Post Unity

Prologue

So some of the ladies here recommended I start a journal to keep myself sane. Well if it works well enough for memory addled mutants it should work for me. My name is Fair Trade; A Unicorn born on a small no-name settlement that has since packed up and moved on. My foalhood was rather dull save the occasional raider or animal attack. Seeing a number of ponies try and run off and be a hero in one way or another and mess up by either dying or just making things worse, taught me that ponies should generally stick to their own business unless it makes itself their business, they have something to gain from it or actually owe something.

Not long after working out a trade agreement with some mercs to route out a persistent raider nest in exchange for food and weapon maintenance (a deal which the rest of the town was having difficulty sealing at the time) I gained my Cutie Mark (a satchel of supplies and a plate of various forms of currency/commodities). Naturally I became a trader when I grew up, and it wasn't long after I got started with my business as part of some caravans that all the crazy stuff began happening.

It started when my current caravan got ambushed by a trio of Alicorns, We weren't really fighters at the time and I have since put some practice time in, learning with my weapon inventory before it changes hooves. The bitches had us cornered when they just suddenly stopped. Then they started screaming and just flew off. Later on, news of the explosion was on the radio. Soon after that whole “Day of Sunshine and Rainbows” thing happened. Now I'll admit that did brighten up my world view, and not just because of the physical light, I mean holy crap, ponies actually gave two shits about the world now.

That said I found that the best way I could contribute to the efforts of making this “nation” better, was to just continue doing what I was doing. Some time passed and they managed to turn on the Gardens of Equestria, but naturally the law of unintended consequences reared its ugly head. Plenty of the Ghouls still capable of thought had an issue with the land being free of radiation as they kinda need that to live.

So they sent out expeditions outside of equestria to get contaminated water, not a task I envy at all. And of course some dumb ass had the bright idea to transport a big shipment on a BARGE floating on a river through the section of land I do my trading on. “yeah sure that won’t cause problems, as long as it doesn't capsize!” So slowly but surly radiation has been spreading through this little region, attracting Ghouls (both sane and feral) Alicorns and radiation loving critters, including Golden Salamanders, I fucking hate those things.

Anyway, my main goal for about a year was saving up to buy myself one of those fancy Pip-Bucks. I had finally obtained one a day ago when we stumbled onto a nest of Fire Salamanders, did I mention how much I hated Salamanders? Bastards toasted up my whole caravan, decent folk I’m sure, but I didn't know them well enough to really grieve. That was due to my caravan regularly rotating with ponies moving in and out of the job all the time, but I digress. I managed to kill the fuckers by tossing my ammo and grenade sacks at their fiery maws, I was alive, but barely.

In the chaos I lost track of the trail, and I hadn't gotten the locations saved to my Pip-Buck yet. So I limped along, with third degree burns from the Salamanders and the explosion, and no supplies. Figures things start getting good and I end up dying. Then I saw a walled off area in the distance. It was a ski lodge, how the fuck did I end up all the way in the hills!? Whatever, it looked inhabited. Then I remembered, I had heard from the radio that a bunch of Alicorns had set up shop in an old Ski Lodge. Now most of them had been minding their own business, but that hadn't given me much reason to trust them. And then I remembered that I was dying and they were still my best chance of not dying. I found the strength to limp to the gate door, knock twice and collapse.

---Footnote---
Trait selected: Wild Wasteland
Wild Wasteland unleashes the most bizarre and silly elements of post-apocalyptic Equestria. Not for the faint of heart or the serious of temperament.

Author's Note

And So I make my dive into writing on this site, you can thank the posters on /mlp/ for both inspiring and encouraging me to start this project, I am likely to be busy for the first month or so, meaning timely updates are not guaranteed. Hope you enjoy and feel free to offer feedback and criticism.