Fallout: Equestria - Bits and Piecesby Complimentary StrawsChaptersChp. 1 - DecisionsChp. 2 - Harsh RealityChp. 3 - Beauty BrewChp. 1 - DecisionsLink to the story on Gdocs - Chp. 1 - Decisions I lovingly caressed her body, admiring her beauty. She was perfect in every way, shape and form. I had never seen anything more perfect in all of my years. I leaned forward and gave her a kiss with my beak. “I love you,” I whispered. “What are you doing...?” I jumped, startled by the owner of the voice. Turning, I saw my brother Ghaleb had entered the room and was looking at me with a quizzical eye. I motioned towards the tri-barreled energy turret I had been stroking. “Isn’t she perfect?” I asked him. “This baby can punch a hole into the side of an armoured sky-wagon in seconds! Anyone tries to enter HQ without permission, they’ll be a turned into a finely glowing ash!” Ghaleb rolled his eyes in annoyance. “How much ammunition does it use, brother? You know we’re short on caps as it is.” “Er...” I stuttered. “Well... it does take quite a bit of ammunition, but it evens out! We’ll be spending less on firearms rounds, plus we won’t need as many guards!” Ghaleb shook his head. “Gur, when will you learn? Dad doesn’t want to use any of your crazy schemes. The ammunition for this thing is expensive. We’d be completely broke by the end of the month.” He turned. “Instead of fiddling with your fancy energy weapons, why don’t you learn to use a gun? If you really wanted to help out, you wouldn’t waste our time and resources doing... whatever this is, you would be out there-” he waved a claw, motioning to the sky “-getting us contracts.” I growled. Ghaleb always refused to see the bigger picture. “You idiot! Do you know how much this would help us? If we can get just a few more we wouldn’t have to worry about defence ever again!” I threw the wrench I had been using to repair the turret onto the ground. “You need to think of the long run! This will save us caps!” “We don’t need to worry about the long run. We need to worry about the now.” I sat there, fuming, as Ghaleb walked away. What an intolerable prick. I picked up my wrench and dusted it off on my mechanic’s overalls. Well, they weren’t really mechanic’s overalls. I couldn’t personally afford anything like that, mainly because my father would call it a waste. It was just the scraps of old combat armour sewed together to create some comfortable working clothes. Sure, it didn’t look as nice as the real thing, but on the bright side it was knife-proof. Not that I got into knife fights very often. I turned back to the turret, my enthusiasm for the weapon drained. “Looks like your chance to shine will have to wait,” I told it. With a sigh and a grunt, I picked up the heavy machine and lugged it back to my workshop. My workshop wasn’t solely a workshop. As with the overalls, my dad would never approve of me using up space for something he considered useless. Instead, I had added a workbench and tool rack into my bedroom. It was cluttered and there wasn’t much space to move, but it got the job done. I dragged the turret toward the back of the room, which was full of other scrapped projects, and placed it down, then went and sat on my bed. My bedroom used to be an old public washroom. It had had all of the toilets and sinks ripped out, but the ever-present stench of waste and mould still lingered. It wasn’t the best, but it was better than the bedroom we had added to the boiler room. Our HQ was built into an old public school. Apparently, before the war, it was a place where young ponies would come to learn. Now, it was a place for us Talons to work out how many caps we would earn from taking contracts and killing people. It was a drastic change of use. I lay down on my bed, trying to come up with another idea on a way to improve HQ. All of my ideas so far had been rejected, all because of the shortsightedness of everyone here. My mind wandered, and I thought about my father. I was the son of the Talon chief of this chapter, Guto. You would think that would get me a little more respect than I got now, but you’d think wrong. If anything, I was treated even worse for it. Everyone expected me to become a great soldier like my father or my brother, and their expectations were high. When I started to gain an interest in science, they didn’t think of it as something good. My father, especially, was disappointed in me. After having my brother Ghaleb turn into the fighter he is, he had high hopes for me. He’d treated me different ever since the day I first picked up that Big Book of Science. The Talon life wasn’t for me. I was no mercenary. In truth, I had always secretly dreamed of travelling to Tenpony tower and helping out as a doctor or nurse. Maybe I would study science without anyone looking at me with disappointment. I fantasized for a bit, picturing myself leaving the Talon life. No more constant weapons practice, which I was no good at anyway. The only weapons I could keep on target were energy weapons, and only the small ones at that. Their lack of recoil made it easy to keep on target, even for someone as scrawny as I. To be honest, I’ve never even killed anything. I was a Talon who never killed anything. A joke. The rest of the Talons laughed at me behind my back. Sometimes right to my face. I really, really didn’t belong here. Could I leave? What would happen if I just packed up some essentials and left? I could find a town, but would I survive the trip? I stopped myself from weighing the odds of survival in my mind. That was ridiculous! I couldn’t leave! Could I? Would anyone even notice I was gone? Its not like they let me help around here. They would probably notice the equipment I took was missing before they noticed I was. If I recalled correctly, the nearest town was a dingy place called Diptrip. If I were to leave, would I survive the three day trip? The wastes could be a dangerous place, and I wasn’t confident in my survival skills, or even my aim. I made a quick mental list of everything I would need to survive. Food, a weapon, ammo, a bedroll, and water were essentials. I could get food and water from the mess hall, I was pretty sure I could get a weapon from the firing range if I acted like I was planning to practice, and I already had a bedroll. That just left ammo. Where could I get the large supply of ammo I would need out in the wastes? That moment was when I realized I was seriously considering leaving. Sure, I had fantasized before, but I had never taken it this far. Could I do it? Could I actually leave? I made up my mind. I was leaving the Talons for good. Four hours later, I was silently padding my way down the halls of HQ, making my way toward the storage closet. The storage closet was where we stored our more valuable or dangerous equipment- Ammo, Rad-away, caps, and even the single balefire egg launcher we managed to scavenge a few years back. The door was always kept locked, but I had spent many hours learning how to pick locks. It was the only way for me to get some of the items I needed for some of my more expensive ideas. I made it to a corner in the hallway and pressed myself up against the wall. One right turn would leave me right in front of the storage closet, but there was a problem. A guard always stood outside the door, and I would need a way to get him away for a bit. I leaned my head around the corner and sure enough, a guard stood in front of the door, assault rifle in claw. I recognized her as Gladwyn, one of my brother’s friends. She was nice enough, and by that I mean she didn’t go out of her way to bother me. I quickly made up a story in my head. I’m not the most convincing griffon, but that was alright. Gladwyn wasn’t the smartest. I walked up to her, an award-winning (nervous) smile on my beak. “Hey Gladwyn,” I said. “My dad sent me to pick up some ammo. Could you let me in?” Gladwyn raised an eyebrow. “You? What do you need ammo for, Chicken Legs?” There was that nickname. Everyone in the base called me that. It was starting to bug me. Nevertheless, I continued. “My dad says I have to go out on the next contract with Ghaleb. Says it’ll ‘make me a real Talon’.” Gladwyn rolled her eyes. “Like that’ll ever happen. Just get some ammo and get out.” I walked up to the door and start to reach into one of the pockets of my overalls. I fumbled around in them like I was searching for something, then frantically started to pat down the rest of me. “Oh, crap! I lost the key!” I exclaimed. Gladwyn sighed and put a claw over her face. “Useless... well, if you can’t get in you have no use being here. Scram!” I raised my claws. “I really need to get in? Can you just let me pick it? Please!” Gladwyn looked around, making sure there was nobody else around in the hallway. “Fine. Just be quick about it.” Success! I took my screwdriver and bobby pin out of a pocket in my overalls. I inserted them into the lock and got to work. It didn’t take long- the lock was two hundred years old, and none of the griffons here bothered with maintaining much. The door opened with a click and I stepped inside. Around me were shelves piled high with stuff. Weapons, ammo, even armour were stacked to the ceiling, just ripe for the picking. I perused the shelves, eventually stumbling on a large pile of spark cells. I took a cloth pouch out from one of my pockets and unfolded it, then took as many cells as I could and dropped them in. After debating whether to take a magical energy pistol or a magical energy shotgun, I eventually took both and threw them in the bag as well. I looked down at my patchwork overalls. They were ugly and obviously homemade, and I debated whether or not to grab a suit of combat armour from a shelf. I decided against it. The overalls had served me well, and they provided enough protection to do me good in the wastes. I grabbed a bedroll and some purified water and shoved those in the bag as well. As I turned to leave the closet, something caught my eye. A safe, wedged in the corner between piles of old leather armour. A few suits of armour had fallen on top of the safe, and I wouldn’t have noticed it if not for the gleam of light on the metal door. I slung my bag over my shoulder and started to walk up to it, but stopped to grab an armoured bag to strap around my waste. I put all my stuff in there and inspected the safe. The safe was oddly clean for something that had survived the apocalypse. Someone had obviously been taking loving care of it, cleaning it and hiding it underneath piles of armour. I took out my screwdriver and bobby pins and went to work. Four bobby pins and many annoyed grunts later, I stood up kicked the safe. The thing definitely wasn’t going to open. With a sigh I placed my screwdriver back into my pocket. Just as I finished grabbing a pile of caps that had caught my eye, I heard a loud banging noise and turned around to see Gladwyn hitting the door. “Hurry up in there!” she ordered. I closed my bags and left the closet. “What, did you get lost in there?” she asked, laughing at her own joke. She became serious a moment later. “Now scram!” She didn’t have to tell me twice. I turned tail and ran back to my room. Back in the safety and comfort of my own room, I started to do inventory on all the goods I had... “liberated”, and counted my caps. I had a fair amount of spark cells, and I had swiped a good three hundred caps. Everything was going along swimmingly, and it looked like I would be able to continue with my plan. I still had some reservations with leaving. Besides make my way to Diptrip, I didn’t know what I would do out there. Sure, I could travel to Tenpony, but what were the odds of them letting in a scrawny little griffon who just wandered in from the wastes? I also didn’t know how my father would react to my leaving. Would he take it as betrayal? Talons were all about loyalty, and anyone who betrayed them didn’t usually live long enough to make any use of it. I’d hoped that he would take it in stride, maybe be happy that the useless son was gone, but now I wasn’t so sure. It was too late to go back on my plan now. I stood up, put both my weapons in their holsters, grabbed my bags, and left my room for the last time. Footnote: Level Up. New Perk: Awareness - Your griffon eyes are well adjusted for seeing over long distances or noticing things others might not. You have +1 perception and can often notice important things about your enemies in combat. Chp. 2 - Harsh RealityLink to the story on Gdocs - Chp. 2 - Harsh Reality Today's weather: excessively violent, with a chance of dismemberment. Stay tuned for our Five-Day Forecast! Tap-tap-tap. My claws made little clicking noises with each button on the terminal I pushed. The password of the terminal I had to use to unlock the main gates was simple. After only a few seconds of tap-tap-tapping the keys, I discovered the password was “Talons”. The simplicity of the password for one of our most important security terminals made me even more glad I was leaving. I didn’t want to wake up one night to find out someone had broken in and started an assault. After I entered the password, I heard the main gate unlock with a small click. Luckily, neither of the gate guards had heard it from all the way up in their security towers. I sat down to think for a moment. Would the guards shoot a griffon who was trying to get out of the compound? They had no reason to think anyone on their side was trying to leave in the middle of the night, and might suspect I was an intruder trying to leave with something stolen, which was only half right. I looked up into the towers and made out faces in the darkness. I recognized the guards as Garl and Thrash, the twin sharpshooters. Excellent shots, but not the sharpest knives in the armoury. I felt like the luckiest griffon alive tonight! It would be easy to distract those two numbskulls long enough to get out the gate! I scanned the vicinity with my eyes, looking for something that would make a suitable distraction, but nothing caught my eye. I was about to give up and find another way out of the compound when I remembered the spark cells in my bag. I rooted around in my bags and carried out a spark cell. It was small, but plenty of magical energy was being stored inside the tiny battery. I grinned, working out a plan in my mind that would occupy enough of the twins’ time to get me out of the gate. I tossed the spark cell into a relatively open area a few yards away. I only had one shot at getting it right, and I hoped I didn’t mess it up. Unholstering my energy pistol, I brought it up to my eye and aimed down the sights, pointing the barrel of the weapon at the spark cell. Bzzzt! My shot missed by a whole yard, passing by the spark battery and hitting the ground near the fence! “Hey, I think I heard a shot!” I heard a voice from the towers shout. I quickly jumped to the right, hiding behind a convenient stack of barrels. I tried holding my breath, but I felt myself start to panic and hyperventilate. “Are you sure? I didn’t hear nothin’,” a voice responded. Whew! Maybe they wouldn’t investigate any more. “Nah, I’m sure I heard something,” the first voice called out. “You stay up here. I’m going down to investigate some more,” he said, followed by the click-clack of claws climbing down a ladder. I started to shake. I should have known better than to try something that stupid! I was never any good at the firing range. Why did I think I’d be able to hit the damned spark cell?! He was going to come down me and put a bullet in my head for trying to abandon the Talons! Or worse, he might tell my dad! What if he- “Huh, there’s no one down here. Guess I’m hearing things.” Yes! I almost let out a whoop of joy, but stopped myself before I dug myself anymore into this hole I had gotten myself into. I carefully listened as the guard flew back up to his post. Okay, that plan was a complete failure. I was going to need to find another way out of the compound. I wracked my brain, trying to think of another way out of the ancient school. The only other exit I could think of was the abandoned fire escape, and that door was alarmed. There was no way I’d be able to bypass the security on it. Unless... a hah! Genius idea in mind, I silently padded my way through the halls of the old school, searching for the equipment I’d need to enact my plan. An unlocked storage closet to my right caught my attention, and I slipped inside. The closet I was in wasn’t as fun as the last one. Where the last one held laser rifles and armour, this one held an old mop and some building equipment. I reached up to a shelf and swiped a box of iron nails and a spool of copper wire. Stolen goods in hand, I left the closet just as another griffon passed by. I hardly recognized him, but I remembered seeing him in the hallways a few times. His name was Chad, or Thad, or something like that. He watched as I stepped out of the closet and close the door, then winked and kept walking. What was that about? I made my way to the old fire escape, which was located near the back of the building. We didn’t use this area very much, and spiderwebs hung in the corners. Eventually I reached the fire escape and started to enact my plan. Fire doors have two magnets attached to them, one on the door itself and the other on the wall. When the door is opened and the magnetic field is broken, it sends an electrical pulse, which activates the alarm. If I could use another magnet to keep the field intact, I could silently open the door and no one would be any wiser. I cut off a bit of copper wire from the spool and wrapped it around the iron nail. I touched the copper wire to one end of a spark cell, turning it into an effective magnet. I wrapped the nail, copper wire, and spark cell together, then taped it to the wall near the handle of the door. I held in my breath and pushed on the door handle, hoping my plan would work. As the door swung open and the halls of the compound stayed silent, I let out my breath and a little whoop of victory. Take that, Talon meatheads! With this one victory in claw, I took off into the night and the perils of the Equestrian Wasteland. I took cover behind a large rock, frantically replacing the spark cells in my energy shotgun with fresh ones. My claws were shaking frantically, and I kept dropping the cells, but eventually I managed to reload the weapon. I poked my head over my cover to peer at the beast I was at odds with. The creature was huge, mutated far beyond the regular size of its species. It was covered in thick natural armour and had a deadly, razor-sharp stinger that looked like it could pierce a tank. I jumped up on the rock and aimed my energy shotgun at the beast in the general area I assumed its face must be. I quickly squeezed the trigger, sending six shots of laser buckshot into the creature’s carapace. The creature let out a high-pitched squeal and stopped moving, seemingly dead. In the end, civilization triumphed over nature, and my energy shotgun took down the beast of claw and stinger. I felt strong. After I was done basking in my own glory, I stepped over to the dead radscorpion, which was about the size of my arm, and removed its stinger, keeping it for a prize. The beast had put up a good fight, and had almost overpowered me. A creature this powerful must be rare in the wasteland, otherwise I fear all of civilization would be destroyed. The wasteland was a horrible place, I had learned. I had been walking for less than an hour before I had stumbled across the creature. It was late, and I was in no condition to be fighting anything. What I needed more than anything was a safe place to sleep. I continued on towards the next town, hoping to find something to settle down in for the night. My prayers were answered when I stumbled upon a small cave. I peered inside, but the murky blackness was enough to stop even my perceptive eyes from seeing too far. There didn’t seem to be anything living in there, so I crawled in, unpacked my bedroll, and went to sleep. Hours later, the sun had risen above the clouds and its dim, filtered light illuminated the cave. I woke up and groaned, rubbing my eyes with my claws. I had learned the hard way that a bedroll will not make it any easier to sleep in a small, dark cave with a weird unidentifiable smell. I rolled off my bedroll and started to pack it up. My eyes drifted to something a bit further back in the cave, something I hadn’t noticed in the darkness. It looked like a pile of dirty armour, and the smell seemed to be coming from it. I went to go inspect it closer. None of the armour was empty. Inside each of the suits of leather and metal armour was a pony, filled with bullet holes, and with dried blood caked onto their fur. I dry heaved, but I hadn’t eaten enough lately for anything to come up. I used my wings to propel myself backwards away from the morbid pile and knocked my head on the far wall. I felt a trickle of something warm on the back of my head as my vision started to turn black... I awoke with a start. I had no idea how long I had been unconscious, but I knew I didn’t want to stick around in the cave full of murder victims. I scrambled to my paws. I quickly touched the back of my head and looked at my claw. It had come back bloody. I frantically searched my bag for something I could use to stem the bleeding, eventually pulling out some dirty cloth. Tearing it into strips, I wrapped one around my head and tied it up. That would stop the bleeding, in the meantime at least. I was about to sprint out of the cave when my eyes fell upon something out of place on the cave floor. I recognized it as a holodisk. Picking it up in my clean claw so as not to damage it, I inspected the device. It seemed intact, but I had nothing to play it on. I placed the holodisk in my bag and ran out of the cave, away from the morbid truth of the wasteland that lay within. Freedom wasn’t as good as I had thought it would be. I travelled for the rest of the day, slowly but surely making my way to the town of Diptrip. Night fell once more, encompassing me in its shroud of darkness, and I started to get antsy. The feathers on the back of my neck stood up, and I got the feeling like I was being watched. I desperately wanted to find somewhere safe for the night. I was in luck. As I reached the top of a small incline in the land, my eyes fell upon an old shack in the distance. Picking up the pace, I ran towards it, hoping the inhabitants would take me in for the night. As I drew near, I noticed that something was off about the shack. No light spilled out from underneath the door, and a few bullet holes peppered the doorway. Inching open the creaky door as quietly as I could, I peered inside. A bunk bed lay overturned near the back, blood splattered on the wall behind it. Bullets were embedded in the floor and walls. A table had been used as a makeshift barricade, but the top half had been torn away by shotgun fire. I slowly walked in, wary of any traps or people who would do me harm. Everything of value was stripped from the shack. Were raiders the cause of the destruction here? I went to go check if the bunk bed was still serviceable. As I got closer, I noticed something on sticking out from behind the overturned bed. A hoof lay in a small puddle of blood. The hoof was attached to the remains of a stallion that lay dead behind the bed. He was wearing old rags, torn from the bullets, and a paper note lay near him. I picked up the note and started to read. To any who find this, let this note act as my final request. Raiders are attacking my home as I write, and it doesn’t seem like I have much more time. My daughter, Ivory, has left for Diptrip and I worry about her coming home to find me here. Please, find her, tell her not to come home. I don’t want her to see whatever they do to me. I placed the note down. It seemed like I had another reason to travel to Diptrip. I started to close the poor stallion’s eyes as an act of respect, but was stopped when a drop of blood fell onto my claw. I lifted my claw up to my eyes, confused. Slowly, I looked up, afraid of what I would find on the ceiling. My eyes widened, and I screamed. A mare had been spiked to the ceiling! I jumped back, trying not to let any more of her blood fall on me. The mare on the ceiling had an ivory white coat and a black mane. Her limbs had been affixed onto the ceiling with railroad spikes, and her chest had been flayed open to reveal her insides. I ran back out the door. I couldn’t be in there. Never before had I been witness to such horrible acts as I had seen in my past couple of days in the wasteland. I put together the pieces. Obviously, the stallion had been under attack by raiders, and they had killed him after he had finished writing his note. Wasn’t his daughter in Diptrip, though? Could the mare I had seen flayed on the ceiling be somepony else? I doubted it. More likely she had come home while the raiders were still at the shack, and they had... I didn’t want to think about that anymore. After what I had seen, I knew I wouldn’t get any sleep. I continued into the wastes, making my way to Diptrip. Chp. 3 - Beauty BrewRead the story on Gdocs here - Chp. 3 - Beauty Brew Diptrip was not what I was expecting. As I looked down at the small settlement, I felt nothing but disappointment. I was hoping to find a nice town where I could buy some food, but Diptrip looked like the inhabitants were wanting the same. Three relatively large buildings were clustered in the middle, and they were surrounded by about a dozen or so small shacks. A tiny wooden wall surrounded the settlement. The wall looked like it could hardly keep out a radroach, let alone attacking raiders. It would have to do, I told myself. I desperately needed food and ammo. My reserves running dangerously low. I could also do with somewhere soft to sleep- I’d be happy with a rotten old bed or a pile of mouldy hay. As I walked up between the gates, I noticed two earth ponies looking at me with distrust in their eyes. They holstered to their sides were small pistols, possibly .32 calibers. Whatever they were, they looked like they couldn’t take down a bloatsprite. They eyed me as I walked into town, but didn’t stop me from entering. The streets were practically empty, save for a few ponies who were moving quickly from one building to another. Was it always this empty? I could see one of the large buildings ahead of me. A sign over the doorway read ‘General Goods’. I eyed my nearly empty bags. I would definitely need to stop there first. I reached out to open the door, but it was opened from the other side first. A tall, light green earth pony mare stormed out in a rush, an angry look on her face. She seemed to be too busy being angry to notice there was someone in her way. We collided before I could move out of the way. I quickly disengaged myself from the tangle of limbs we had become. “I’m sorry!” I exclaimed, helping her to her hooves. She dusted herself off and looked at me. Now that I got a better look at her, I really noticed her looks. She was beautiful- something hard to come by in the wasteland. Her big purple eyes matched the green of her curly mane. She looked at me angrily. “Watch it!” she chastised. Her features softened as she looked at me. “Hey, you’re not from around here. What’s your name?” she asked sweetly. That was a drastic change of emotions. I blushed at her attention. “Uh, Gur, my name is Gur.” “That’s such a nice name! I’m Beauty Brew, but you can just call me Beauty. So, what brings you to town?” I was fleeing my old life and trying to forge my own path in the wasteland. “I just stopped by for some supplies.” She looked me up and down, and I blushed at the attention. “You look like a fighter,” she commented. Beauty moved a bit closer. “Say... I could really use someone like you...” My face was burning even hotter now. “Y-yeah?” I asked. “F-for what?” “Well, you wander the wasteland, right? I’ve been wanting to travel. Maybe I could... come with you?” I found myself nodding before even thinking about the question. “Great!” she said. “I’ll just go and get my gear. How about you meet me at the bar-” she pointed at another relatively large building a few yards away “- when you’re ready?” I nodded again, a wide grin on my face. Beauty Brew winked and walked off, swaying her hips as she moved. I noticed that her cutie mark was two clusters of green grapes. I was looking there to see her cutie mark, honest! I shook my head to clear it and stepped inside the general goods shop. It was small and cluttered, and a mustachioed stallion stood behind the counter. He smiled and started to call out a greeting, but stopped when he noticed me. He looked at me, distrustful, as I trotted up to the counter. “Yer new in town.” I nodded. “Whaddya want?” We traded for a bit. It had taken most of my bottlecaps, but I had replenished my supply of spark cells and bought some food and water. I didn’t know how long the spark cells would last, but I estimated the food would last me about a week. I nodded thanks to the stallion and turned just as a pony burst through the door. “Missel, come quick!” the pony shouted before turning and running back out the door. The stallion , Missel, jumped over the counter and ran to the door. I quickly followed, caught up in the panic of the situation. The two ponies made their way to the center of the town, which was clear of any buildings and seemed to be some sort of meeting area. A pony that may have once been white or yellow was lying down on the ground on a bundle of old rags. His fur was matted with blood. Ponies were running to and fro with various medical items, but none seemed to know how to use them. “Missel, Blast Door’s been attacked!” Missel made his way up to the pony and gave him a once over. After a few moments of silence, he looked somberly to the ground. “I don’t think there’s anything we can do for him,” he said. A mare in the crowd started crying as I went up to look at Blast Door. The ponies assembled around me watched me warily as I inspected him. He wasn’t that injured- something small had exploded near him, sending shrapnel into his side. The large amount of blood must have made them all think it was very serious. Didn’t they have anyone with medical training? “Doesn’t this town have a doctor?” I asked. “Got blown up a few days ago.” Oh. Well, that would explain it. I could easily pull all the shrapnel out of his side. The trick was to do it before he bled out. His internal organs were likely fine, and all in all it would be simple to patch him up. “Does anyone have any healing potions?” A few ponies in the crowd nodded and started fumbling in the bags they were carrying. “I’ll need tweezers, too. Alcohol would be great, too.” We had pulled Blast Door into the abandoned doctor’s house, where I had found everything I needed to patch him up. He was going to be fine, if a little scarred. A mare was shaking my claw furiously, thanking me over and over for helping me save her husband. I tried to stop her but she kept ignoring my ‘you’re welcome’s and ‘it was the least I could do’s. Missel, who I learned was the mayor as well as shopkeeper of the town, trotted up to us and put a hoof on the mare’s shoulder. “Okay, Glimmer, give the griffon some space. I’m sure he knows how much you appreciate what he’s done.” The mare nodded, shook my claw for a few more moments, and then left with some more hastily shouted ‘thank you’s. The mayor turned to me. “You’ve done a mighty good deed for her family. I doubt they’ll be forgetting it any time soon.” “What happened to him, anyway?” I asked, motioning towards the unconscious pony on the bed. The mayor looked down. “Raiders. They’ve been attacking us relentlessly lately. I have no clue what’s gotten into them. If we don’t stop them soon, we’re going to be in major trouble.” He looked up at me. “Hey... you look like the wandering type. Whaddya say to going to their camp and putting an end to things?” I was about to shake my head when the door opened and Beauty Brew stepped in, an angry look on her face. “There you are! I’ve been waiting for you for hours! I-” She stopped when she noticed the patched up pony on the bed. “What happened to him?” “Raiders got him. This young griffon here patched him up nice, though! We were even talking about him going to go take out the raiders once and for all!” the mayor answered. “About that, I-” Beauty smiled. “Oh, Gur! How heroic of you! A doctor and fighter?” She walked up to me. “The world could use more ponies- er, people, like you.” I blushed. All my reservations against taking out the raiders disappeared. “Yeah, heh heh...” “Oh, and of course I’ll go with you! We are adventuring buddies now, after all? Now, I’m not that good with guns, but...” Beauty continued to talk, but I was too busy admiring the way her mane bounced up and down to notice. She had a really pretty mane, and I wondered how she styled it. Hair gel couldn’t be very common in the wasteland, could it? “...So, when are we heading out?” “Huh?” I asked, my musings interrupted. “Oh, maybe we should go tomorrow? I’ve, um , just crawled in from the wasteland, and, uh... yeah.” “Owner of the inn died a few days back. You won’t have anyplace to sleep tonight,” the mayor commented. Beauty put her arm around my shoulders. “He can stay with me! Now come on, Gur! Let’s hit the bar!” It seemed like there were more ponies in the bar than there were buildings in the town! Ponies crowded around rotting, creaky old tables, drinking from dirty glasses and playing games with cards that had seen centuries of use. A few mares in the corner watched me with lusty eyes as I walked in, but I could tell from the fat coin purses they were wearing that I really didn’t want to speak with them. Beauty led me up to the bar, where a little earth pony mare stood, wiping cups with her magic and a dirty cloth. “What’ll you have?” she asked us, giving us a winning smile. “‘Course, all we got’s whiskey, but I figured I’d give you the freedom of choice.” We sat down on some bar stools that had seen better days. The bartender grabbed a bottle of whiskey and two glasses, pouring some and giving them to us. “Hear you’re the one who helped my uncle. Drinks are on the house!” “He’s going to do more than save your uncle, Rose,” Beauty told the bartender, “Tomorrow we’re going to go take out those raiders once and for all.” The bartender, Rose, jumped up in the air. “Really?! This is great news!” she exclaimed. “Hey everypony! The boy here’s gonna take care of our raider problem!” Everyone stopped talking and turned to me. I blushed, not used to being the center of attention. Suddenly, everyone got out of their seats and crowded around me, all shouting encouraging words. “You’re a real hero!” “I wish my son was more like you!” “It’s a good thing you’re doing this for us! If you didn’t, I don’t think we’d survive another year!” That last one was less than encouraging, and only served to add pressure. To be honest, I didn’t think I could do it. I had already formulated an escape plan for when everything went wrong. But the ponies of this town were counting on me to solve their problem. Could I really abandon them at the first sign of trouble? I wasn’t a fighter. I was just a griffon who liked books a little too much for his own good. But if the ponies of this town depended on me to survive, could I really turn them down? If I abandoned them to their fate, was I any better than the raiders? With my decision made, I chose to enjoy what very well might be my last night on Equestria. Much later, Beauty led me out of the bar. Night had fallen, and the stars were clearly visible. I smiled, remembering the day the sky had opened up for the first day in two hundred years. Beauty looked back at me and noticed what I was staring at. “Beautiful, aren’t they? I never thought I would see them in my lifetime, yet here they are.” I nodded. Things could change. The clouds had been parted, and the entire wasteland was slowly returning to a state of order. If something so drastic could change, why couldn’t I? I would never be a mercenary, I knew that, and I never wanted to be. But maybe, just maybe, I could change into someone better. I had left the Talons looking to make a life for myself, when I really should have thought about the lives of everyone else. “So, what do we do now?” I asked Beauty. The gorgeous mare turned her head back to me with a small smile. “Whatever we want,” she replied. As she walked away, she lifted her tail and- Oh. Oh! Perk gained: Friendly Help - You’ve decided to be a good person, and your karma rewards you for it. You are more likely to acquire help from outside sources in dangerous situations.
Chp. 1 - DecisionsLink to the story on Gdocs - Chp. 1 - Decisions I lovingly caressed her body, admiring her beauty. She was perfect in every way, shape and form. I had never seen anything more perfect in all of my years. I leaned forward and gave her a kiss with my beak. “I love you,” I whispered. “What are you doing...?” I jumped, startled by the owner of the voice. Turning, I saw my brother Ghaleb had entered the room and was looking at me with a quizzical eye. I motioned towards the tri-barreled energy turret I had been stroking. “Isn’t she perfect?” I asked him. “This baby can punch a hole into the side of an armoured sky-wagon in seconds! Anyone tries to enter HQ without permission, they’ll be a turned into a finely glowing ash!” Ghaleb rolled his eyes in annoyance. “How much ammunition does it use, brother? You know we’re short on caps as it is.” “Er...” I stuttered. “Well... it does take quite a bit of ammunition, but it evens out! We’ll be spending less on firearms rounds, plus we won’t need as many guards!” Ghaleb shook his head. “Gur, when will you learn? Dad doesn’t want to use any of your crazy schemes. The ammunition for this thing is expensive. We’d be completely broke by the end of the month.” He turned. “Instead of fiddling with your fancy energy weapons, why don’t you learn to use a gun? If you really wanted to help out, you wouldn’t waste our time and resources doing... whatever this is, you would be out there-” he waved a claw, motioning to the sky “-getting us contracts.” I growled. Ghaleb always refused to see the bigger picture. “You idiot! Do you know how much this would help us? If we can get just a few more we wouldn’t have to worry about defence ever again!” I threw the wrench I had been using to repair the turret onto the ground. “You need to think of the long run! This will save us caps!” “We don’t need to worry about the long run. We need to worry about the now.” I sat there, fuming, as Ghaleb walked away. What an intolerable prick. I picked up my wrench and dusted it off on my mechanic’s overalls. Well, they weren’t really mechanic’s overalls. I couldn’t personally afford anything like that, mainly because my father would call it a waste. It was just the scraps of old combat armour sewed together to create some comfortable working clothes. Sure, it didn’t look as nice as the real thing, but on the bright side it was knife-proof. Not that I got into knife fights very often. I turned back to the turret, my enthusiasm for the weapon drained. “Looks like your chance to shine will have to wait,” I told it. With a sigh and a grunt, I picked up the heavy machine and lugged it back to my workshop. My workshop wasn’t solely a workshop. As with the overalls, my dad would never approve of me using up space for something he considered useless. Instead, I had added a workbench and tool rack into my bedroom. It was cluttered and there wasn’t much space to move, but it got the job done. I dragged the turret toward the back of the room, which was full of other scrapped projects, and placed it down, then went and sat on my bed. My bedroom used to be an old public washroom. It had had all of the toilets and sinks ripped out, but the ever-present stench of waste and mould still lingered. It wasn’t the best, but it was better than the bedroom we had added to the boiler room. Our HQ was built into an old public school. Apparently, before the war, it was a place where young ponies would come to learn. Now, it was a place for us Talons to work out how many caps we would earn from taking contracts and killing people. It was a drastic change of use. I lay down on my bed, trying to come up with another idea on a way to improve HQ. All of my ideas so far had been rejected, all because of the shortsightedness of everyone here. My mind wandered, and I thought about my father. I was the son of the Talon chief of this chapter, Guto. You would think that would get me a little more respect than I got now, but you’d think wrong. If anything, I was treated even worse for it. Everyone expected me to become a great soldier like my father or my brother, and their expectations were high. When I started to gain an interest in science, they didn’t think of it as something good. My father, especially, was disappointed in me. After having my brother Ghaleb turn into the fighter he is, he had high hopes for me. He’d treated me different ever since the day I first picked up that Big Book of Science. The Talon life wasn’t for me. I was no mercenary. In truth, I had always secretly dreamed of travelling to Tenpony tower and helping out as a doctor or nurse. Maybe I would study science without anyone looking at me with disappointment. I fantasized for a bit, picturing myself leaving the Talon life. No more constant weapons practice, which I was no good at anyway. The only weapons I could keep on target were energy weapons, and only the small ones at that. Their lack of recoil made it easy to keep on target, even for someone as scrawny as I. To be honest, I’ve never even killed anything. I was a Talon who never killed anything. A joke. The rest of the Talons laughed at me behind my back. Sometimes right to my face. I really, really didn’t belong here. Could I leave? What would happen if I just packed up some essentials and left? I could find a town, but would I survive the trip? I stopped myself from weighing the odds of survival in my mind. That was ridiculous! I couldn’t leave! Could I? Would anyone even notice I was gone? Its not like they let me help around here. They would probably notice the equipment I took was missing before they noticed I was. If I recalled correctly, the nearest town was a dingy place called Diptrip. If I were to leave, would I survive the three day trip? The wastes could be a dangerous place, and I wasn’t confident in my survival skills, or even my aim. I made a quick mental list of everything I would need to survive. Food, a weapon, ammo, a bedroll, and water were essentials. I could get food and water from the mess hall, I was pretty sure I could get a weapon from the firing range if I acted like I was planning to practice, and I already had a bedroll. That just left ammo. Where could I get the large supply of ammo I would need out in the wastes? That moment was when I realized I was seriously considering leaving. Sure, I had fantasized before, but I had never taken it this far. Could I do it? Could I actually leave? I made up my mind. I was leaving the Talons for good. Four hours later, I was silently padding my way down the halls of HQ, making my way toward the storage closet. The storage closet was where we stored our more valuable or dangerous equipment- Ammo, Rad-away, caps, and even the single balefire egg launcher we managed to scavenge a few years back. The door was always kept locked, but I had spent many hours learning how to pick locks. It was the only way for me to get some of the items I needed for some of my more expensive ideas. I made it to a corner in the hallway and pressed myself up against the wall. One right turn would leave me right in front of the storage closet, but there was a problem. A guard always stood outside the door, and I would need a way to get him away for a bit. I leaned my head around the corner and sure enough, a guard stood in front of the door, assault rifle in claw. I recognized her as Gladwyn, one of my brother’s friends. She was nice enough, and by that I mean she didn’t go out of her way to bother me. I quickly made up a story in my head. I’m not the most convincing griffon, but that was alright. Gladwyn wasn’t the smartest. I walked up to her, an award-winning (nervous) smile on my beak. “Hey Gladwyn,” I said. “My dad sent me to pick up some ammo. Could you let me in?” Gladwyn raised an eyebrow. “You? What do you need ammo for, Chicken Legs?” There was that nickname. Everyone in the base called me that. It was starting to bug me. Nevertheless, I continued. “My dad says I have to go out on the next contract with Ghaleb. Says it’ll ‘make me a real Talon’.” Gladwyn rolled her eyes. “Like that’ll ever happen. Just get some ammo and get out.” I walked up to the door and start to reach into one of the pockets of my overalls. I fumbled around in them like I was searching for something, then frantically started to pat down the rest of me. “Oh, crap! I lost the key!” I exclaimed. Gladwyn sighed and put a claw over her face. “Useless... well, if you can’t get in you have no use being here. Scram!” I raised my claws. “I really need to get in? Can you just let me pick it? Please!” Gladwyn looked around, making sure there was nobody else around in the hallway. “Fine. Just be quick about it.” Success! I took my screwdriver and bobby pin out of a pocket in my overalls. I inserted them into the lock and got to work. It didn’t take long- the lock was two hundred years old, and none of the griffons here bothered with maintaining much. The door opened with a click and I stepped inside. Around me were shelves piled high with stuff. Weapons, ammo, even armour were stacked to the ceiling, just ripe for the picking. I perused the shelves, eventually stumbling on a large pile of spark cells. I took a cloth pouch out from one of my pockets and unfolded it, then took as many cells as I could and dropped them in. After debating whether to take a magical energy pistol or a magical energy shotgun, I eventually took both and threw them in the bag as well. I looked down at my patchwork overalls. They were ugly and obviously homemade, and I debated whether or not to grab a suit of combat armour from a shelf. I decided against it. The overalls had served me well, and they provided enough protection to do me good in the wastes. I grabbed a bedroll and some purified water and shoved those in the bag as well. As I turned to leave the closet, something caught my eye. A safe, wedged in the corner between piles of old leather armour. A few suits of armour had fallen on top of the safe, and I wouldn’t have noticed it if not for the gleam of light on the metal door. I slung my bag over my shoulder and started to walk up to it, but stopped to grab an armoured bag to strap around my waste. I put all my stuff in there and inspected the safe. The safe was oddly clean for something that had survived the apocalypse. Someone had obviously been taking loving care of it, cleaning it and hiding it underneath piles of armour. I took out my screwdriver and bobby pins and went to work. Four bobby pins and many annoyed grunts later, I stood up kicked the safe. The thing definitely wasn’t going to open. With a sigh I placed my screwdriver back into my pocket. Just as I finished grabbing a pile of caps that had caught my eye, I heard a loud banging noise and turned around to see Gladwyn hitting the door. “Hurry up in there!” she ordered. I closed my bags and left the closet. “What, did you get lost in there?” she asked, laughing at her own joke. She became serious a moment later. “Now scram!” She didn’t have to tell me twice. I turned tail and ran back to my room. Back in the safety and comfort of my own room, I started to do inventory on all the goods I had... “liberated”, and counted my caps. I had a fair amount of spark cells, and I had swiped a good three hundred caps. Everything was going along swimmingly, and it looked like I would be able to continue with my plan. I still had some reservations with leaving. Besides make my way to Diptrip, I didn’t know what I would do out there. Sure, I could travel to Tenpony, but what were the odds of them letting in a scrawny little griffon who just wandered in from the wastes? I also didn’t know how my father would react to my leaving. Would he take it as betrayal? Talons were all about loyalty, and anyone who betrayed them didn’t usually live long enough to make any use of it. I’d hoped that he would take it in stride, maybe be happy that the useless son was gone, but now I wasn’t so sure. It was too late to go back on my plan now. I stood up, put both my weapons in their holsters, grabbed my bags, and left my room for the last time. Footnote: Level Up. New Perk: Awareness - Your griffon eyes are well adjusted for seeing over long distances or noticing things others might not. You have +1 perception and can often notice important things about your enemies in combat.
Chp. 2 - Harsh RealityLink to the story on Gdocs - Chp. 2 - Harsh Reality Today's weather: excessively violent, with a chance of dismemberment. Stay tuned for our Five-Day Forecast! Tap-tap-tap. My claws made little clicking noises with each button on the terminal I pushed. The password of the terminal I had to use to unlock the main gates was simple. After only a few seconds of tap-tap-tapping the keys, I discovered the password was “Talons”. The simplicity of the password for one of our most important security terminals made me even more glad I was leaving. I didn’t want to wake up one night to find out someone had broken in and started an assault. After I entered the password, I heard the main gate unlock with a small click. Luckily, neither of the gate guards had heard it from all the way up in their security towers. I sat down to think for a moment. Would the guards shoot a griffon who was trying to get out of the compound? They had no reason to think anyone on their side was trying to leave in the middle of the night, and might suspect I was an intruder trying to leave with something stolen, which was only half right. I looked up into the towers and made out faces in the darkness. I recognized the guards as Garl and Thrash, the twin sharpshooters. Excellent shots, but not the sharpest knives in the armoury. I felt like the luckiest griffon alive tonight! It would be easy to distract those two numbskulls long enough to get out the gate! I scanned the vicinity with my eyes, looking for something that would make a suitable distraction, but nothing caught my eye. I was about to give up and find another way out of the compound when I remembered the spark cells in my bag. I rooted around in my bags and carried out a spark cell. It was small, but plenty of magical energy was being stored inside the tiny battery. I grinned, working out a plan in my mind that would occupy enough of the twins’ time to get me out of the gate. I tossed the spark cell into a relatively open area a few yards away. I only had one shot at getting it right, and I hoped I didn’t mess it up. Unholstering my energy pistol, I brought it up to my eye and aimed down the sights, pointing the barrel of the weapon at the spark cell. Bzzzt! My shot missed by a whole yard, passing by the spark battery and hitting the ground near the fence! “Hey, I think I heard a shot!” I heard a voice from the towers shout. I quickly jumped to the right, hiding behind a convenient stack of barrels. I tried holding my breath, but I felt myself start to panic and hyperventilate. “Are you sure? I didn’t hear nothin’,” a voice responded. Whew! Maybe they wouldn’t investigate any more. “Nah, I’m sure I heard something,” the first voice called out. “You stay up here. I’m going down to investigate some more,” he said, followed by the click-clack of claws climbing down a ladder. I started to shake. I should have known better than to try something that stupid! I was never any good at the firing range. Why did I think I’d be able to hit the damned spark cell?! He was going to come down me and put a bullet in my head for trying to abandon the Talons! Or worse, he might tell my dad! What if he- “Huh, there’s no one down here. Guess I’m hearing things.” Yes! I almost let out a whoop of joy, but stopped myself before I dug myself anymore into this hole I had gotten myself into. I carefully listened as the guard flew back up to his post. Okay, that plan was a complete failure. I was going to need to find another way out of the compound. I wracked my brain, trying to think of another way out of the ancient school. The only other exit I could think of was the abandoned fire escape, and that door was alarmed. There was no way I’d be able to bypass the security on it. Unless... a hah! Genius idea in mind, I silently padded my way through the halls of the old school, searching for the equipment I’d need to enact my plan. An unlocked storage closet to my right caught my attention, and I slipped inside. The closet I was in wasn’t as fun as the last one. Where the last one held laser rifles and armour, this one held an old mop and some building equipment. I reached up to a shelf and swiped a box of iron nails and a spool of copper wire. Stolen goods in hand, I left the closet just as another griffon passed by. I hardly recognized him, but I remembered seeing him in the hallways a few times. His name was Chad, or Thad, or something like that. He watched as I stepped out of the closet and close the door, then winked and kept walking. What was that about? I made my way to the old fire escape, which was located near the back of the building. We didn’t use this area very much, and spiderwebs hung in the corners. Eventually I reached the fire escape and started to enact my plan. Fire doors have two magnets attached to them, one on the door itself and the other on the wall. When the door is opened and the magnetic field is broken, it sends an electrical pulse, which activates the alarm. If I could use another magnet to keep the field intact, I could silently open the door and no one would be any wiser. I cut off a bit of copper wire from the spool and wrapped it around the iron nail. I touched the copper wire to one end of a spark cell, turning it into an effective magnet. I wrapped the nail, copper wire, and spark cell together, then taped it to the wall near the handle of the door. I held in my breath and pushed on the door handle, hoping my plan would work. As the door swung open and the halls of the compound stayed silent, I let out my breath and a little whoop of victory. Take that, Talon meatheads! With this one victory in claw, I took off into the night and the perils of the Equestrian Wasteland. I took cover behind a large rock, frantically replacing the spark cells in my energy shotgun with fresh ones. My claws were shaking frantically, and I kept dropping the cells, but eventually I managed to reload the weapon. I poked my head over my cover to peer at the beast I was at odds with. The creature was huge, mutated far beyond the regular size of its species. It was covered in thick natural armour and had a deadly, razor-sharp stinger that looked like it could pierce a tank. I jumped up on the rock and aimed my energy shotgun at the beast in the general area I assumed its face must be. I quickly squeezed the trigger, sending six shots of laser buckshot into the creature’s carapace. The creature let out a high-pitched squeal and stopped moving, seemingly dead. In the end, civilization triumphed over nature, and my energy shotgun took down the beast of claw and stinger. I felt strong. After I was done basking in my own glory, I stepped over to the dead radscorpion, which was about the size of my arm, and removed its stinger, keeping it for a prize. The beast had put up a good fight, and had almost overpowered me. A creature this powerful must be rare in the wasteland, otherwise I fear all of civilization would be destroyed. The wasteland was a horrible place, I had learned. I had been walking for less than an hour before I had stumbled across the creature. It was late, and I was in no condition to be fighting anything. What I needed more than anything was a safe place to sleep. I continued on towards the next town, hoping to find something to settle down in for the night. My prayers were answered when I stumbled upon a small cave. I peered inside, but the murky blackness was enough to stop even my perceptive eyes from seeing too far. There didn’t seem to be anything living in there, so I crawled in, unpacked my bedroll, and went to sleep. Hours later, the sun had risen above the clouds and its dim, filtered light illuminated the cave. I woke up and groaned, rubbing my eyes with my claws. I had learned the hard way that a bedroll will not make it any easier to sleep in a small, dark cave with a weird unidentifiable smell. I rolled off my bedroll and started to pack it up. My eyes drifted to something a bit further back in the cave, something I hadn’t noticed in the darkness. It looked like a pile of dirty armour, and the smell seemed to be coming from it. I went to go inspect it closer. None of the armour was empty. Inside each of the suits of leather and metal armour was a pony, filled with bullet holes, and with dried blood caked onto their fur. I dry heaved, but I hadn’t eaten enough lately for anything to come up. I used my wings to propel myself backwards away from the morbid pile and knocked my head on the far wall. I felt a trickle of something warm on the back of my head as my vision started to turn black... I awoke with a start. I had no idea how long I had been unconscious, but I knew I didn’t want to stick around in the cave full of murder victims. I scrambled to my paws. I quickly touched the back of my head and looked at my claw. It had come back bloody. I frantically searched my bag for something I could use to stem the bleeding, eventually pulling out some dirty cloth. Tearing it into strips, I wrapped one around my head and tied it up. That would stop the bleeding, in the meantime at least. I was about to sprint out of the cave when my eyes fell upon something out of place on the cave floor. I recognized it as a holodisk. Picking it up in my clean claw so as not to damage it, I inspected the device. It seemed intact, but I had nothing to play it on. I placed the holodisk in my bag and ran out of the cave, away from the morbid truth of the wasteland that lay within. Freedom wasn’t as good as I had thought it would be. I travelled for the rest of the day, slowly but surely making my way to the town of Diptrip. Night fell once more, encompassing me in its shroud of darkness, and I started to get antsy. The feathers on the back of my neck stood up, and I got the feeling like I was being watched. I desperately wanted to find somewhere safe for the night. I was in luck. As I reached the top of a small incline in the land, my eyes fell upon an old shack in the distance. Picking up the pace, I ran towards it, hoping the inhabitants would take me in for the night. As I drew near, I noticed that something was off about the shack. No light spilled out from underneath the door, and a few bullet holes peppered the doorway. Inching open the creaky door as quietly as I could, I peered inside. A bunk bed lay overturned near the back, blood splattered on the wall behind it. Bullets were embedded in the floor and walls. A table had been used as a makeshift barricade, but the top half had been torn away by shotgun fire. I slowly walked in, wary of any traps or people who would do me harm. Everything of value was stripped from the shack. Were raiders the cause of the destruction here? I went to go check if the bunk bed was still serviceable. As I got closer, I noticed something on sticking out from behind the overturned bed. A hoof lay in a small puddle of blood. The hoof was attached to the remains of a stallion that lay dead behind the bed. He was wearing old rags, torn from the bullets, and a paper note lay near him. I picked up the note and started to read. To any who find this, let this note act as my final request. Raiders are attacking my home as I write, and it doesn’t seem like I have much more time. My daughter, Ivory, has left for Diptrip and I worry about her coming home to find me here. Please, find her, tell her not to come home. I don’t want her to see whatever they do to me. I placed the note down. It seemed like I had another reason to travel to Diptrip. I started to close the poor stallion’s eyes as an act of respect, but was stopped when a drop of blood fell onto my claw. I lifted my claw up to my eyes, confused. Slowly, I looked up, afraid of what I would find on the ceiling. My eyes widened, and I screamed. A mare had been spiked to the ceiling! I jumped back, trying not to let any more of her blood fall on me. The mare on the ceiling had an ivory white coat and a black mane. Her limbs had been affixed onto the ceiling with railroad spikes, and her chest had been flayed open to reveal her insides. I ran back out the door. I couldn’t be in there. Never before had I been witness to such horrible acts as I had seen in my past couple of days in the wasteland. I put together the pieces. Obviously, the stallion had been under attack by raiders, and they had killed him after he had finished writing his note. Wasn’t his daughter in Diptrip, though? Could the mare I had seen flayed on the ceiling be somepony else? I doubted it. More likely she had come home while the raiders were still at the shack, and they had... I didn’t want to think about that anymore. After what I had seen, I knew I wouldn’t get any sleep. I continued into the wastes, making my way to Diptrip.
Chp. 3 - Beauty BrewRead the story on Gdocs here - Chp. 3 - Beauty Brew Diptrip was not what I was expecting. As I looked down at the small settlement, I felt nothing but disappointment. I was hoping to find a nice town where I could buy some food, but Diptrip looked like the inhabitants were wanting the same. Three relatively large buildings were clustered in the middle, and they were surrounded by about a dozen or so small shacks. A tiny wooden wall surrounded the settlement. The wall looked like it could hardly keep out a radroach, let alone attacking raiders. It would have to do, I told myself. I desperately needed food and ammo. My reserves running dangerously low. I could also do with somewhere soft to sleep- I’d be happy with a rotten old bed or a pile of mouldy hay. As I walked up between the gates, I noticed two earth ponies looking at me with distrust in their eyes. They holstered to their sides were small pistols, possibly .32 calibers. Whatever they were, they looked like they couldn’t take down a bloatsprite. They eyed me as I walked into town, but didn’t stop me from entering. The streets were practically empty, save for a few ponies who were moving quickly from one building to another. Was it always this empty? I could see one of the large buildings ahead of me. A sign over the doorway read ‘General Goods’. I eyed my nearly empty bags. I would definitely need to stop there first. I reached out to open the door, but it was opened from the other side first. A tall, light green earth pony mare stormed out in a rush, an angry look on her face. She seemed to be too busy being angry to notice there was someone in her way. We collided before I could move out of the way. I quickly disengaged myself from the tangle of limbs we had become. “I’m sorry!” I exclaimed, helping her to her hooves. She dusted herself off and looked at me. Now that I got a better look at her, I really noticed her looks. She was beautiful- something hard to come by in the wasteland. Her big purple eyes matched the green of her curly mane. She looked at me angrily. “Watch it!” she chastised. Her features softened as she looked at me. “Hey, you’re not from around here. What’s your name?” she asked sweetly. That was a drastic change of emotions. I blushed at her attention. “Uh, Gur, my name is Gur.” “That’s such a nice name! I’m Beauty Brew, but you can just call me Beauty. So, what brings you to town?” I was fleeing my old life and trying to forge my own path in the wasteland. “I just stopped by for some supplies.” She looked me up and down, and I blushed at the attention. “You look like a fighter,” she commented. Beauty moved a bit closer. “Say... I could really use someone like you...” My face was burning even hotter now. “Y-yeah?” I asked. “F-for what?” “Well, you wander the wasteland, right? I’ve been wanting to travel. Maybe I could... come with you?” I found myself nodding before even thinking about the question. “Great!” she said. “I’ll just go and get my gear. How about you meet me at the bar-” she pointed at another relatively large building a few yards away “- when you’re ready?” I nodded again, a wide grin on my face. Beauty Brew winked and walked off, swaying her hips as she moved. I noticed that her cutie mark was two clusters of green grapes. I was looking there to see her cutie mark, honest! I shook my head to clear it and stepped inside the general goods shop. It was small and cluttered, and a mustachioed stallion stood behind the counter. He smiled and started to call out a greeting, but stopped when he noticed me. He looked at me, distrustful, as I trotted up to the counter. “Yer new in town.” I nodded. “Whaddya want?” We traded for a bit. It had taken most of my bottlecaps, but I had replenished my supply of spark cells and bought some food and water. I didn’t know how long the spark cells would last, but I estimated the food would last me about a week. I nodded thanks to the stallion and turned just as a pony burst through the door. “Missel, come quick!” the pony shouted before turning and running back out the door. The stallion , Missel, jumped over the counter and ran to the door. I quickly followed, caught up in the panic of the situation. The two ponies made their way to the center of the town, which was clear of any buildings and seemed to be some sort of meeting area. A pony that may have once been white or yellow was lying down on the ground on a bundle of old rags. His fur was matted with blood. Ponies were running to and fro with various medical items, but none seemed to know how to use them. “Missel, Blast Door’s been attacked!” Missel made his way up to the pony and gave him a once over. After a few moments of silence, he looked somberly to the ground. “I don’t think there’s anything we can do for him,” he said. A mare in the crowd started crying as I went up to look at Blast Door. The ponies assembled around me watched me warily as I inspected him. He wasn’t that injured- something small had exploded near him, sending shrapnel into his side. The large amount of blood must have made them all think it was very serious. Didn’t they have anyone with medical training? “Doesn’t this town have a doctor?” I asked. “Got blown up a few days ago.” Oh. Well, that would explain it. I could easily pull all the shrapnel out of his side. The trick was to do it before he bled out. His internal organs were likely fine, and all in all it would be simple to patch him up. “Does anyone have any healing potions?” A few ponies in the crowd nodded and started fumbling in the bags they were carrying. “I’ll need tweezers, too. Alcohol would be great, too.” We had pulled Blast Door into the abandoned doctor’s house, where I had found everything I needed to patch him up. He was going to be fine, if a little scarred. A mare was shaking my claw furiously, thanking me over and over for helping me save her husband. I tried to stop her but she kept ignoring my ‘you’re welcome’s and ‘it was the least I could do’s. Missel, who I learned was the mayor as well as shopkeeper of the town, trotted up to us and put a hoof on the mare’s shoulder. “Okay, Glimmer, give the griffon some space. I’m sure he knows how much you appreciate what he’s done.” The mare nodded, shook my claw for a few more moments, and then left with some more hastily shouted ‘thank you’s. The mayor turned to me. “You’ve done a mighty good deed for her family. I doubt they’ll be forgetting it any time soon.” “What happened to him, anyway?” I asked, motioning towards the unconscious pony on the bed. The mayor looked down. “Raiders. They’ve been attacking us relentlessly lately. I have no clue what’s gotten into them. If we don’t stop them soon, we’re going to be in major trouble.” He looked up at me. “Hey... you look like the wandering type. Whaddya say to going to their camp and putting an end to things?” I was about to shake my head when the door opened and Beauty Brew stepped in, an angry look on her face. “There you are! I’ve been waiting for you for hours! I-” She stopped when she noticed the patched up pony on the bed. “What happened to him?” “Raiders got him. This young griffon here patched him up nice, though! We were even talking about him going to go take out the raiders once and for all!” the mayor answered. “About that, I-” Beauty smiled. “Oh, Gur! How heroic of you! A doctor and fighter?” She walked up to me. “The world could use more ponies- er, people, like you.” I blushed. All my reservations against taking out the raiders disappeared. “Yeah, heh heh...” “Oh, and of course I’ll go with you! We are adventuring buddies now, after all? Now, I’m not that good with guns, but...” Beauty continued to talk, but I was too busy admiring the way her mane bounced up and down to notice. She had a really pretty mane, and I wondered how she styled it. Hair gel couldn’t be very common in the wasteland, could it? “...So, when are we heading out?” “Huh?” I asked, my musings interrupted. “Oh, maybe we should go tomorrow? I’ve, um , just crawled in from the wasteland, and, uh... yeah.” “Owner of the inn died a few days back. You won’t have anyplace to sleep tonight,” the mayor commented. Beauty put her arm around my shoulders. “He can stay with me! Now come on, Gur! Let’s hit the bar!” It seemed like there were more ponies in the bar than there were buildings in the town! Ponies crowded around rotting, creaky old tables, drinking from dirty glasses and playing games with cards that had seen centuries of use. A few mares in the corner watched me with lusty eyes as I walked in, but I could tell from the fat coin purses they were wearing that I really didn’t want to speak with them. Beauty led me up to the bar, where a little earth pony mare stood, wiping cups with her magic and a dirty cloth. “What’ll you have?” she asked us, giving us a winning smile. “‘Course, all we got’s whiskey, but I figured I’d give you the freedom of choice.” We sat down on some bar stools that had seen better days. The bartender grabbed a bottle of whiskey and two glasses, pouring some and giving them to us. “Hear you’re the one who helped my uncle. Drinks are on the house!” “He’s going to do more than save your uncle, Rose,” Beauty told the bartender, “Tomorrow we’re going to go take out those raiders once and for all.” The bartender, Rose, jumped up in the air. “Really?! This is great news!” she exclaimed. “Hey everypony! The boy here’s gonna take care of our raider problem!” Everyone stopped talking and turned to me. I blushed, not used to being the center of attention. Suddenly, everyone got out of their seats and crowded around me, all shouting encouraging words. “You’re a real hero!” “I wish my son was more like you!” “It’s a good thing you’re doing this for us! If you didn’t, I don’t think we’d survive another year!” That last one was less than encouraging, and only served to add pressure. To be honest, I didn’t think I could do it. I had already formulated an escape plan for when everything went wrong. But the ponies of this town were counting on me to solve their problem. Could I really abandon them at the first sign of trouble? I wasn’t a fighter. I was just a griffon who liked books a little too much for his own good. But if the ponies of this town depended on me to survive, could I really turn them down? If I abandoned them to their fate, was I any better than the raiders? With my decision made, I chose to enjoy what very well might be my last night on Equestria. Much later, Beauty led me out of the bar. Night had fallen, and the stars were clearly visible. I smiled, remembering the day the sky had opened up for the first day in two hundred years. Beauty looked back at me and noticed what I was staring at. “Beautiful, aren’t they? I never thought I would see them in my lifetime, yet here they are.” I nodded. Things could change. The clouds had been parted, and the entire wasteland was slowly returning to a state of order. If something so drastic could change, why couldn’t I? I would never be a mercenary, I knew that, and I never wanted to be. But maybe, just maybe, I could change into someone better. I had left the Talons looking to make a life for myself, when I really should have thought about the lives of everyone else. “So, what do we do now?” I asked Beauty. The gorgeous mare turned her head back to me with a small smile. “Whatever we want,” she replied. As she walked away, she lifted her tail and- Oh. Oh! Perk gained: Friendly Help - You’ve decided to be a good person, and your karma rewards you for it. You are more likely to acquire help from outside sources in dangerous situations.
