Lonely.

With a click, the flame was cut out, leaving just a glowing eye of a cigarette in the darkness. It bobbed slightly, its meager illumination revealing the Overmare’s jaw, but nothing more.

“…Mint Chip.”

“Yes Ma’am?”

“Do you know why I asked you here?”

“No Ma’am.”

The cigarette moved away from the Overmare’s face, obscuring here once more in darkness. She let out a long sigh. “Mint. You’re a smart cookie. You have always been a dependable, and I’ve always valued your opinion.”

The cigarette glowed slightly brighter for a moment, illuminating the Overmare’s downcast eyes. She looked tired. “Stable-tech has given me a choice.”
“You’ve probably figured out by now that the power outage wasn’t an accident. It can’t be fixed either. I said the engineers were working on it to try and allay fears. The generators were rigged from the start.”
“Aren’t there supposed to be backups?”
“Just an unfinished room.”
Silence filled the gloom. The glow of the cigarette bobbed slightly as the Overmare tapped off some ash. “It won’t take long for ponies to become restless. Our food won’t last long. Without pumps, we’re reduced to whatever water is already standing in the toilets.”
“There’s a bigger problem though.” The cigarette illuminated a foggy puff of smoke. “Air.”
“Without power, air won’t be passed through the scrubbers. We can’t reach the scrubbers, and there is no other way for air to get down here. The ponies on the upper floor will notice it first. Dizziness, shortness of breath. It won’t take long.”
“How much time do we have?”
The Overmare paused before responding. “A couple days before the air grows stale. Maybe a week, then we start dying. Suffocation or thirst, whichever comes first. The weak will die first, elderly and… Foals.”

It was quiet for quite some time after that. All that existed was the slight scent of smoke, and the glowing end of the cigarette. “Can we find another way to obtain water?”
“Possibly. A manual pump may be able to draw water from the aquifers. I set the engineers to look at finding a way to use the food recycler manually.”
“But air..?”
“There’s no way. The scrubbers are near the surface, and there’s no way to reach them once the door locked.”
The cigarette flickered as more ash dropped from its tip. From somewhere in the darkness, Mint Chip spoke: “Wasn’t the door supposed to have its own backup power?”
“It was supposed to. It was linked straight to the generator though. ”
“Do we have any other form of power supply? Perhaps we could route it to the door…”
“The stores are all empty. Even the PipBucks were bled dry. The only spark batteries are those that the residents brought in.”
“And..?”
“We confiscated them under the guise of ‘precautionary measures.’ It’s not enough to so much as budge the lock.”

Silence reigned supreme once more. The cigarette was slowly burning down to a nub, and it could be seen reflected in the Overmare’s eyes. “This doesn’t sound like much of a choice to me.”

The Overmare pulled an item out from behind her desk, hidden in the pervasive darkness. “This is my choice.”

“It was found where the secondary generators should have been. It came with instructions, addressed to me.”

“’You’ve been selected for an important social experiment,’ it said. ‘As you may have guessed, you are now living on borrowed time. The device before you has two buttons: the green will release a chlorine gas into the Stable. All inside will die quickly, and mercifully.

“’The red will lock the device, preventing the gas from being used in the future. This, of course, will only save the collective lives of your charges for a short while. The choice is left to you, Overmare.’ Bastards.”
The Overmare spat, the cigarette sparking as it hit the floor. She ground it out with an audible stomp. The only light that remained was the small trigger box and its softly glowing buttons. One, an ominous red. The other, an inviting green.
It was a long time before Mint Chip broke the silent tableau. “I’m sorry.
“I… I know why you called me here, but I can’t help you with this. I can’t make this choice. No pony should have to make this choice. But… I believe in you. I believe the Stable-Tech ponies had a reason when they chose you for this.
“I can’t tell you what to do, but I can tell you this: Whatever you do, I believe it will be the right choice.
“I’m… Sorry.”
The silence held for a moment, then there was the soft tap-tap of hooves as Mint Chip slowly navigated out of the darkened room.
“I’m sorry too,” whispered the Overmare once the hoofsteps faded into the perpetual night.

Snick-snick went the lighter, and the Overmare’s office was momentarily lit once again by a single, baleful flame. The Overmare reached for the trigger box, her hoof hovering over one of the glowing buttons. After an unending moment of though, her hoof shifted slightly to the left, pressing down with a click. The box stopped glowing, leaving only the soft orange light of the cigarette, as it illuminated a small cloud of smoke drifting on the Overmare’s breath.

Author's Note

Hopefully this story carried across well. It was an attempt at proper dialogue and the creation of emotion - neither of which I'm skilled at. And yes, the ending is meant to be ambiguous. Based on what you now know of the nameless Overmare, what do you think her choice was? Was it the correct one?

The next story is another tale of a nameless mare, as you're afforded short glimpses of her life...

The Missionary

Sand blew steadily cross the desert’s dry plains. Sliding across itself, it shifted around bare outcroppings of stone and slowly encroached upon the still figure lying in its midst.

The doors burst open, thrown by the mare rushing into the chapel, and the strong winds of the storm brewing outside. The Preacher, startled from his task, rose to greet the wanderer now standing in his hall.

“…There were two great goddesses, who ruled all lands. The lesser rose the moon for the night, the greater, rose the sun at dawn, to bath her children in its blessed light…”
“…What’s a sun?”
Chuckling, the dark mare bent down to nuzzle the curious filly. “The sun, my little light, was Celestia’s gift to all ponies. It grew our land, and protected us from harm. But it hasn’t been seen in Equestria for a very long time…”

The Preacher, unable to sleep easy with the violence of the storm raging across the wastes, walks through the chapel he calls home. Pausing, he approaches the pale mare sitting in rapture before a stained-glass window. Noting her wide-eyed gaze, he quietly sits by her, the regal image of Celestia blanketing them both with each lightning bolt arcing across the sky above.

A mare, standing upon an aged and rotting crate, calls out to the crows set before her. She preaches of happier days, with warm light from the heavens. She informs them that such days will come again, should the ponies prove faithful to the tenants of harmony. She implores them, telling them not to give up hope in eachother, or their goddess, who has surely not forgotten them.

A mare, teetering upon a ruined barrel, shouts to be heard over mocking cries. Mud and other foul things mar her pale coat. She looks imploringly, desperately into their jeering faces, and her reward is pain as a thrown bottle strikes the side of her face. Sobbing, she realizes their hearts are as dark as the turbulent clouds above.

The stallion leans close to his victim’s ear. Between grunts of exertion, he asks harshly: “Where is your goddess now, bitch? Where is she?”
Tears staining her once white coat, the mare beneath him can be heard muttering prayers amidst whimpers of pain. “…Mother of Harmony…save your servant…return your light…AAH!” She cries out in pain as the stallion, angered, bites down on her ear, redoubling his efforts.

The pegasi had provoked the clouds into a rage. Great gusts of wind and rain raked the barren wasteland, howling through the gaps in a makeshift shelter in the plain below. Within, a pale mare, barely more than a filly, cowered, covering her ears as the shack vibrated around her. Lightning struck, and with a yelp she curled into a little ball in the middle of the floor. With a crack, a beam loosed from the ceiling, striking her as it fell. Blissful unconsciousness follows.
When she awoke, the waste’s meager simulation of daytime had arrived. Wiping the last remnants of tears from her eyes, she looked to where the clouds were their thinnest, gazing towards the light.

“Will I ever see the sun?”
“Someday, my little light. Someday Celestia will come back for all of us who still live with harmony in our hearts. She will take us to a land without clouds, and you will see the sun then.” The dark mare bends low, nuzzling the pale filly now dozing at her hooves. “Someday, my precious little light…”

Gasping, the mare drug herself over the dune. With a cry, she tumbled down the other side, pale sand mixing with her pale coat. She lay still for a time, then opened her eyes to observe an empty stream bed, as dry and cracked as her own lips.
Rolling over, she lay on her back, half-closed eyes gazing at the sun beating down from its place in the heavens. “Celestia, light my hooves,” she murmurs. “As I walk the path to your blessed kingdom.”
“Where the sun shines eternal, and where your little ponies...never…”
A rattling breath, and she closes her eyes, to lie forever still.
“…Never…die…”

Author's Note

...Wow, that's... Quite a downer, isn't it?
Partially inspired by Gardener, (http://www.fimfiction.net/story/259/fallout-equestria-side-story-gardener) I took the protrayal of Celestia as a deistic figure and ran with it. The prayer at the end especially was key for that, as it gives reason and direction for the worship.

Hopefully the non-linearity did not prove too confusing. (Rough chronological order would be 3, 9, 8, 2, 4, 5, 6, 7, 1, 10, over a period of several years.)

Next up... Will it be the story of the survivors of the Enclave? A tale of revenge? The young zebra, with an unexpected companion? Only time will tell...

Markspony, eh?

The mare limped unsteadily across the wasteland. It had been a downright unpleasant few days for her. Fresh out of the stable, she was captured by slave-traders. She escaped due to simple luck and quick wits, but ran into the open forelegs of raiders instead.

It was an encounter the unicorn barely survived, thanks in no small part due to her Pip-Buck. Though wounded, she had enough piece of mind to cobble dead raiders’ barding for a patchwork suit – hopefully, it would keep her alive long enough to reach pony civilization.

Sane pony civilization.

She almost made it to the road when a shot rang out – two gouts of blood suddenly flashed into being, and she dropped before the echoes faded.

A minute later, a Pegasus swooped down to the still form. Rolling her over, he proceeded to scavenge for anything of value. She didn’t smell as bad as other raiders, he considered, but gave it no more though than that.

Taking to the air again, he resumed his patrol over a tiny caravan moving along the road.

At some point, a crow pecked at the dead mare, but the wasteland gave no more thought to the corpse as it rotted away.

Author's Note

Yeah, it did irk me slightly when re-reading (or listening, rather) FO:E that the great "Deadshot Calamity," for all his trumpeted marksmanship, couldn't kill a lone, unaware target in broad daylight. One less point in luck, and we would have had a very different - and far shorter - story.