Fallout Equestria: Broken Steel - Under the Red Cloud

by Lex the Pikachu

Chapters

Chapter 1: That Collar around your Neck
Chapter 2: The Cloud and the Ghost
Chapter 3: God is Everywhere
Chapter 4: Tick Tick Tick
Chapter 6: Domino
Chapter 5: Look before you Step

Chapter 1: That Collar around your Neck

Fallout Equestria: Broken Steel

Under the Red Cloud

Chapter 1: That Collar around your Neck!

HowoooOOOOooooOOOO

Ugh, what is that noise?

That sound, what is it and why is it repeating itself? It sounds like some sort of broken alarm.

I groaned out in discomfort as I began to wake up. My throat felt like it had been attacked by a cheese grater and I had the awful taste of copper in my mouth as I slowly became aware of my bodily functions and senses again. I put a hoof to my head as I pulled myself up to sit on my haunches, and I felt a slight headache come along. In all honestly, I felt like I had one too many and now had a hangover but I don’t even remember drinking any lager last night… Come to think of it, I haven’t drunk any alcohol in the last ten years. Ugh… What did I do last night?

I sighed with some relief as the light headache faded some and I placed my hoof back down to the paved floor I was seated on and then opened my eyes. What came to greet my vision was not at all what I was expecting. It was like something out of a horror movie. The sky is cloudy and stormy and I could hear the rumble of thunder in the distance. I appear to be in what looks like an abandoned holiday resort villa which was showing signs of severe neglect. There is an old run down fountain right in front of me, its base tiled with what looks like blue and white flower patterns but many have fallen away, leaving empty patches all over the base. There is a high elevated cliff in the distance and atop the cliff sits an imposing large structure that looks to be reaching up to the sky, and to cap it all off, everything is red, it’s like the sky itself is red, the light of the sun filtering through the dense clouds is bathing everything in a shade of red. This has to be the scariest place I’ve ever been.

Just what the fuck did I do last night?

I closed my eyes again as I tried to think. I felt my head clear when the last of the headache faded and then everything came rushing back.

XXXXX

It has been ten years since the destruction of the Krogoth, and life in Equestria was slowly but surely improving. Things were still bad with Raiders and Slavers and all, but still with how things were improving now that Equestria’s land had been restored and we no longer had to worry about taint or radiation, life was improving.

My family and I had left our home in New Ponyville to visit Stable 24 to see how things were going. I smiled as we entered the Trottingham area, as it was clear life was returning to the old town. Makeshift homes and tents were now sitting close to the entrance to Twenty Four when there wasn’t anything before when we left. It was good to see the change around us.

Elder McNamare, who was being flanked on both sides by two rangers approached when she saw us. She smiled at us when we saw her.

“Ah, good afternoon Paladin Longshot, it’s been a long time and it’s good to see you” She greeted us happily.

I smiled in return. “Thank you ma’am, it’s good to see you again too and it’s good to be back”

“Good afternoon McNamare” Motor Runner said with a smile and a respectful nod of his head.

Blueberry hid behind me, as she didn’t know the now middle aged mare before us. But before any of us could get her to say hello our attention were directed to my two passengers sitting in my foal carrier saddle as the latest editions to our family began to wail loudly.

I giggled as I opened my storage unit and pulled out two bottles of milk, then lifted my wings to reveal the two tiny foals sitting comfortably in the carrier.

“Here you go” I said with a motherly smile as I split my levitation so both bottles floated to the mouths of my hungry foals. Sitting in the carrier were twin fillies, both purple furred with black manes and tails just like their father, one an Earth Pony and the other a Pegasus, who thankfully had her wings bound while in the carrier. She’s just as much of a nightmare as Xian was as a foal.

“Two new additions to your family, huh?” McNamare asked.

I smiled and nodded as my two foals held their bottles with their tiny hooves and greedily drank from them. “Yeah, this is Prism” I said, indicating my Pegasus filly with my left wing. “This is Raspberry” I said while indicating with my right wing. “And this is Blueberry” I said, stepping to my side to reveal my shy ten year old filly who “eeped” as she was now in plain sight.

“Well I’ll be. I haven’t seen you since you were no older than your sisters” McNamare said gently as she smiled down at my eldest child.

Blueberry simply shuffled on her hooves nervously. Motor Runner bent down and lowered his head so it was close to her ear and whispered something. She looked up and smiled softly, “Nice to meet you ma’am,” she said quietly but with a soft smile on her lips.

After our introductions we began to make our way towards Twenty Four with McNamare leading until she stopped just before the entrance.

“Oh, nearly forgot. Since you are here would you be able to check something out for us?” She asked, turning to face us.

I’m still a paladin of the Applejack Rangers and still have a duty to uphold with them so I felt obligated to ask. “What is it?”

“Nine months ago a radio signal was recorded from an abandoned Steel Ranger bunker. The signal just appeared and then a few days after it disappeared. Thirty two hours ago however we detected the same signal from the same location. Currently all my available rangers are out doing other important tasks. Can you please check it out for me?”

“Err?” I looked back at Motor Runner.

”Don’t worry; I can look after the kids. You are still a ranger after all”

“It shouldn’t take you long; the bunker itself is only an hour’s trot from here”

Well I wasn’t going to be that far away and my newborns were in good hooves with their father, so I decided to check it out. Besides, how bad could it be? Well, my answer came when I arrived at said bunker.

I decided to fly to it since it would be quicker. I learned I didn’t have a fear of heights as I first thought, it was a fear of falling, as I could go extremely high and not be scared, if I knew I was safe. If I knew I wasn’t safe I would be shitting bricks and wouldn’t move. I was still a bit uneasy flying high so I flew low so that if I did fall and crash, I wouldn’t plummet to my death.

The Pegasus part of me loved the feel of the air rushing past my face and through my mane. I understood why Sky Fire loved to fly now. The flight to the bunker took roughly twenty minutes and when I landed I stood in the middle of an intersection with a ponyhole cover right in the centre.

Even now I’m still amazed that my PipBuck can instantly acquire direction markers and new objectives without anypony’s input as my EFS was pointing directly at the cover. Not wanting to waste any more time, I used my telekinesis to heave the ponyhole cover off and slid it to the side, as I descended into the bunker.

I was expecting a tunnel upon reaching the bottom of the ladder but instead I found myself in a fair sized rectangular room that was pretty much bare with ridged walls. Beside the ladder I climbed down sat an empty footlocker. I turned around and took in the rest of the room. The first thing to catch my attention was the large poster on the back wall. It looked like an old movie poster or something like it as it displayed an actress or singer wearing a lovely looking dress and holding a wine glass. At the bottom of the yellowed poster in fancy lettering it read. “Sierra Maredre” I didn’t know if that was the mare’s name or the name of what the poster advertised. Before I could muse on that more the second thing to catch my attention showed itself as a blood splatter half way down the poster and seemed to dribble down to the wall to the floor. I followed the blood until I then saw a decapitated corpse lying on its back before the poster.

Suddenly what seemed like a simple recon mission turned into a mysterious murder investigation. Why was there a body in the bunker, why was its head missing, what did this and who? Those were just some of the questions running through my head as I approached the corpse. I lit my horn with my colourless magic to shed more light onto the situation. The body was too decayed to really give me a sense of gender. Plus, it was wearing a white jumpsuit. I gently rolled the body over onto its side to see the back, sometimes a jumpsuit has a logo or a company name written on them but this one just has a red painted X on the back. I shook my head and put the body back into its original position. I then checked the wound around its neck where its head would have been and I was surprised to find the flesh around the entire neck where the head would be was burnt. Lastly I checked to see what this body had on it and found a number of useless miscellaneous items, some drained Micro-Fusion Cells and a vile of an odd red powder that my PipBuck labelled as “Cloud Residue”. This was just plain weird.

Before the corpse to the right side of the room was a large rectangular hole with a set of stairs leading down. I left the corpse and walked around back to where I came in, descending the stairs. At the bottom was a familiar security door. You seem to see these doors almost everywhere underground and in a secure area. I used my magic to grip the manual override wheel and spun it clockwise, which then released the door’s locking clamps as it fell with the weight of gravity pushing it down into the floor, opening up a short corridor. The walls were the same as the room upstairs but it seemed that the corridor branched off in two directions and ended with a room at each end.

I stepped into the corridor and to my right was a hallway that would take me somewhere deeper but it was completely blocked by a cave in. A little further down I came to the other branching off hallway to my left which ended with a locked security door with a terminal mounted to the wall. I had learned a lot from Zyon about hacking and I would hopefully be able to hack this particular terminal. If I attempted it, it would have likely taken me several attempts, and I didn’t have time to waste hacking it. I left it alone, which left me with the small room at the end of the main corridor.

Standing at the threshold to the room I noticed it was a sleeping quarters as both sides were lined with foldaway cots, each cot having an accompanying locker. The room looked pretty much standard apart from one oddity. Sitting in the centre of the room with a light shining down on it was a small table with an unusual looking radio sitting on it. I could hear it clearly now, the radio signal that McNamare told me about was coming from this radio set. A lovely mare’s voice was speaking. It said:

“Has your life taken a turn, do troubles beset you, has fortune left you behind? If so, the Sierra Maredre Casino in all its glory is inviting you to Begin Again. Come to a place where wealth, excitement and intrigue await around every corner. Stroll along the winding streets of our beautiful resort; make new friends or rekindle old flames. Let your eyes take in the luxurious expanse of the open desert under clear starlit skies. Gaze straight on into the sunset from our villa rooftops. Countless diversions await you. Gamble in our casino or take in the theatre or stay in one of our exclusive executive suites that will shelter you and cater to your every whim. So if life’s worries weigh you down, if you need an escape from your troubles or if you just need an opportunity to Begin Again. Join us, let go and leave the world behind at the Sierra Maredre grand opening, this October. We’ll be waiting”

The transmission then began to repeat itself. It sounded like a wonderful place by the sound of it, and the time it mentioned told me it was advertising an opening to a resort from before the war. It was strange that it was still broadcasting this even now. I didn’t know what to make of it and I hope that McNamare would understand it better than I. I looked around again for anything out of the ordinary considering the body upstairs. Finding nothing that could outright kill me, I decided to just turn off the radio and go.

I stepped fully into the room and reached for the radio when all of a sudden the security door at the end of the hall closed up tight again. Before I had a chance to react, a red mist began to be pumped into the room from vents in the ceiling. I coughed and hacked as I breathed in the gas. My vision instantly began to blur and I became unsteady on my hooves. My wings drooped and fell limp at my sides as I finally lost what little balance I had left and collapsed onto my side. The last thing I remember seeing before everything went black from the knockout gas was the radio still sitting on the table and still repeating its message.

XXXXX

Now I remembered what happened to me but that still doesn’t explain how I got here to this… Wait, I’m in a holiday resort. This, this is it; this is the Villa of the Sierra Maredre. I looked up at the tall structure on the cliff. I suppose that’s the Sierra Maredre Casino. Well I guess I know where I am now but that still doesn’t answer the other question now floating in my head.

How the buck did I get here?

There was a blue flash in the corner of my eye and I turned my head back to the fountain and a blue hologram that appeared at the top of the fountain and stood looking out behind me. A quick glance told me that must have been the entrance to the Villa, as there was a wide road with an arch going across it but was also locked up tight with a heavy iron gate. Looking back to the fountain and its hologram I felt like I had seen that hologram before, well its image. It took me a minute to remember the poster in the bunker. Yes, the hologram is the same as the starlet from the poster.

The starlet hologram flickered for a moment before it disappeared and a section of the fountain’s base tilted up, revealing a projector, before a new hologram appeared above the fountain. It was a single unmoving image like a photograph of an old stallion with a wiry mane and a mouth encompassing beard in the same fashion. Again I felt like I’ve seen him before.

Suddenly a gruff voice began to speak. The voice sounded of experience, authority and intelligence and it seemed to be coming from the fountain and I then realised it was the stallion behind the image who was talking.

“Are you listening? Good. From now on, when I talk, Listen – and follow my instructions”

This was a voice you didn’t want to argue with, and it carried with it such weight that just made you keep your gob shut and listen. But it was also laced with a dark edge.

“Play stupid, play clever, make the mistake of saying ‘No?’ That collar around your neck’ll go off and take your head with it”

“Collar?” I shrieked and instinctively reached up with my cybernetic leg to feel at my neck and sure enough my metal hoof clashed with another metallic object around my neck. My bright red eyes widened as I felt around the object and it was indeed a slaver’s explosive collar. I’ve seen enough of the wretched things to know one when I felt one.

The voice continued, albeit in a calmer tone this time.

“It’s like that pipbuck in your leg, except filled with explosives. A little radio of the Old World, just needing some tuning.

Do as I say, and the collar won’t go off… refuse, try and run, disobey me? I’ll kill you and find somepony else,” the dark edge returned in the last sentence. “There’s no escape until I let you go. The sooner you accept your situation, the better”

Well I don’t have a fucking choice in this, do I with this contraption around my neck. I sighed knowing full well I had to do what he asks in the hope he keeps to his word in letting me go afterwards. I need to do this quickly then, for my babies need me.

“What do you want?” I asked with a defeated tone.

“That structure you see above the Fountain, the Sierra Maredre Casino… You need to break inside. A…” There was a pause as if he was trying to think of an appropriate word to continue. “Heist. Too many years in the making.

But to get inside, you’ll need to avoid its traps… you’ll need to gather the team. As I’ve found, one cannot do it alone”

Wait, the team? There are more here? This is sounding more dangerous by the second with the mention of traps.

“There are more ponies here, more ponies I’ll need to gather for this Heist?” I asked standing up and feeling oddly light but at the moment I didn’t think about it.

“Around the Villa are three other collars like yours, Collar 9, 13 and 15. Find all three and bring them back here to the Fountain. We’ll talk more then. And should you get any ideas about killing each other and taking the treasures of the Sierra Maredre for youself, a Warning: All your collars are linked… one of you dies, you ALL die. If that’s what it takes for you to co-operate, so be it”

The situation just got a whole lot worse.

“Why would you do that?” I cried out at him.

“Because in some respect, breaking into the Sierra Maredre is easier than breaking equine instinct. Greed.”

The Villa is filled with corpses. Some killed by the dangers here, some by me. Others… turned on each other.

Once they realised the Sierra Maredre could be theirs, they cared nothing for their freedom… their survival… or each other”

If I wasn’t already an albino I would have paled a few shades hearing that.

“This just keeps getting better and better” I thought sarcastically.

“So everypony is dead?” I asked.

“The ones brought here live on only in what they left behind, their marks, graffiti on the walls and the victims they’ve killed.

Some tried to help… left supplies and healing aids for others who came. Their reward? They were tracked down, killed by others with baser instincts.

Some of these murderers went as far as to leave traps behind them… turning markers for help into death traps for anypony following them.

It killed some of them when they forgot where the traps lay… or when they desperately needed the assistance they had cut others off from”

Dear Celestia, this place is gonna be more dangerous than any other place I’ve been to.

I felt a little anger rise in me as I asked my next question. “Just how many ponies did you bring here to die?” I growled.

“Too many. This place is dangerous… and its quarantine measures, its hazards… have claimed many. Failures upon failures” He replied in a casual tone which pissed me off more. The fact he didn’t care how many he was sending to their deaths was something that was really eating at me, but I didn’t voice my anger as he continued. “Do you think I wanted to place collars on you to ensure compliance? No… if robots could have done this, I would’ve sent them.

The Sierra Maredre is a complicated lock. Cracking it open requires equine hooves”

Quarantine measures? It was then that I realised why I was so light. I wasn’t wearing my power armour and all my weapons and ammunition was missing. I was stripped of everything I had when I entered the bunker and was now dressed in the same white jumpsuit. Oh dear Luna please tell me I’m not wearing the same one that corpse was in.

“Where is my armour and equipment?” I demanded, stomping my cybernetic hoof, cracking the ancient paving beneath it.

“The Sierra Maredre has many… defences, means of screening guests for illicit or dangerous items. Your arrival here, weaponless, was not my intention” He replied honestly.

“The Casino, this Villa… it takes anything with even a trace of radioactivity, traces of unknown substances… and returns it home. The Bunker.

The process is automated, and the Casino itself has other, similar “Services”. I was unable to find a work around, except to send others in as tools.

Still, I have not left you defenceless, and the Sierra Maredre’s security in some respects, can help you if you are resourceful enough”

I was about to ask what he meant by not being defenceless until I saw what looked to be a pump action rifle of sorts lying on the floor just in front of me. I sighed, knowing I would have to do as he asks if I wanted to have any chance to get home to my children and husband. So with my magic I picked up the rifle and held it before me as I looked back up at the hologram.

“All right. So I find the others wearing bomb collars and bring them back here?” I asked.

“I’ve downloaded the instructions and markers into your PipBuck in case you forget. And yes, I have access to that device in your leg.

Get the other three here, after that… I’ll have other instructions for you.

Do this, I’ll let you go. I’ll let all of you go”

I sighed again hopefully. “Ok, I guess that’s it for now. I’ll do as you ask and find the other ponies to bring them back here”

“Good. If necessary, I will guide you through the Villa’s broadcast systems, if you get lost, return here and I’ll direct you.

I’ve downloaded instructions on an audio log in your PipBuck in case you can’t read… If you forget why you are here, let my voice remind you” Once the last word was spoken his hologram faded away and was replaced with the original starlet hologram standing on the fountain.

I actually felt insulted with the “In case you can’t read” statement. The nerve of that bastard.

I checked the weapon over as I brought it close to me to inspect it. It was in piss poor condition, and to make matters worse it is also an energy weapon. I couldn’t even describe it since I’ve been trained in projectile weapons and never used energy based weapons before. But a plus about the weapon is that it has a scope, so it can be a medium and long range weapon. If anything it looked like it was made from an old grenade launcher as it has the loading port at the bottom for the ammunition it takes. Ranged weapons are my speciality thankfully.

Well, I find myself in another bad situation with certain death to look forward to if I screw up. At least this time I do not have a giant robot to deal with. Sighing dejectedly I began my new adventure in the Villa of the Sierra Maredre.

Chapter 2: The Cloud and the Ghost

Fallout Equestria: Broken Steel

Under the Red Cloud

Chapter 2: The Cloud and the Ghost

I sat down after my conversation with the hologram and groaned. What the fuck have I been dragged into this time? From the conversation I had with the old git over the hologram I seem to have been dragged here for a fucking robbery. I can’t believe I’ve been brought here to steal from this place. What can be so valuable in the casino that drives everypony to be greedy assholes willing to kill their own friends over? Gold? Technology? Nothing is worth that.

I let out a deep sigh. I have no choice but to do as he says since I have this thing around my neck. I can feel the worn cushion on the inside of the collar rubbing against my neck, a constant reminder that I’ve got no choice. Well I do, but the alternative isn’t worth thinking about. I have a family I need to get back to.

I looked down trying to see if I could see the collar but my eyes instead met the dirty white jumpsuit I have somehow been shoved in. I remembered the beheaded corpse back in the bunker and my skin began to crawl as this was the same kind of jumpsuit. I didn’t know if it was the same one but just wearing this made me feel dirty and horrible with the idea of wearing a dead pony’s outfit. In a fit of disgust I used my magic to grip the fabric of the suit and then pulled it with my magic in several different directions and was happily met with the satisfying sounds of the fabric tearing and the sensation of the cloth being torn away from my body. I sighed with relief as the cold air of the Maredre met my hide. Free of the horrible jumpsuit I looked around myself. On the floor next to me lay a pair of magical saddlebags which had fallen off me when I tore the suit off and just in front of me lay the weapon I was left with. Picking up both items with my magic I placed the saddlebags on my back and fastened them around my waist as I placed the weapon across my back. I lifted my cybernetic leg and opened my PipBuck compartment to view the device. I scrolled through each of the tabs in my equipment screen and sighed in frustration.

“Nothing, I have absolutely nothing,” I groaned. Indeed I have virtually nothing. The Weapon tab only had one item, which must be the rifle I was given. My PipBuck somehow labelling it the “Holorifle”. Whatever the fuck that means. The Apparel tab only had the slave bomb collar. which was unselectable, obviously. The Aid tab had nothing, so it seems I have no healing aids. Gonna have to scavenge around the Villa for meds. Oh wait… I opened a small compartment which houses my regeneration talisman. The compartment opened and I nearly screamed in frustration. My pink regeneration talisman was gone. Why, why the fuck would the Villa’s security system label it an illicit or dangerous item? It can’t be because it’s a zebra talisman can it? Fuck, never mind, can’t brood over this now, it’s done, nothing I can do about it. I looked back at my PipBuck to continue my evaluation of my current state. The Misc. tab was also empty. Finally I checked the ammo tab, which showed I had only twenty five Microfusion Cells [BULK]. Well at least I have a few rounds for the rifle but its still pretty much nothing. This is going to be rough.

Coming to grips with my situation I stood up and looked around. The Fountain was the dominant feature in this large open area of the Villa. This is obviously the entry point to the Villa and where most traffic would have gone through. The Villa must have looked nice when it was new. It had a nice brick base for all the arches I am seeing around the ground floor of most of the buildings around me, and white walls with red shingled roofs. The nice look of the place was spoiled by many patches of the plaster that have crumbled away from the white wall areas to reveal the bricks underneath, and plenty of roofing tiles have slipped and fallen from their places. The windows were mostly framed with old style wooden shutters that had been painted blue, but several of the shutters have either fallen off or were barely hanging on with one hinge. The constant darkness and deep red shade from the sky didn’t help to give the Villa an inviting look, it made it more dark and creepy. Taking another look around I see that there is a gate up in front of me which I believe will take me to the casino on the cliff, a street to my right, behind me the gate home and to my left another street. I lifted my PipBuck again and toggled to the world map screen. As the image of the Villa’s map appeared I found that I am in the dead centre of the Villa and that the locations of the streets and gates were lined up to be exactly North, South, East and West. The street going east would lead me to the gates for the “Residential District” and “Salida del Sol South”. The street to my left would lead me to the “Medical District”, “Puesta del Sol North” and the “Villa Police Station”. I also then become aware that I had a direction marker already pointing me to the police station for one of the ponies I’m suppose to find. I need to look around a little first, I can’t just head straight there as I don’t know what dangers could lurk the streets and I need some supplies. With that in mind I began to look around.

The basin of the Fountain was dry but is also littered with lots of gold, hexagonal objects. I used my magic to pick up one of these gold coinlike items and examined it. One side of the coin was decorated with the face of Celestia, and on the back it was decorated with a full body image of Celestia with her wings and forelegs outstretched, holding a banner that read “Begin Again”. On the left side of the engraving it had “Sierra” and on the right it had “Maredre” written. My EFS labelled the coin as a “Sierra Maredre Chip”. Of course, it’s a casino chip to be used in the casino itself. No, that can’t be right, if it was the chips wouldn’t be scattered about in a fountain like pennies for wishes. With the sheer number of the chips lying in the basin, they must also be the currency of this place, it’s the only explanation I can think of to explain why so many of them were scattered about like this. I climbed up and into the basin of the Fountain as I began to collect the chips. They might be useful to me. By the time I did a complete circuit of the Fountain I had picked up fifty three chips and thanks to the magical storing properties of my saddlebags I didn’t have a huge weight and bulge to slow me down or get in the way. Climbing down from the basin and back onto the floor facing the gate to the casino, I noticed something lying on the floor at the base of the Fountain. Picking it up with my magic I was surprised that I had found a very useful skill book. “Pugilism Illustrated”. I haven’t seen many of these books before, but I know from other ponies that they are very informative and have helped to teach lots of ponies how to do things. This particular book focuses on hoof to hoof combat, something I sorely lack experience in. I sat down and took a few minutes to quickly skim through the book. It’s a good thing this book is also illustrated, as the information would take ages to read but the pictures are like an idiot guide. With only skimming through it I’ve already picked up one or two things from the book which might turn out to be useful while I’m here. I stuck the book into my saddlebags for reading later and began my search.

Walking around the roundabout road and looking under the archways of the Villa, I came across lots of useless junk and a fair few items I could use. Such as: Drained Microfusion Cells, some packs of food, a couple bottles of purified water (I did find more bottles, but the water in them was contaminated), and a new weapon. I had picked up an odd looking knife. It looked like your mother’s large kitchen knife, the kind used to chop vegetables, but the entire thing was metal where the standard knife normally had like a wooden mouth grip. This knife is also ridiculously sharp. Even with the knife being dirty and has been exposed to the elements for two hundred years. I had accidentally scraped it along my cybernetic leg as I picked it up and it left a groove in the metal, which is why I say it’s ridiculously sharp.. I don’t have a clue what it’s made from, but my PipBuck has labelled it as a “Cosmic Knife”. A part of me thinks the knife is made from Starmetal, but I don’t know.

Another interesting thing I’ve found is graffiti on the walls, like what the old stallion had mentioned. One of them is on the arch over the gate to the casino which read “The Gala is the Key”, which I don’t understand, and the other one I saw is on the arch over the gate to the exit which was more of a warning, as it read: “Try to leave and BOOM!”, with the “BOOM” surrounded by a spiked speech bubble like those seen in comics when somepony is shouting. The longer I explore the more I dislike this place.

Under an arch towards the east road I found an odd looking device. It looked like some sort of TV, with the top half having a circular screen, but completely see through. The base was more like a large box with no buttons or anything to explain to me what it is. It did, however, have a small slot in the upper half of its base which had a small image of a chip on it. I suppose it takes the chips, but for what? Curious to find out what it is, I lifted my organic forehoof to the screen and gently poked it to see if I could interact with it. To my surprise, a table appeared on the screen showing my inventory on the left and inventory of the machine on the right. Above the right side table it was labelled “Vending Machine”, and its list of items backed that up. It had practically everything I could think of, and it also separated each item into categories to make it easier to find the items you are looking for. In one tab it had Pack of Cigarettes and Carton of Cigarettes but with [RETURN] beside them. I assume that means if I find said items I can exchange them for the number of chips it states, which are five chips for a pack and twenty for a carton. This vending machine has at least told me the other purpose to the chips and also that I can get supplies from them if I need them. It might not be that hopeless here after all.

I may have found a fair few supplies, but I am still without any healing aids, so I decided to explore a little down the east street. I followed the street for a minute or two until I came to a right turn. There is another fountain against the wall, this one more of a wall decoration but still with a floor basin and, inside it, more chips. After pocketing an extra six chips I looked up to see a lantern still working. Next to it was more graffiti but this one sounded like one of the ponies described to have lost all sense as it simply said “Maredre mine, Mine, MINE!”. I shook my head at the stupidity of the pony that wrote that and turned away to my left to see a set of arches with a tunnel leading to a small square courtyard.

Walking through the passage, I found that the square courtyard had a path going around it lined with arches, so ponies could walk around under the arches if the weather was bad. There is also a wooden balcony above me; it seems to start from the top right of the square upper wall and to the bottom left. I then became aware of a red marker, and quickly turned around to my right to see the hostile target. I waited for a moment since I couldn’t see it, but then a Radroach scurried out from behind an arch pillar. I sighed with relief that it wasn’t anything bad. I quickly took the Cosmic Knife off my flank and approached the insect. The large bug noticed me and began to scurry towards me. Before it could try to bite me, I swung the knife and effortlessly cleaved the bug in two. I was amazed with how easy it was. Damn this knife is sharp. Placing the knife back on my hip I continued to look around. As I approached the top left corner from where I came in, I noticed something wooden poking out from behind a pillar. Curious, I walked around. On the wall facing the pillar, I saw more graffiti, but this was just a heart with a black painted arrow pointing diagonally down. Following it made my heart flutter. Lying propped up against the pillar is a Brayning Automatic Rifle, BAR for short.

“Hearths Warming’s come early” I practically shouted in glee as I seized the huge heavy rifle with my magic. I revelled in the feel of the heavy weight. I love big rifles. I was lucky to have used one of these during my training back when I was a Pondale Ranger Initiate. The weapon is deadly powerful with it using .308 rounds and being a fully automatic weapon. This thing could stop a minotaur in its tracks. Despite its firepower and being automatic, the weapon was let down by having a wide spread. Its power and recoil made it a difficult weapon to control. It was best firing this weapon in a few round bursts to maintain accuracy. While I examined the large, long and heavy weapon my pipbuck was able to tell me the condition of the weapon and my glee at finding this rifle quickly faded to disappointment as the condition of the weapon is around eight percent. Its condition was so poor that it would likely disintegrate if I fired it. I opened my saddlebags and gently pushed the weapon inside to keep it for later. Once it was safely packed away I looked back to where I picked it up and found two small cardboard boxes of ammo lying on the floor. I smiled as I picked them up but again my smile faded as I read what the boxes contained.

“Twenty gauge shotgun shells?” I whined as I then pocketed them as well. “Ugh, first I find a kickass rifle which ends up being in shit condition, and then I find two boxes of ammo it can’t even use. What a load of bollocks.”

I grumbled to myself about my find as I walked over to an open door with a wall sign saying “Gift Shop” and walked inside. I had seen the door from the courtyard, and there was a blue light coming from within. When I looked up from my grumbling I nearly shat myself, because standing behind a counter looking at me stood a hologram. I stared at it for a while and it stared right back. After standing there for about five minutes I determined the hologram wasn’t going to do anything. The hologram looked to be a stallion in a business suit and he seemed to be looking at me expectantly, as if it was waiting for me to do something. I took another quick look around and it finally dawned on me. The hologram is a shop clerk. It must have a similar barter system to the vending machines, but how do I initiate transaction?

“Um, err, Hologram, initiate transaction” I ordered, half expecting it not to do anything.

“Transaction initiated” It stated emotionlessly and then a table similar to the one the vending machine displayed appeared in the air in front of it. However, unlike the vending machine, the hologram appeared to only accept Pre-War Money, aka Bits. Of course I didn’t have any Pre-War Money and even if I did, the condition of the old currency wouldn’t be accepted so these hologram merchants would be useless.

“Transaction cancel,” I groaned.

“Transaction cancelled, Have a nice day,” it said as the table disappeared and the hologram resumed its staring contest with the wall.

I rolled my eyes and began to search the shop. I frowned. It looked like the shop had already been ransacked by other ponies that have been brought here before, as there wasn’t much left on the shelves. Whatever was left was nothing but crap. While I trotted about the store however, I found a bunch more chips in a broken old freezer and picked them all up. After another quick look around I found the cash register on the floor behind the counter. Usually when I’m looking at something that’s owned or would result in bad karma, the object would be highlighted red by my EFS. But my EFS was showing the register in blue, meaning I could open it and takes its contents without any negativity. The hologram didn’t budge or look at me as I used my magic to open the register. Inside, I found two bundles of Pre-War Money in the form of paper banknotes, ten more chips which brings my total to eighty, and a holotape. I raised an eyebrow as I pocketed everything and pulled the holotape up to exam it.

“Return Code Holotape: Casual Wear” it is labelled as. I flipped it around to look at the back, where I found text on the bottom. “To be used with Villa and Maredre vending machines”. Oh yeah, the vending machine I saw earlier had return options for returning items. I smiled as I realised that if I could find more holotapes with these codes, I could maybe return more items for chips.

Another quick look around the shop told me there was nothing left to even bother with. At the back of the shop, I saw a set of stairs leading up to the first floor. I approached the stairs, and tucked away between the back far corner next to the stairs and a set of shelves, lay three suitcases. Two of the suitcases were empty, but the third just had a set of Pre-War Casual Wear. My EFS told me the old sundress I picked out of the suitcase somehow increased my Endurance and Agility by one point. How a dress like this can do that I don’t know, but at least this’ll be something to wear for the time being. I quickly removed my saddlebags and slipped into the cream coloured and butterfly decorated sundress and placed the saddlebags back on my back. Despite being two hundred years old, the dress actually felt really nice on my fur.

The first floor was barer than the ground floor. To the back of the room behind the stairs sat a kitchen area with a worktop, cooker and a fridge without a door. Along the wall opposite the stairs sat two sets of old shelves which had a few pieces of junk sitting on them and some cigs. Remembering what I saw on the vending machine, I pocketed the three packs and the one carton from the shelves. Along the wall facing the stairs was nothing but an old run down couch and a door that looked to be bulging, as if something was pressing hard against it. I could see rubble pushing out from the gaps so I assume the room beyond the door has had a cave in. The far wall had an open door that lead onto the balcony above the courtyard, and beside me at the top of the stairs is another door that was closed.

“I can go through the door to the balcony on the way back,” I thought as I then gripped the door handle with my magic and pushed it open. The door opened up onto another balcony and my eyes widened in surprise as what lay beyond the threshold entered my vision. Past the balcony I could see a swirling, thick, deep red cloud, and the smell of sulphur and the taste of copper was far, far more potent here. This must be a dense cloud of whatever is in the air here, and by the burning in my nose and throat it wouldn’t be a good idea to stick around. I was about to turn around to go the other way when I then noticed something glowing on the far side of the courtyard filled with the cloud.

I poked my head out of the door to have a look around outside. Up above the balcony is a roof that is largely intact and seems to be sheltering the balcony from the thick cloud. The balcony still had a guard rail in place until the far end which looked like somepony had barrelled through it. The hole in the rail is only a few feet from the back wall, and level with the balcony is a roof that at the bottom, met up with the balcony. The roof actually forms a pathway to the glowing thing on the other side.

“Hmm,” I thought aloud as I wondered if there are other low roofs like this one that can form pathways to other places. I stepped out onto the balcony and slowly trotted to the hole in the railing, and then onto the low roof. I climbed up the shallow roof so I was flush with the wall and looked over to the glowing thing on the opposite side and frowned.

“That horrible cloud is on the roof,” I groaned.

Looking up, I could see that there is a small overhang of a roof above that didn’t cover the roof to shelter it. I hugged the wall where the overhang did shelter and could see clearly to the other end and to what looked to be a small alcove. The glowing thing turned out to be a glowing horseshoe print with a red dot in the middle. Remembering the heart I saw on the wall in the last courtyard, I figured this could also be a marker with some supplies I could use, but I suspected a trap. The print is glowing and is indeed meant to attract attention to it, so it could be as much as a trap as it could be for help. I sighed. With no supplies to speak of as of yet, I decided to take the risk and began to run through the cloud over the shingled roof.

Almost immediately I began to feel queasy as I began to breathe in the thick cloud. I could feel my stomach start to churn and flip and almost threaten to send up whatever was still in my belly. My throat, lungs and nostrils felt like somepony had lit a fire in them and was also beating them with a rake, and my head began to swim. I could feel something like a horrible migraine coming on as I ran through the cloud and not only did my vision also began to blur with how my eyes were burning and watering so badly, my head felt like somepony was putting it in a vice and tightening it. Everything I could feel was getting gradually worse the longer I was in the cloud, and I was even starting to become unbalanced on my hooves. I could feel myself starting to sway as I ran, but thankfully before anything got really bad I came to the alcove, and discovered that it had a recessed roof, causing my hoof to slip on the lip of the wall and I face planted into the alcove. I didn’t move my face from the floor of the roof as I wheezed and panted, coughing every now and then as recovered from my ordeal in the cloud. I was so grateful to be out of it.

XXXXX

I bolted upright with a start and looked around as I regained consciousness. I’m still on the flat roof in the recess in the upper wall of the cloud filled courtyard. I looked worriedly at the cloud as I couldn’t remember losing consciousness.

“How long was I out?” I shakily asked myself as I stood up and looked up at the thick cloud cover. Eventually I saw a little break in the clouds, and there were twinkling dots in the red sky. “Oh shit,” I cried, “it’s night!” I quickly brought up my PipBuck and checked to see exactly what the time is. As the screen flicked to my status tab, I caught the time in the top corner and gasped. The time read thirteen minutes past eight. I’ve been out for almost six hours. Realising how late it is and that the sun would have set by now, I looked around again in bewilderment, as everything looked the same. It hasn’t darkened at all. Wow, this cloud must be so thick that it blots out the sun.

Recovering from my shocking realization that I was out cold for so long, I looked around again at the recess now that I wasn’t panicking. Thankfully there aren’t any traps lying around, but there are some things that made me smile. First is a suitcase standing up against the wall. I trotted up to it and sat down as I used my magic to open the case. I was pleasantly surprised with the contents. Inside I found a Colt Police Pistol, a small short barrelled six shot .357 Magnum revolver with a filed down hammer and mouth grip, a small plastic bag of .357 Magnum rounds, with my PipBuck somehow being able to tell me that it held thirty six rounds even though I haven’t even opened the bag. I found a hoof full of Microfusion Cells, a few miscellaneous items which would be worthless to me, and thankfully four healing potions which, according to my EFS’s health meter, at least, I needed them badly as I was down to just under a third of my health. Damn, just what is in that cloud? I drank the potions one by one and sighed with relief as I felt myself getting better. The headache and most of the burning in my throat and lungs fading away, I was back in the state I was in before I went through the cloud.

My medical skill isn’t very high so it takes every one of the four potions to bring me back to full health. I seriously need to talk to Sky Fire about some lessons. Without my regeneration talisman I’m quite vulnerable. I forgot how fragile a pony’s body really is from ten years of having that thing keeping me healthy.

After taking what I could use from the suitcase. My PipBuck had labelled the case as “Dean’s Stash,” which I found a little odd, wondering who this Dean is and how the PipBuck knew about him, but shrugged it off. I found three bottles of alcohol and another bottle of something I didn’t recognize. My PipBuck labelled the unknown bottle as a “Sierra Maredre Martini”. I decided to pocket it for its healing properties that my PipBuck said it had, but left the rest. I don’t drink.

Next to the alcohol sat a box that made me sigh with relief. A familiar yellow and pink cross with butterflies, a Fluttershy medical kit. I opened the box and smiled brighter. It was full. I picked out three more healing potions, a single super healing potion, four Rad-Aways, one Rad-X and five bobby pins. This’ll hopefully see me through the cloud again with the super healing potion remaining.

Lastly, nestled in a corner is something that had me smiling again, another BAR. I hefted the twenty pound rifle over to me and examined it. My first impression is that the weapon looks to be in better condition than the last one. I performed the necessary checks and the weapon seemed to perform smoothly. My PipBuck displayed the BAR as around eighty percent, which is just what I wanted to see. My mood now a little higher, I took out the other BAR and used my repair spell to increase the condition of the one I just found. Once the spell was complete I now had one BAR now just over ninety percent. I put the Holorifle into my saddlebags and placed the BAR on my back. It felt good to be carrying a huge heavy rifle again. My mood got even better when I also noticed the three boxes of ammo that had been hidden behind the BAR when I picked it up. I picked up the three boxes and smiled in delight. Three full boxes of .308 means I’ve now got seventy two rounds for this BAR. Oh thank Celestia.

Once I packed away everything I needed I looked back to the cloud and sighed. I have to go back through it to get out of here. At least now I know to avoid the fucking thing if I run into it again elsewhere in the Villa. I gulped nervously as I looked at the thick swirling cloud of death before taking a deep breath and bolting through. Even though I galloped as fast as I could, I still came out suffering nearly as much damage as before, but since I’ve experienced it once already I knew what to expect and thankfully didn’t collapse when I made it to the relative safety of the living room above the gift shop. I took a moment to rest and drink another two healing potions before I set off again.

The balcony in the clear courtyard led me to another apartment room with a kitchen and a double bed with a nightstand. The nightstand contained a pair of sunglasses which I slipped on as my PipBuck said increased my perception, and six more chips. The room had a door opposite the one I entered which lead onto another balcony into the main street above the passage I used to get into the courtyard. The balcony had some more chips lying around on it, which I took, and a metal box that was locked. The lock looked complicated and with only five bobby pins, I decided to leave it alone. Now that I have some supplies, I might as well head to the Police Station.

XXXXX

The walk from the Fountain down the west street led me to a fork in the road, and to a set of gates that would take me to “Puesta del Sol”. I was scared shitless as I got close to the gate, as out of nowhere that old bastard uses a nearby speaker and shouted “Don’t go through the gate to Puesta del Sol yet, gather the others first!” With the threat of my head going pop if I continued, I turned around and went the other way. Along the way I picked up more chips and explored an open apartment, which had an upstairs with a balcony. The balcony had three boards going across it to a neighbouring balcony, and in the room on the other side I found a gun locker with a Magical Laser Pistol and thirty two Energy Cells for it. Jumping down from the balcony, I found more graffiti, but this one was different. It was scratched into the wall and looked like the letters were backwards, but I could tell what it said. It read “Find me and we can talk”. I didn’t get what it meant, so I ignored it and made my way up the stairs.

The stairs opened up to a large open area. I could see a little recess in the wall to my left, to my right more stairs, and ahead more arches. Nestled between the stairs and the arches is another small fountain, but I could see the blacken bones of a pony from behind the stairs with a wooden pole sticking up from it. I walked to the recess and found yet another fountain, this one filled with chips and tucked away into a corner is a bottle of whiskey that I left alone after pocketed the chips. As I walked over the arches I stopped and swivelled my ears around as I could hear something. I closed my eyes and strained my ears, and over the rumble of thunder and the constant howling noise, I could now pick up periodic chimes, as if somepony is ringing a bell. This place just keeps getting weirder and weirder.

As I approached the arches, I noticed another one of those glowing hoof prints. I smiled, remembering what the last one gave me as I cantered under the arch and found the suitcase up against the brickwork pillar along with a double barrelled Caravan Shotgun.

“FINALLY!” I yelled to myself when my eyes fell upon the shotgun, “something to use those damned shotgun shells with!” I was also glad to find another box of shells to go with it. I have plenty of twenty gauge shells now, but unfortunately the Caravan Shotgun is a pretty weak weapon. I pocketed the shotgun and ammo and moved onto the suitcase, my EFS confirming it to be another “Dean’s Stash”. Smiling, I used my colourless magic to pry open the worn suitcase and gazed at its contents. This one was actually disappointing. It was filled with more junk than anything else but I did manage to pull out a few more Microfusion Cells and another Cosmic Knife. Sighing with disappointment with the stash, I pocketed the cells and used my repair spell to combine the two knives to make the high quality one better.

Shaking my head from the find I turned to the other fountain nestled between the wall and the stairs. I gasped when I saw the skeleton up close. The pole I saw earlier turned out to be a makeshift spear that was made from a broom handle and four of those Cosmic Knives strapped to one end. I cringed as I looked at how the skeleton is posed. It looks like the pony was reaching for a pair of Purified Water bottles that are just a few inches from its hooves, and with how spear is angled it looks like somepony quite literally stabbed this pony in the back. The blades of the knifes had cut right through the pony’s ribs and embedded themselves into the floor. That old stallion isn’t full of shit after all. I hope none of these ponies I’m supposed to gather have the same idea about stabbing me in the back.

I decided to leave the spear where it is in respect of the dead as well as leaving the water the pony had been reaching for. I didn’t feel right taking something this pony died trying to get. I did, however, pocket the chips I found in the fountain. Once I picked up the last chip, I turned to the stairs and began to climb them. As I neared the top of the flight of stairs, I slowed right down as I noticed a red marker on my EFS and then suddenly my broadcaster crackled to life.

“Watch out for the Villa inhabitants, they’re… difficult to kill unless you chop them apart… if you can, blow them up or disintegrate them”

I yipped out in surprised and then quickly hugged the stairs to hide myself from sight in case that hostile heard my cry.

“Celestia damn it,” I silently said to myself, “does he have to do that? He scared me half to death”

I began to hear what sounded like a broken rebreather and the clip clop of hooves. Curious to what the old git meant by “Villa Inhabitants”, I slowly crept up the stairs so I could see over the top step. I raised an eyebrow as the “Villa Inhabitant” turned out to be a pony wearing a hazmat suit, but it did give off a creepy and dark vibe. The pony walked in a strange manner, almost as if it was drunk. The worn dark brown suit covered the entire pony, even its head was covered up by a breathing mask with glowing green eye lenses. I shivered, hearing the rebreather and when I saw a green puff of gas come out of the mask. The hazmat wearing pony stopped facing me, crouched down and then levitated out a Knife Spear like the one in the skeleton and seemed to prod the ground with it. I found it odd that it was doing that, as there was no horn sticking out of the creature’s head to suggest it was capable of magic. Ok, this thing is weird. Seeing as this thing is a hostile I assume I’ll have to take it out in order to get past it.

I slowly pulled my BAR off my back and hefted the gun up. I looked through the square window to the semi-circle sight at the end of the barrel and sighted up the creature’s head while it was busy poking the floor with the spear. I slowly raised myself to full height and placed my legs to brace myself, took a deep breath, and then pulled the trigger with my magic. I fired off a burst of two rounds at the creature. Oh yea, this thing packs a punch with how hard it hit back into my shoulder with the recoil. My first round went wide but the second struck the creature’s head, but was deflected by the breathing mask and into the hood of the hazmat suit pulling it down. Shit, it saw me now. It let out a weird croaking growl as it then jumped to the right. The way it jumped, it was facing me but seemed to jerk about as it was in the air before it landed. What the hell is this thing? I quickly slipped into SATS to get an aim assisted shot but silently groaned in frustration as it gave me a twenty four percent chance of hitting its head. I suppose it’s only right with the BAR’s wide spread. I came out of SATS only to see the spear flying at my face. “OH SHIT” I cried and quickly dropped to my stomach. The spear flew over my head and embedded itself in the floor behind me somewhere. The creature jumped again. While it was airborne, I sprinted to a nearby arch to take cover. While I hid in cover I heard a clang. Coming out to take a shot I saw another spear embedded in the brick. Dear Luna what the fuck are those Cosmic Knives made of? I lifted the rifle and fired another two rounds as the creature was busy magically pulling another spear out of Celestia knows where. The two rounds went wide of the creature’s head. Shit! The creature flung its third spear at me as I tried to get back under cover, but this time I wasn’t quick enough, and one of the flour blades sliced through the fabric of my dress and my shoulder before impacting with the wall. I cried out in pain as the knife had cleanly cut through my dress and a good inch into my shoulder, the wound now oozing blood freely and dirtying my dress. Damn, those things are sharp. I quickly jumped out of cover and closer to the creature while it was busy pulling out another damn spear and fired off two more rounds at close range. The two rounds impacted the creature’s head, both boring into its head with a spurt of greenish blood and the creature doubled over and collapsed to the floor. About time it went down.

I turned away from the body and approached another large fountain like the one back in the centre of the Villa. I smiled as I found that like the others, it was full of chips. I heard a strange sound behind me that sounded like something gasping for breath. My smile turned into a frown as I slowly turned around, then gaping in disbelief as the supposedly dead creature seemed to raise itself into the air like it was being levitated with is back arched, before it seemed to unnaturally bend over so it hooves landed back on the floor, fully revived.

“WHAT THE FUCK?” I cried out in shock at what I just saw, the dead coming back to fucking life.

I didn’t want that damn thing to throw anymore of those spears, so I quickly ran up to it before it could react and smashed it in the face with the butt of the BAR. As it staggered away I slipped into SATS at practically point blank range. I toggled as many action points as I could into my shots,, making sure I targeted its head, thankfully having a ninety five percent chance at hitting it. When I came out of the spell and time resumed I fired out three bursts of two rounds each into the head of the creature. All six powerful .308 rounds slammed into the creature’s head and I was rewarded with the abomination’s head exploding in green blood and its body falling to the floor again. I panted with adrenaline running through my system as I stood over the body with the BAR pointing at it, waiting to see if it would get up again. Thankfully, nothing else happened. Fuck, that stallion was right. I put two rounds into its head and it got back up as if nothing happened. It took me putting six rounds at point blank range into its skull to kill the bastard. I groaned with frustration as I checked my ammo count in my current clip.

“Eight left, fuck, I wasted twelve rounds to kill that thing” Suddenly, the seventy two rounds I found for the BAR didn’t seem like all that much now. “I hope there aren’t too many of these things. Just what the fuck is it anyway?”

Looking down at the corpse, I was again surprised to find that my EFS was able to give this thing a name. It called the creature a “Ghost Harvester”. Ghost Harvester, just what the fuck is that supposed to mean?

Sighing with frustration at the encounter I turned back to the fountain and resumed my scavenging, picking up all the chips, bringing my total to over a hundred and fifty. In front of the fountain are two arches leading into another open area. Along the wall to my left, a monitor sat next to a set of stairs leading up to another street. On the wall next to the stairs and between the terminal was more of that backward lettered, scratched out graffiti. This one read: “The Casino is the Old Stallion’s collar”. What the fuck is the deal with these cryptic messages?

I trotted up the stairs and followed the street to an open door, which led into another apartment that sat next to a set of stairs going down into the plaza outside the Police Station. I looked up and noticed another set of three boards leading to a balcony. “There must be something up there for somepony to have made a makeshift bridge,” I thought to myself as I then entered the apartment. BAD IDEA!

It wasn’t until I was starting to climb the stairs that I realised the room was full of that red cloud. I didn’t see it at first because the room was so dark, and with the element of danger I started to run, barrelling up the stairs and sprinting for the hole in the wall. I crashed through a music stand and a guitar as I flopped onto the wooden bridge, coughing my guts out from the cloud. Goddesses, if this collar doesn’t kill me, this place surely will. Thankfully I wasn’t in the cloud as long as before and only suffered minimal damage, but it still had my health down to below fifty percent. I pulled out my last healing potion and downed it like a shot. I sighed with some relief as I felt it work its magic. Once I felt that it was finished, I stood up and looked back to the music stand and guitar. I picked up a magazine that I had knocked off the music stand and found it to be a mag on explosives. Weird item to have in a holiday resort, nevertheless on a music stand. I pocketed it and also stuffed the guitar into my saddlebags. What? It could be worth something back home.

Turning around, I looked to the balcony the planks led to and found that at the end of it, there were two metal ammo boxes and a medical kit. I trotted up to the boxes and opened them all, taking their contents. The first ammo box contained fourteen .357 magnum rounds, the other contained five frag-grenades which could be useful if I ran into another one of those Ghost Ponies. In the medical box I found two more healing potions and two more bobby pins. Not a bad haul from nearly killing myself in that cloud filled room. I’ve got to be more careful here.

I lowered myself down from the balcony and trotted down the stairs until I stood in the plaza outside the Police Station. I could clearly hear the bell ringing now. It was coming from the Police Station, almost like a beacon. In the large open space I saw another large fountain and a passage to the right of the Police Station. Surprisingly there aren’t any hostiles in the area, but I didn’t want to hang around with that bell ringing. Instead of going directly to the front door of the Police Station, I made my way to the passage, ignoring the chip filled fountain. I can pick them up on the way back after I find the pony with the collar.

The passage led to another square courtyard, but before I entered into it, I noticed a taught wire going across the exit, an obvious trip-wire trap. I cautiously approached the wire, and with my magic, carefully cut it to disarm it. I exhaled softly with relief as the wire fell away and looked around to find what the trap would have triggered. I cringed as I saw two chains bolted to the ceiling above me, both connected to a large metal girder. Memories of the girder that slammed into my chest and caused my wings to sprout out of me from the taint I consumed flashed in my head. I shivered at the memory, remembering how painful it was. Looking to my right from where the girder would have likely hit me if I triggered the trap I found two bear-traps where I would have likely have landed and I gaped at the position. It looked like one would have clamped on my mid-section and the other would have closed on my head. Damn, somepony really thought out this trap.

The courtyard had two doors I could see and a path leading to the back of the Police Station. I walked into the middle of the courtyard and became aware of a hostile marker on my EFS. I braced myself for another Ghost Pony but thankfully a Radroach scurried out from behind an arch pillar. I simply stamped my cybernetic hoof on the bug. The door to my right opened up into a cloud filled store, so I simply stayed away from it. The door facing the way I came opened up into another apartment. The ground floor was pretty much bare, so I headed up the flight of stairs at the back of the room to the first floor. The first floor was pretty bare too, but something caught my eye. Past a table and a metal locker, I saw a bookshelf which was empty apart from said something. I trotted up to the shelf and pulled out a bundle that had been folded up and smiled as it unravelled into a set of security armour. The armour looked identical to the Stable Security Armour I remember my stable’s security force wearing but where the Stable Armour was blue, this armour was brownish yellow. I smiled as I slipped out of the dress and then slipped into the armour. My legs weren’t protected by the armour, but thankfully the torso had ceramic plates sewn into an armoured vest. The boots I now wore on my legs, minus my cybernetic leg, also had steel hoofcaps, which would make kicking somepony a viable compat option. I lost the endurance and agility boost the dress gave me but didn’t care as this suit of armour, which thankfully was in good condition, gave me a decent damage threshold of fifteen. I felt better now that I had something that could offer me at least some decent protection from attack now.

I exited the apartment and proceeded down the path to the back of the Police Station. I had to dispatch another roach with my Cosmic Knife and found three metal boxes, one of which was locked with a pretty easy lock and another fountain. The boxes offered me nothing but a couple of chips and Drained Microfusion Cells, and the fountain had a few more chips. I’m going to be one rich mare with the rate I’m finding these chips. After taking what I could, I turned to the door at the end of the passage and tried the handle. It didn’t budge so I assumed it was locked. Using one of the bobby pins I picked the lock, which thankfully was also quite easy, and then opened the door to the Police Station, where I should find Collar 9.

Chapter 3: God is Everywhere

Fallout Equestria: Broken Steel

Under the Red Cloud

Chapter 3: God is Everywhere

I closed the back door to the Police Station and found myself in what looks to be the staff cafeteria. The room I find myself in is pretty large. It contains two large tables that look big enough to hold up to ten ponies each, and a long set of counters that form an L shape in the top right corner of the room, stretching down about halfway across the top end wall. Beside the counters on the right side wall sit three fridges which looked like somepony had wrenched the doors clean off, as two were missing, and the other is lying face up on the floor. The counters were littered with cutting boards, knives, coffee machines and other kitchen appliances. Against the far wall next to the counters sits a vending machine for Sunset Shimmer Sarsaparilla. Sunset Shimmer? I thought she owned a loan company. I suppose she owned more than that, she was a business mare after all. Shame the machine is dead; I could do with a nice soft drink right now. Ugh, oh well.

I took another quick look around to be sure I didn’t miss anything, spotting the yellow medical box on the wall next to the entryway to the Police Station main lobby. I trot up to the box and use my magic to open it. Inside I find a hoofful of medical stuff, a couple of healing potions, a syringe of Med-X and three bobby pins. While I put the medical stuff in my bags I became aware of a beeping sound. I realized my collar is vibrating and beeping, getting faster and faster. My eyes widened in realization and I dove backwards. My rump crashed into the counters in my haste to get back from whatever it is that’s causing my collar to go haywire, followed by a piercing pain in my flank. I yelped and grit my teeth to prevent myself from screaming in pain.

My broadcaster crackled to life again, and I heard the old stallion’s voice drift up to me.

“Speakers and radios interfere with the bomb collar frequency, and can set off the detonators…prematurely.

“It is an unfortunate side effect, one I did not anticipate. I was unable to calibrate the collars to block the signals – so you’ll have to make do.”

“YOU WHAT?” I screamed at the PipBuck on my leg as I heard his warning about the radios and speakers. I couldn’t believe this. I could have walked into the room and died because he didn’t tell me sooner. “You could have warned me about this shit earlier,” I groaned to myself loudly and winced as the pain in my flank spread down my right hind leg and up my back. Oh, fuck, I should have asked more damn questions when I had the chance. I shook my head at my own thoughtlessness and then looked back to my flank as I feel a familiar trickle of warm liquid running down my leg. I cringed when I saw the Cosmic Knife sticking out my flank. I gripped the knife with my magic, took a couple of deep breaths and then yanked the knife out of my flank, screaming in agony as the blade was wrenched free. The blade had sunk three inches into my flesh. How sharp are these knives? I threw the knife away from me and watch as it impales itself in the wall just as deeply as it did my flank. I swear these knives are gonna be the death of me.

I sigh deeply as I drink a healing potion to heal the gash in my flank. I cautiously approach the large opening. I could feel my collar start to vibrate and beep again, and I step back until it stops. I am still in the cafeteria but I can at least see most of the main floor. In front of me I see a large detention cell that happens to contain a prisoner, who is rocking back and forth on the floor. From where I’m standing, I can’t tell what or who it is, but he or she is definitely large. I can see one desk to the left of the cell door, where a Ham Radio rests on the floor, underneath the desk. Against the bars of the cell on the other side towards an open door sat two more desks , one of which has another radio sitting on it and on the other, a terminal. I can see into the reception area of the main floor and the front door. Behind a partition wall there’s a table with a large coffee machine sitting on it along with those mugs that no matter how shitty everything is will always remain clean, stacked next to it along with lots of chairs against the far wall. I can see two radio sets which, from the light I can see from the one on the floor are telling me that they are on so they could be a source for the inference so turning them off should help.

I reach out with my magic to grab the first radio, but I find myself unable to do so. I try another two times but can’t get a hold of it at all, like it was being magically protected. I close my eyes in concentration as I begin to cast the “Aura Scanner” spell that was taught to me by a powerful magic user in New Ponyville. It allows the user to be able to see magic. When I open my eyes they are glowing white with magic, but my vision was black. I quickly look around and find that I can see the outlines of the objects in the room.Anything with a trace of magic has a shimmering bubble around it. The creature in the cell had a huge bubble, implying it has lots of magic and the radio sets I can see also had a strong bubble around them. Focusing on the sets I was able to see the spell matrix around them and discovered they are protected by a barrier, likely made to prevent anypony else from using magic on them. I cancelled the spell and shook my head as my normal vision returned. Looks like I’ll have to turn these radios off manually. “This is gonna be fun” I thought sarcastically.

I looked around again before I set my gaze onto the desk with the radio underneath it. If I run I should be able to turn the radio off and retreat back into cafeteria before my head pops. I brace my legs and gallop into the Police Station proper, running up to the radio on the desk. I skidded on the dirty tiled floor and slid right into the desk, smacking my chin on the top of it.

“Ow, cock! I bit my tongue,” I whined painfully as I gently rubbed my sore tongue on the roof of my mouth. My collar had started to beep as soon as I had entered the main room and now it began beeping faster and faster. I quickly crouch down and reach under the desk, turning the knob anti-clockwise with my hoof until the light on the radio went dark to signal that it had turned off. Unfortunately for me, my collar is still beeping and I quickly pushed off the desk and used my large wings to give me a boost to get me back into the cafeteria just as the beeps became a near constant tone.

I panted with relief as the collar stopped its beeping. I guess I know when I’m about to pop with how fast the beeping goes. I suppose when the beeps reach that near constant tone the collar would explode at any moment. It certainly felt like it with how badly it was vibrating. Okay, one down. I close my eyes again and cast the same scanner spell as before, focusing on the radio sitting on the desk around the corner of the cell. As I focused, I noticed another bubble behind a partition wall just outside the cafeteria. There’s another radio? Cock, just how many are there?

I cancel the spell and look to the radio on the desk again, “hmm, I can run to that one first and turn it off and then turn the other off before my head pops,” I thought out loud. I look back at my wings and give them a shake. At least these can help by giving me a boost. I pushed off with my legs and beat my wings as I rushed over to the desk, and like last time I slid on the dirty floor and crashed into the desk. Groaning in pain from the crash I quickly turn off the radio and gallop over to the desk sitting behind the partition and a steel door. Another Ham Radio sits atop the desk. I grabbed the dial with my hoof and turned it off, thankfully causing my collar to stop beeping.

“Oh thank the goddesses,” I sighed in relief as I wasn’t in any more danger for the time being.

The desk also has a terminal sitting on it with its screen flickering. I sit in the seat and tap a key with my hoof, waking up the ancient device. The screen flickered over to the login screen and I let out a groan of annoyance as the screen was full of words. This terminal’s gonna be a hard nut to crack. I examine the terminal to get a sense of what it’s for and noticed the words “Contraband Locker” in the top corner. I look up to see the door and smiled. I might find some goodies behind that door. Looking back at the screen my smile faded as I looked at the wall of text. Ugh, ok, um, err, you. I selected a password at random; “Intimidation”. To my surprise, the computer beeped and let me in, what luck, the screen switched to give me a report which I didn’t read and an option to open the locker. I smile happily with my lucky guess and click the option. A dull thunk was heard from the door as its lock was released.

The locker is small, probably a three foot by six in size. Both sides are lined with two sets of metal shelving which hold a few boxes and other items. As I look at the shelves I see some Med-X, Buckout, and Rad-Away. The boxes are empty and I find a magazine on explosives lying on the floor. On the other side I find a holotape that will let me purchase .357 Magnum rounds for the vending machines outside in the Villa, which is a wonderful find as it means I can now buy ammo with these chips. My biggest surprise in this room came when I found another BAR. I grab the gun and inspect it. To my surprise, this BAR is also in decent condition so I shove it into my saddlebags. Wow, three BARs found in the space of a couple of hours, but, also odd. The BAR is a very old rifle. I mean sure it appeared around the start of the Great War but with so many newer and better weapons that were created after it, they were discontinued and many were recycled. I’ve never seen a BAR outside of the Ranger Base I grew up in, which told me how rare this gun is in Equestria, but here I am at the Sierra Maredre and I’ve found three of them. I wonder if they were a standard for the police force here.

Leaving the locker, I stand in the reception area looking at the cell with the creature rocking back and forth still. Now, without the strange noise coming from the radios, I can hear it muttering to itself. The voice was deep but feminine and seemed to be repeating itself. I could hear it saying “please turn the noise off”, “so hungry” and “master, please let me go”. I walk up to the bars of the cell and look inside. Being this close now the light shining down on the creature wasn’t making it hard to make out what it is. I gasp when I see just what sits inside. An alicorn, a fucking purple alicorn. She was just sitting in the middle of the cell, rocking back and forth and muttering to herself like a lost and scared child. From where I stand she has her back to me, but I can see that she is heavily scarred and I could see a bear-trap wrapped around her left forehoof. This struck me as one of the most bizarre things I’ve ever seen. I soon noticed that the direction marker is actually pointing to this alicorn, meaning the pony I’m looking for is right there in front of me.

“Um, excuse me?” I called out to her but my call might as well have fallen on deaf ears as she didn’t make any sign of hearing me or took any notice

Well that didn’t work. The old stallion’s audio log came to mind after a brief moment of wondering what to do as he might have some info that he didn’t tell me at the fountain. With nothing better to do to get this alicorn’s attention I open up my leg, access my pipbuck’s notes tab, and selected the tape “Elijah’s Instructions”. The tape played and filled the Police Station with his deep commanding voice but the tape was basically everything he told me at the fountain but simplified and shortened. I groan at the waste of time. To my surprise the alicorn stands up and turns around to face me.

She is very scarred indeed. She has several on her face and many on her chest and forelegs. It looks like somepony carved their name in her chest or something as she has scarring that spell out the word “GOD”. Her right eye is just white and a deep scar can be seen cutting across it. Her mane looks to have been cut short and is extremely messy, same with her tail. She wears a relieved look on her face as she faced me and then spoke.

“Mater?” She asked expectantly but when she sees me her face twists into a confused and upset look. “No, not Mater,” she said quietly, almost foalishly, as she turns back around and sits down again to resumed her rocking.

“Well that was sure interesting,” I muttered to myself.

I trot around to the cell door and find it to be locked. Well duh. I examined the lock but it would be impossible to pick. As I shake my head in annoyance, I can hear the strange noise that the radios now give off with their decayed speakers which thankfully alerts me to another radio somewhere nearby. I’ll deal with it when I come to it.

I walk back around to the lobby and see an open doorway between the cell and partition wall next to the coffee table. Above the door is a sign which reads: “Restrooms, Locker Room, Equipment Room”. If I’m going to find the key to the cell it would likely by in the locker room.

The doorway opens into a short corridor with four doors lining the wall facing me. To my right is the mare’s restroom and to my left I can see the locker room, the equipment room and, at the end, the colt’s restroom. All four of them had open doors which told me somepony might already have been through them but I migh as well check them out anyway. I start with the mare’s restroom, inside sits a single toilet, and sitting in the cistern is another glowing hoofprint on the wall, indicating another Dean’s Stash. I smile as I open the briefcase and find that inside it holds some goodies. I pick out another Police Pistol which I use to repair the other one with my repair spell. I also find a good number of .357 Magnum rounds, thirty seven according to my PipBuck. I also pick up twenty standard Microfusion Cells, along with some miscellaneous stuff like food and also five healing potions. Not a bad haul. Turning around I catch sight of a medical box behind the open door. Inside I picked up another four healing potions, a few Med-X, a Rad-Away and a couple of bobby pins. Well, this is great; I have plenty of meds now. Smiling happily with my find I walk into the locker room.

The locker room is lined with lockers on the walls, a desk against one wall with a terminal and a large bench in the middle. I walk along the lockers, opening them one by one and taking what was inside. I came out with three lots of C4 but unfortunately no detonator, several suits of armour which I used to repair my current suit, keeping a couple for later on, and several more Police Pistols with at least a hundred rounds. I guess I’m not gonna be hurting for .357 rounds, but I doubt a Police Pistol will be able to inflect much damage on those Ghost Ponies.

The equipment room was sadly empty apart from a couple of useless items, save for the main attraction of the room, the Reloading Bench at the back. I can use that later on for making ammo. Lastly I check the colt’s restroom. Like the equipment room it is empty. I was about to leave when I noticed a holotape on the floor. I picked it up and a smile spread across my face with glee. It was a vending machine code to unlock .308 rifle rounds. Oh fuck yea. I am so gonna splash out on .308 rounds when I find another vending machine.

I haven’t been in much of a good mood since I got here but after all the good shit I found so far in the Police Station I was genuinely smiling. Sadly I didn’t find a key so I would have to keep looking. I walk around the detention cell and into the back portion of the station. After entering the area my collar starts to beep again and I quickly notice the same exotic looking radio from the bunker sitting on a desk. I quickly run up to it and turn it off, and the collar went cold again. No longer in danger of my collar going off I look around. This must be the prison area as I can see three holding cells. The middle one had a horrible sight. I could see a skeleton on the floor behind a barred door with one of its legs outstretched trying to reach two bottles of purified water. Some sadistic asshole had on purposely left those there just out of reach. Elijah was right… “NOW I KNOW WHERE I SEEN HIM BEFORE.” I mentally screamed as it finally clicked in my head. I had heard about him during my time in the Steel Rangers, he was like the first Scribe ever to be made an Elder. I also heard that he became unstable and at some point went rogue. Great, I have an insane Elder holding my leash.

I quickly looked through the cells, desk and filing cabinets in the back and found several chips, a vending machine code for Weapon Repair Kit(s), which I found sitting on the top of a filing cabinet, and a pair of twenty gauge shotgun shell boxes containing twenty shells each.

I scratched the back of my head as I wondered what I should do now. How can I get that pony out of the cell if I can’t find the key? I grumbled to myself in annoyance as I began to head back to the front of the station until I then saw some stairs leading down. I might as well. I descended the stairs and came to a blue door.

I stepped into a hallway that resembled the typical underground concrete and steel. As my eyes adjusted to the gloom of the dimly lit basement I found myself looking at more of that scratched graffiti facing the door. It was as if it was purposely placed there for whoever came in to see it. I raised an eyebrow in confusion as this was just as cryptic as the others. It read “God is everywhere”. What the fuck is that supposed to mean?

I walked up to the wall and turned around as it’s a corner and then I heard a voice begin to talk. I let out a scream of fright as I wasn’t expecting it. I winced with slight pain as one of my wings slammed into the concrete wall as the voice spoke. It sounded similar to the voice from the alicorn but more refined and deeper.

”Knew you would come, below the cage… down to where I am. Maybe you saw the letters I scratched on the Villa walls.

“A little further. Follow my voice… The one in the cage? Dog. I had to lock her up. She keeps… disobeying me.”

The voice then stopped. What the fuck was that? So, the alicorn upstairs in the cell is called “Dog”? And this voice, it’s not Elijah so what does it mean by it saying she keeps disobeying? Okay, I’m confused.

After I turn the corner I come to a security door just like the one I went through before entering the bunker, which opened up into a small room. The room contained little, mainly huge crates and a desk with a terminal. I enter the room and my collar starts to beep again. “Shit,” I cried out before quickly jumping back. From the safety of the doorway I look around again the best I can. I can’t see anything at all that would suggest a radio or speaker. It might be behind the crates. I ran around the crates but found nothing but another door, and with my collar beeping I didn’t have time to think and quickly ran through the door, which thankfully caused my collar to stop beeping. The corridor I find myself in goes on for a few feet before making a ninety degree turn to the left, where it ends at another door.

I go through the door, and I find myself in a slightly larger room, which had two other doorways, one directly in front of me and another to my right. I gingerly take a few steps into the room in fear of my collar. I sigh with relief as it doesn’t make a sound or throb. I do a quick sweep of the room and find nothing but chips in the filing cabinets that lay against a corner. I open the door that is on the same wall I came in from and find myself in a tiny storage room that holds plenty of cleaning utensils and another filing cabinet. I find more chips in this room and on the floor I find an intact Grognak the Barbarian Pony comic. I always enjoyed that comic. I pick it up and stuff it into my saddlebags to read later.

I left the room and open the door opposite to where I entered, seeing and following a slightly winding corridor to another door. This door opens into yet another small room but this time the sound of a radio can be heard. I look around the room but find nothing as it’s pretty bare in here, but it does have another door on the far side wall. I walk up to the door and open it. The door slides into the floor and opens up into another small room, this one is well lit, and facing the door sat a desk with a Ham Radio on it. Other than the desk and the radio this room too is also pretty bare. I quickly walk up to the radio and turn it off but as soon as it stops, the same voice from when I entered the basement pipes up again, giving me another scare.

“That’s me, there, on the table. The disk. My voice.

“Can’t take any chances, though… you may be some victim who simply stumbled down here”

“Got that right,” I mutter out loud.

“If so, can’t let you let Dog out… no, not yet. If you’re who I think you are, you came to fetch Dog, use her to drag others here. Now I’ll use you - and that PipBuck you’re wearing”

The fuck? How does she know I have a PipBuck or Elijah for that matter?

“You’re smart. Clever. The key to Dog’s cage is simple. Take my voice to the cage above. Let me speak to the beast inside.

“Then you and I… we can talk”

I didn’t like that last bit, it sounded like she wanted to do more than to just sit down and have a friendly chat, but I don’t have any better options with this. I noticed the holotape on the table before the radio and took it, might as well give it a try. I turn around and quickly trot out of the basement and back up to the detention cell with “Dog” still moaning and rocking back and forth.

I trot up to the cell door, lifting my mechanical foreleg and opening up the PipBuck compartment. I access the device’s notes tab and find the holotape I picked up at the top of the list of stored notes. I look at the file name: “Dog Command Tape,” and “umm’d” and “ahh’d” for a moment about wether or not I should play it, but after a little while I decide to go for it. I had no alternative at the moment and Dog did seem to respond to Elijah’s tape.

I select the file and it begins to play. “Dog, back in the cage,” Commanded the voice from downstairs. To my surprise Dog stands up again and turns around to face me, but her facial expression is completely different this time. It was like looking at a completely different pony. This is obviously a pony of intellect and a strong mind. The purple alicorn for a moment wore a look of surprise when she saw me but it was only brief. When she spoke, her voice is the same as the tape and from downstairs. What the hell?

“What have we here, asnow white alicorn perhaps ? You weren’t who I was expecting, I’m disappointed” Her voice is calm and collected, almost like my husband’s, which is kinda scary. “Still… even if you are not my intended guest, you take direction. Good. You can’t have been an idiot to figure out how to release me from my cage…

“…or perhaps you are, with that leash in your leg and the one around your neck… with our collars and manacles, why, we may as well be kin.”

I growled a little at the alicorn and idiot comments but I take a deep breath to control my anger before responding to Dog. “Why is your voice different from earlier?” I asked her.

“I am the voice of reason. I sleep sometimes… down in the basement, in the cage. Now that I’m awake, Dog goes back into the cage.

“Dog knows I’m here, but can’t do anything about it. I’m her… conscience. I keep her tame, keep her from hurting us… doing foalish things.

“I’ve been trapped in here for some time, when you came along and let me out. So… you opened my cage for a reason. Now… I want to know why.”

This alicorn seems to be suffering from a split personality. I can see it with how she is talking about Dog being a different pony and that they are together and this “cage”, which I suppose is her head, the mind they share, both fighting for control.

“You seem to be suffering from multiple personalities. Was this a result of the death of the Goddess and the end of her Unity?” I asked her.

“Yes, in a manner of speaking. We were once two but forced into one when there weren’t enough bodies to go around.

“Do you see these wounds of hers, covering her coat… the bear-trap on her leg? She placed her own hoof in it.

“The name carved in her chest? To remind her of whom she is. She inflicts pain on herself to silence me, when all I try to do is… Hrr!” She grunted in anger and pain. “She cuts, hurts, and tries to murder me out of her. She won’t succeed. Just makes me angrier.

Dog is the beast, we simply change cages. Like the ones here”

I guess I can understand that. Plenty of alicorns were killed since the Goddess and with all the ponies she consumed I would assume there wasn’t enough bodies for all the minds to return to their proper bodies, so it’s conceivable two or more minds would be forced into the same body, like here with Dog or God. I think I’ll refer to this personality as God since she is like a mirror opposite to Dog and it works with the way everything she has scratched into the walls.

I am however a little confused to why she’s locked in this cell when it’s her mind that locks out the other.

”Why did you lock yourself in this cell?” I asked.

“No… why did I lock her in the cage,” of course… “I locked her in because I could feel her… getting hungry again. There wasn’t much time,” It was then that I noticed her teeth were sharpened and got a very bad feeling about her.

“If Dog roams, she gets into trouble… eats things she shouldn’t, listens to others she shouldn’t… so she’s safer in here. We’re safer in here.”

“I hoped if I locked her in here… the one she obeys would come for her. Instead, I get you,” yeah, tough luck you got me.

I shook my head, needing more information.

“Hmm, you wouldn’t have locked yourself in there if you didn’t have some kind of key to let yourself out.”

“The key? Why it’s the Old Stallion of course, the one who brought us here.

“I hid the key on me so Dog wouldn’t know… I just need the Old Stallion to show up, so he and I can talk.” Yeah, somehow I doubt that.

“If Dog was in control when the Old Stallion appeared, she would just whatever he commanded, as always. And I can’t have that.”

I look around at the numerous radios around the police station. I remembered that these collars have a microphone built in and with God’s plan to lure Elijah to her. She must have used them to block out her plan from being heard by him.

“These radios, were you using them for like signal interference of something?”

“They were here when I arrived… so I made use of them, in a manner of speaking. More their… voices, really.

“These collars… they don’t just track us. You can eavesdrop on them as well. Tune to a frequency, and you can hear everything somepony is saying.

“So perhaps it’s a good thing that Dog swallowed her collar. Anyone listening would find it difficult to hear past the… digestion”

“Then I suppose that annoying bell outside helps too?”

“Very good. Yes… it’s another layer of white noise to ensure privacy. Unfortunately, it also acts like a dinner bell for the residents,” I shiver at the thought of that damn bell attracting more of those damn Ghost Ponies.

“As long as the holographic greeter outside is active, however, I can get by them… the Holograms fascinate them. Ghost-worship perhaps.”

Okay, well, time is wasting and I need to get her out of there so I can move on to find the others, steal whatever I’ve been brought here to steal and then go home to my family.

“I need you get you out of here,” I said, tapping the bars to the cell door.

“No… no, I don’t think so. Even in here, I have more control than you do” Oh great, so she’s a control freak too.

“I’m not leaving until the one who controls the collars shows… not his voice, not his hoof, not his lackey… him.

“And when he comes to see me, we’ll settle things. So go on, go back to your master, and tell him I’m waiting for him. Dog may follow him - I won’t” She said the last bit with finality.

God won’t come out on her own accord, she wants Elijah. Hmm, wait, Dog listens to Elijah and follows him, I have his voice, maybe I could use that to get Dog to come out and I can tell her where the key is to let her out of the cell. I smirked as an idea came to mind.

“Perhaps I suppose I can order Dog to come with me. I bet he’d obey me ” I said with the smirk still plasters on my muzzle.

God chuckled at this. “Dog? You’re not talking to him now, are you? No, even if you could drag Dog out of her cage, you still couldn’t get her out of this cage.

“I put her in here for a reason… if she could have escaped, she would have. So here she stays.”

My smirk grew into a full on grin. “The key is in there with you and Dog.”

She laughed as if what I said was funny. “Yes, but Dog doesn’t know that. We don’t share everything. Sometimes it’s a blessing… sometimes… it causes difficulties.

Now I think it’s a blessing, it keeps you on that side of the cage. Now… you go fetch. Find your master, bring him here so we can talk.”

This time it was my turn to laugh which did cause the calm and collected mutant to raise her brow.

“I think I could tell Dog how to unlock a door.”

“Yes… you could. And once she was out, all starving and hungry… what do you think she would do then?” My victorious smirk faded and considering that Dog ate her own collar and the fact she has fangs. Oh cock! You smart bitch.

“Be careful what cage you open, because she won’t go back in it without a fight. She’ll tear you apart, she won’t care if it kills you both,” fuck, you are one smart bitch.

I had to think. I still could play Elijah’s voice card since Dog listens to him. Well it’s worth a shot.

“If Dog hears the Old Stallion’s voice, she’d obey and do what he says,” I challenged.

“Dog… obeys. Yes. Why… do you have some means of contacting the Old Stallion?” My victorious smirk returned as I knew I had her now.

“I have his voice on an audio log right here,” I said, pointing a hoof to my synthetic leg.

God’s eyes widened in a mixture of shock, fear and rage. When she spoke again her voice was so full of anger it actually scared me.

”You… don’t play it. If you do, I’ll find a way out of the cage, end you. I’ll murder you, crush your legs until…”

Holy shit. “Whoa, whoa, whoa,” I yelled while flaring my minds and holding my forehooves up in a defensive gesture. Thankfully the raging alicorn did calm down and she now wore a confused expression. “Follow me willingly and I won’t play it,” I told her as calmly as I could despite her rage just then giving me a right old scare.

“No, you wouldn’t. If you did, you won’t escape this place alive. I’d shatter every one of your limbs to splinters and leave you hear ,” Yikes, that’s a nasty reminder of that Raider Leader I tortured when I was eighteen. “You think I’m afraid of your collar exploding, killing us? No, I’ll leave you breathing, then keep walking until my collar goes cold,” damn she is quite dark. “I’ll prop your broken body in view of the Sierra Maredre so you can see what you came to steal… forever out of reach as you die”

“Ok, I can’t convince you I’m not here for the Sierra Maredre or the old twat that brought us here, so I’ll prove it.”

“Prove it… how? Words are worthless.”

“I didn’t want to come here, it was just a recon mission, and I’ve been taken from my family and my foals. I don’t want to be here anymore than you want to be in that cell. But I have the power to let Dog out so I’ll prove it by not doing it.”

She looked at me, stared into my eyes as if searching for the truth. I stared right back, letting her see the pain in my eyes from being stolen from my loved ones. Telling her through eye contact that I want nothing more than to go home.

“Hmm. No… no, you’re not. Even though Dog’s more docile… easier to control.

“You may regret this. This place… this place is where creatures like Dog can survive. The things that fill its streets…

“She is as vicious, more vicious than they are. Her hunger can help you more than I can. When I’m in control… this shell is difficult to… fight in.”

“Even if Dog is more helpful, we can manage” I assured her and she laughed.

“I am not sure you belong here,” her face then became serious, “no, you don’t belong here.

“Yet you came this far. And I’m not interested in remaining here any longer. I’ll unlock the cage.”

I smile and sigh in relief that God has decided to follow me. I would rather have God in control than Dog because I wouldn’t want a crazy hunger driven maniac running around eating everything in sight.

“Alright, let’s get out of here.”

“Very well… lead on,” she said as her long horn glowed with a light blue aura, lifting a key out from her mane, which inserted itself into the lock of the door and twisted until a loud click was heard as the door unlocked.

I smiled up at the scarred purple alicorn and turned to the front door. One pony down, two more to go.

Chapter 4: Tick Tick Tick

Fallout Equestria: Broken Steel

Under the Red Cloud

Chapter 4: Tick Tick Tick

I had made it to the gate to the Medial District of the Villa. It was a hard road from the Police Station back the way I came as when God and I left the Police Station we were both confronted by two Ghost Ponies. According to God these ones were known as Ghost Trappers, most likely for the fact their primary weapon is something called a Bear-Trap Hoof which is exactly what it sounds like, a bear-trap strapped to the hoof which will clamp shut everything you strike. In that short battle I for the first time used the Holorifle as an experiment to test its effectiveness. I was pleasantly surprised to see that it was quite effective. In two shots, SATS assisted due to the Ghosts being too close to aim via scope, the Ghost Trapper had been brought down to a tenth of its health with a bizarre glow coming off it as it glowed from being struck by the holographic cube the weapon fired. The third shot caused its head to explode. I am certain that once I get this weapon repaired to one hundred percent it’ll be even more devastating and could probably be able to kill a Ghost Pony in two shots, or maybe in one due to it being a scoped weapon. During the fight the other Trapper managed to land a punch with its Bear-Trap Hoof on my flank armour, the jaws of the bear-trap bending the armour plate under the fabric of my armour causing it to bit into my flank painfully. I can feel it squeeze each time I take a step. After defeating the two Ghosts I searched their bodies and took both their Bear-Trap Hooves, using my repair spell to improve the one that was in the better condition and I decided I’d use it for a melee weapon as it’ll be perfect for chopping the inhabitants up if my shots down them without killing them . When we got to the stairs leading down to where I found my second Dean’s Stash we ran into another Trapper which I dispatched pretty much the same way I did the first with the Holorifle and took its Bear-Trap Hoof and used it to further repair the first. From there it was an uneventful trip towards the Fountain.

God looked down at me when she realised I stopped, but didn’t say anything.

“You go on ahead. I’ll meet you at the Fountain,” I told her as I turned to look at the large wooden gate to the Medical District.

“Are you sure?” She asked.

“I’ll be fine; Collar 13 is through those doors. You’ll be safe at the Fountain.”

“Very well, to the Fountain and its ghost then,” she said, trotting away towards the Fountain.

I was about to open the gate when I noticed the glow of a Vending Machine to the left of it. “Might as well buy some more Weapon Repair Kits,” I said to myself as I approached the odd machine. When the interactive menu appeared I saw that I could buy .357 Magnum and .308 rounds and that beside the items it had (20). I don’t know what that means but I assume it’s telling me how many I’ll get for, um, one chip maybe? I dunno and ammo for those guns will have to wait until I get more chips. I scrolled through the available items until I found the Weapon Repair Kits and toggled up ten of them. The ten kits cost me pretty much nearly all my chips, I’ve gotta pay attention to how many I have... With the kits now bought and in my possession I used four of them to bring the Holorifle to maximum condition. I smiled at the result, a weapon that looks brand spanking new and powerful. I took a quick moment to double check my inventory and then opened the gate into the Medical District.

The gates open up to a short street just two arches long before it ended by a wall with a short passage leading into another square smaller than the first one I entered in the Villa proper. I stopped at the passage when my collar began to vibrate and beep again which prompted me to quickly step back until it stopped.

Father Elijah’s voice rang out from my PipBuck again, giving me another heart attack,

“The Villa’s comm speakers have aged poorly, like the Maredre. Pre-war junk. The speakers emit a signal that’ll set off your collar if you stay too long.

“There are damaged speakers, and shielded ones... the damaged ones you can destroy at range- don’t get close, you can’t switch them off like a radio.”

“For fuck’s sake will you stop doing that” I cried out loudly in annoyance at the unexpected warning.

Okay, so I have to be on the lookout for these speakers as well as radios. I don’t have a clue what they look like but I suppose I’ll know them when I see them or hear them. Looking back towards the passageway I noticed more graffiti on the wall above the final arch before the passage. “Listen before you move AHEAD” was written on the wall, the word “AHEAD” written in red, emphasizing its importance. Yeah I guess that’s good advice considering that the radios and speakers will make my collar go boom.

With caution I walk back towards the passage, my collar beginning to beep and vibrate again. The passage was only about six feet long but it opened up into another square with an enclosed path that has arches surrounding it. On the arch beyond the passage I notice a picture of a pony head with a sad face and crosses for eyes, an arrow through its head pointing at a speaker with a blue square light surrounding it, which sparked every few seconds. I quickly unholster my Police Pistol and aim at the speaker, firing once. My .357 round impacted the speaker’s casing and the insufferable device exploded in a shower of sparks, my collar stopping its beeps and buzzes and going cold again. Phew.

The square is pretty much empty aside from the tonnes of rubble littering the floor. The only notable features I can see is a soil bed with a withered black dead tree in it and a sign post pointing three ways. In front of me I could see a half blocked gate with yellow light beyond it, almost like a beacon, and to my right I can see another passage through the arches. Heeding the warning about listening before you move I stopped and listened. After a moment of listening I began to hear the tell tale signs of a Ghost Pony nearby from the sounds of the rebreather they use.

“Oh for Celestia’s sake,” I groaned, already hating these things with a passion. I crouch down low and begin to creep towards the blocked gate as quietly as I can, which is a job and a half in itself, considering my left foreleg is made of steel. I sigh with disappointment when I come up to the gate. Through the gaps I can see the Fluttershy Medical Clinic and its neon sign just on the other side, but now that I’m here I could see how much rubble and shit has been pushed up against the gate, it’s like a mountain. There isn’t a chance in Luna’s butthole that I’ll be able to shift this. I sat down on my haunches and lifted my left leg to view my PipBuck’s map screen. The local map showed me that the passage to the right of where I came in leads to another square and to the left of entering that is a short street which ends at an apartment but half way up the street on the left would be another passage leading to the street beyond the gate and my destination. This shouldn’t take me too long.

I crouch down again and quietly sneak my way into the passage to the second square and quickly drop to my belly as I spot the Ghost Pony in the opposite corner next to an arch column, poking the floor with its Knife Spear. Have I told you how much I’ve grown to hate those fucking things? Yeah, I hate them a lot. I subconsciously rub my flank as I can still feel the sting from that Cosmic Knife stabbing me back in the Police Station. I shift my left foreleg out in front of me and then I used my magic to levitate the Holorifle down from my back. I press the butt of the gun to my shoulder and rest the underside of the breach on my metal leg as I bring the scope to my right eye. It’s still night and the scope automatically switches itself to night vision, which thankfully makes everything a lot clearer and makes seeing my target piss easy. I sighted the crosshairs onto the abomination’s head as it continued to poke at the floor completely unaware of my presence. I grin with anticipation as I then pull the trigger. The rifle releases a strong magical discharge in the form of a cube that hurtles through the air at a good speed for an energy weapon and impacts with the monster’s head which, to my delight, disintegrates as the Ghost Pony falls dead to the floor.

“Hah! In your face!” I shout with glee. What a rush.

I pick myself up from the floor and trot around to the passage, completely ignoring the body as I trot through the short passage and into the street. My collar began to beep again and I look around at the walls for any signs of a speaker. I walk out into the middle of the street looking around but can’t find it. My pulse starts to race as panic starts to rise as I fail to find the speaker.

“Fuck, where is it?” I cry while drawing out the Police Pistol.

I gallop to the end of the street hoping to get out of range but at the dead end by the closed the door my collar was still beeping. “Shit!” I cry out as the beeping and throbbing sped up. Panicking, I look around trying to find the speaker. Unable to see it on the ground floor I end up looking higher. That’s when I noticed a balcony running the length of the wall on one side and the wall above the passage. While looking at this balcony I noticed the sparking blue light of the speaker nestled on the wall under the roof of the balcony above where I came in. The beeping of the collar has almost reached a constant tone, I don’t have long. I aim the pistol quickly and fire. The bullet impacted the rotten plaster next to it. I fire again; the bullet hits the wooden guard rail. FUCK! I fire two more times quickly and both rounds miss completely. The beeping has now reached a constant tone, any second now and boom. “Come on, come on,” I whimper as I close my left eye, focusing my aim down the sight with my right and pulled the trigger as the beeping and throbbing of the collar reach a peak and then boom. I scream, thinking the collar had blown but to my utmost relief my final bullet in the pistol had hit the speaker and destroyed it. Oh thank fuck for that. I collapse to the floor panting as I fought to regain my nerves from again shitting myself with fear. Fuck these collars, fuck this place and fuck that old git.

I lay there for a couple of minutes while I wait for my pulse to drop back down to near normal levels. Once I came down from my fear induced anxiety of my collar almost popping, I stand back up and dust myself off, rubbing at my neck where I can still feel a tingling around where the collar had been vibrating. I cringe as my metallic hoof grinds against the cold steel of the collar and I force myself to pull my hoof away. Shaking my head I continue.

The passage into the final street of the Medical District opens up into an open triangular street. Directly in front of me I can see the clinic, to my right the blocked gate and to my left a gift shop. Why the hell would you put a gift shop in a medial area, anyway? It’s not for tourists.

I stop in the middle of the street as my ears swivel around. I can hear another rebreather to my right. Looking up towards the clinic I can see a path between the clinic and the shop, my EFS showing a red marker in that direction. Great, another Ghost to deal with. Sighing, I equip the Holorifle and check its ammo count. Hmm, three shots before I need to reload should be enough.

I crouch and slowly make my way to the corner of the shop. I take a deep breath and ready the rifle as I turn to make my way down the path, but as soon as I do I find the Ghost Harvester in my face. I let out a startled yelp and quickly beat my large wings to push me back fast. My hooves leave the floor as I soar backwards. I land and skid over the cobble stone street until I come to a stop several feet away. I grit my teeth and snarl at the monster as I see a Knife Spear lodged into the floor where my head had been only seconds before. The creature makes a sound that I can only guess to be of confusion as it tries to pull the four bladed staff from the ground. Taking this opportunity I jump into SATS and toggle up three shots. The spell does its job and I fire off three rounds in quick succession. The first shot strikes the Ghost in its shoulder, consuming the entire being in the blue glow effect of the holoshot and its strange glow effect. The second shot goes wide and strikes the wall. The third and final shot smashes into the creature’s face, but doesn’t kill it. It stumbles for a moment but recovers and starts to advance on me while I’m reloading the Holorifle by shoving Micro-Fusion Cells into the breach. The creature had managed to yank its spear free and had raised it over its head for a killing strike. “Shit,” I groan as I pump the rifle to chamber a cell and then to my surprise the Ghost falls to the floor unconscious just as the light stops glowing. It was then that I realised the effect of the holoshots leave a lingering disintegrating effect that continues to deal damage to them until it wears off. Well that’s nice to have.

I holster the rifle and then equip my Police Pistol, aiming it at the creature’s head. I cock the hammer back and am about to pull the trigger when I stop as a dark thought enters my mind and I holster the pistol and instead pull out the Bear-Trap Hoof I had acquired earlier. I grin as I slip my right hoof into the device’s harness and thrust my hoof out as if to punch something. As I reach the end of my punch the sharp jaws of the bear-trap clamp shut. Grinning darkly I step up to the fallen Ghost. “You know, I’m starting to really dislike you guys,” I say to it before punching the creature’s head. The jaws clamp down on the Harvester’s head and with a sickening crunch the jaws crush its skull and rip its head in two. Smiling with satisfaction I put the Bear-Trap Hoof back into my bags.

Recovering from my fight with the monster I decide to check out where the path leads to instead of going through the front door of the clinic. The path leads to a dead end divided in half by two arches with a shingled roof. Looking up at the roof of the arches, I notice that they connect with the roofs like in the square where I got my second BAR. At either end of the walkway like roof of the arches, I see two huge holes in the walls. Hmm, it looks like I can get up there through the gift shop and the hole in the wall opposite looks like it could lead me to a back door of the clinic. Nodding to myself, I decide to go through the shop and try for a backdoor.

The shop is pretty much empty save for a cash register on a counter. Quickly checking it reveals a dozen chips and two bundles of pre-war money, again in paper bank notes. There is nothing else really of value and so I make my way up the stairs that are in front of the front door. The stairs lead up into a large living area above the shop. To my left I can see the hole in the wall and the sickly red hue of the cloud filtering in from it. I ignore the room and walk out onto the roof, trotting over to the other side using the bridge, and then through the hole in the opposite wall, which lead me into what I can only describe as being a café. In front of me sits a long bar with a large coffee machine at the end. The room is pretty much bare apart from a couple of tables and chairs in a corner to my right, a door on the back wall, and a set of stairs going up. The door seemed to be barred from the other side as it wouldn’t budge, which left me with no choice but to go up the stairs.

I cough as I get a lungful of the tainted air as I step out onto the roof of the building. The Sierra Maredre looms over me from atop its cliff. If the sun could shine here it would cast its shadow all over this place. Looking around the roof I see other roofs of neighbouring buildings, as they were at varying levels and didn’t seem to go any higher than five stories tall. To my right from the door onto the roof I can see a hole in the wall like the downstairs, which is where I need to go to get down. I take it. Looking to my left I see that the roof I’m standing on is sunken slightly as I see a rim all around the roof. I trot over to the left side as it is almost next to the lip and look down into the street below, which is the dead end. While I’m looking down I catch something in the corner of my eye and look up. I smile with delight at the sight of another glowing hoofprint on the wall on the opposite side of the shingle roof that forms a square around the dead end street on this level. Eager for prizes, I climb onto the roof and trot around. Just as I was about to make it to the case I freeze, the clouds above part enough to give the full moon a brief chance to shine. When it does its light filtering through the red cloud paints a bright red glow over the case and behind a wooden railing I can see a dead pony skeleton slumped onto the railing with its hoof outstretched as if it was reaching for it.

I call upon my magic to pick up the case and levitate it away from the skeleton. I drop it at my hooves and open it. Inside I find a few things I can use, three healing potions, some food, 9mm rounds, a 9mm Pistol, another Police Pistol and a few Energy Cells. The other stuff I didn’t have any use for and just left them. I really must thank this Dean pony if I ever meet him. He’s left some nice goodies in those cases.

The hole in the wall next to where I got on the roof opens into another living area, as I can see a vanity table against the wall, a blocked door, and on the other side of the vanity is a queen size bed. I step into the room and immediately step back out as my collar starts to beep again. “For fuck sake,” I groan as I look around for the speaker. To my left from the hole I can see into an open plaza, maybe it’s down there. I climb onto the shingles and walk to the edge of the roof, the drop is shallower than from the other side into the dead end, only a single story drop rather than two. I don’t see any other streets or passages leading away from it either. In the far corner I notice a door which must be the back door to the clinic. A spark catches my attention and I turn to the wall at my right. Leaning out from the wall, I can see the speaker sparking away. I pull out my Police Pistol and aim at the damaged speaker spewing out its unintelligible noise and pull the trigger. I groan as I miss my first shot. I steady my aim and close my left eye to better focus down the sight and pull the trigger again. The hammer strikes the bullet and with a bang sends the .357 Magnum round into the casing of the speaker, silencing it for good.

Without the speaker to get in my way now I enter the apartment. Rooting around I only find a couple of chips in the vanity, and in the end table next to the bed I find a pre-war bonnet hat which for a laugh I decided to wear. The wide brim of the hat blocks about a third of my vision above me. Giggling to myself I descend the stairs in the room into another shop. This one, much like the last, is pretty much bare and only has a couple of chips lying around for me. I sigh at the lack of valuables and make my way into the plaza. It too is empty of anything, so I decide not to explore it any further, trotting up to the door I noticed earlier. My EFS confirms that the door is to the clinic, however it’s locked. I levitate a bobby pin to the lock and start to mess around with it. I can feel the tumbles shifting as I move the pin until finally I feel it click as it releases the lock and I open the door into the clinic. It’s time to find Collar 13.

Chapter 6: Domino

Fallout Equestria: Broken Steel

Under the Red Cloud

Chapter 6: Domino

Slowly feeling began creep back in across my body as I regained consciousness. I found myself to be lying on my back with my wings spread out against the uneven wooden panelled floor of the balcony and my hooves and legs in a tangle with the wooden guard rail support struts. I groaned in the uncomfortable position as I tried to free my legs.

“Ugh, my head, what happened?” I asked myself mentally. I couldn’t shake the cobwebs in my brain as more feeling slowly crept up my body. Soon I began to feel my face again but a warmth settled over the right side which left me confused even more since the left side of my face is cold.

My eyes shot open when a spike of pain grew along the right side of my face and with it my memory of what happened earlier.

I had triggered a trap that was connected to something that caused the gas canister I was stood next to, to explode in a fireball which bathed the right side of my face in flames and the concussive blast sent me into the wooden guard rail before knocking me out.

I hissed as the full burning pain reinserted itself across my face once all feeling had returned and the pain was quick to clear out the cobwebs. I pulled my head up and looked across my stomach to find my legs all tangled up in the struts and now that I could see... wait... my vision feels wrong. I can see my nose more clearly and it looks like part of my vision is blocked by the bridge of my nose. My eyes widened when I felt a deep piercing pain coming from the right side of my head, more specifically, my right eye. In a panic I thrashed my limbs in the confines of the struts until finally they either came free or the struts holding them broke and I quickly pulled my right forehoof up to the right side of my face and immediately threw it away as my boot covered hoof touched my charred flesh which prompted a large spike in the burning pain. I brought my hoof back up to the damaged area again more carefully and gingerly began to softly feel. Through the boot and the pain I could feel the charred and flaking flesh of my face. I cringed when my hoof pulled on some of the burnt flesh and then my hoof came into contact with something hard. I traced the hardness until I realised I was tracing a circle and then went to feel towards the middle, hoping to poke myself in my eye but instead my hoof found something metallic and upon touching that sent a powerful surge of pain running though my head. I threw my hoof away as I quickly scrabbled back up onto my shaky legs while letting out an agonized cry.

“I need a mirror” I wailed.

I quickly barged into the apartment the trap had been set up to catch somepony with and quickly searched the dark red tinted room for a bathroom. I rounded a corner and found a door that had been broken in half and saw that a mirror sat above a sink inside. I kicked down the rest of the door and stood before the cracked and dirty mirror. I flared my magic and swept it over the mirror until it was clear enough and peered at my reflection. What looked back shocked me to my core. I saw a mare’s face that’s entire right side minus her muzzle was horribly burnt and her mane had been blown back and stood on end in a spiky fashion. The flesh was burnt black with cracks of dark red running all over it where it was bleeding slowly. However the most horrifying thing about the reflection was where the eye should have been. Instead of an eye there was nothing but a deep hole rimmed with pure white, showing the actual bone of the eye socket and in place of the eye sat a piece of jagged metal. In a fit of panic I grabbed the piece of metal with my magic and pulled it out, this was a big mistake as the piece of shrapnel also pulled out what remained of my eye and my pain level spiked again. I screamed out into the apartment with all my agony.

I scrabbled for my torn saddlebags as I used my Pipbuck’s inventory sorting spell to find my healing potions and pulled out two of them along with one of the Super Healing Potions I had found along the way. I had tears streaming down the left side of my face from the pain as I also pulled out two syringes of Med-X. I cried from the burning pain as I jabbed both Med-X needles into my flank and pushed down on the plungers, injecting me with their clear fluid. Within moments the fantastic drug made my roaring fire dull down to a gentle simmer. It was still there but thankfully it wasn’t killing me. I looked back up at the reflection of the burned mare. I watched as her only intact eye drifted to the gaping black hole in her head and quickly gulped down the two healing potions. I watched as the lightly, least damaged, areas of her face slowly healed and regrew her pure white fur. The burned flesh now covered most of the right side of her face, the damage to her neck and the surrounding area of the burn had healed but the eye was still missing.

I held the super healing potion, hoping against hope that it would return to me what I’ve lost. I tore off the bottle’s top and gulped it down. I had to brace myself against the sink after dropping the bottle as I immediately felt weak, like I’d ran marathon. Looking back at my reflection I watched as a little more of the burn healed, not by much, and regrew fur but the cracked black flesh flaked more to reveal healed skin below that is twisted and out of shape to the rest. Worst of all, my eye is still missing, it’s just a gaping hole rimmed by my skull’s exposed eye socket.

My eye widened as a realisation settled in my brain. I had just drunk three healing potions; the damage done to me had been healed. If... When, I get home my regeneration talisman will not see that I’m injured and thus will not regrow my eye. I’ll be a half blind, one eyed mare for the rest of my life with this horrible burn disfigurement. I threw my head into my forelegs and began to weep loudly in despair as my traitorous imagination began thinking up scenarios of my friends and family abandoning me because of it.

My feelings of despair began to give way to a deep roiling anger. I had just lost my eye to this pathetic endeavour. I am a right hoofed pony and my right eye was the one I used for practically everything I did. Because of this I’ve lost fifty percent of my combat efficiency as I’m blind on one side and aimed with my right eye. This will force me to relearn how to fight, how to see and how to act. I slowly pulled my head from my forelegs looking at my reflection, my face twisting into a deep scowl. My breathing became heavy as my anger rose to boiling point. I haven’t felt this much anger in nearly ten years. All because of him. All because of Elijah. He has pulled me away from all I hold dear and now because of this place he’s dumped me in I’ve sustained a horrific injury that has left me crippled... Again! My feelings of despair about losing my family and friends because of this injury turned around to fuel my anger and thinking of Elijah, oh everything he’s responsible for with me and everypony else brought my anger and hate to an all time high and something inside me broke which was followed by a sudden surge of magical energy.

The mare in the mirror's eye turned an all-too-familiar green, her red pupils shrinking and a malignant purple flame erupted from the top of her single remaining eye. I snarled looking at my reflection in the mirror, at the darkness that lives within me. For the first time over five years she’s been released. I snarl at my reflection as my emotions boil over with rage from everything that I’ve had to endure since I got here. “THIS IS ALL HIS FAULT” I scream at my reflection before I drove my cybernetic leg through the mirror, shattering it into a million pieces before driving it into the substandard wall behind it. I let out a primal scream of rage as I began to take out my frustration and anger out on the poor innocent porcelain sink. I kick at the sink with my forelegs before standing back up and using my hind legs to starts kicking out against the toilet bowl and bathtub around me while I smashed at the sink until it crumbled apart into small chunks. I began to turn in a circle in the small bathroom, kicking and screaming as I beat the shit out of everything I saw. Not even the dry wall survived my rage fuelled wrath, breaking it down leaving only the wooden supports behind it.

I must have spent half an hour pounding everything I could see into powder. I just had to let it all out. I just couldn’t control myself. I fell to my haunches panting as I slowly recovered from my break down until a glint of light caught my eye. Looking back to where the mirror had been I saw that a piece of the mirror still clung to the wrecked frame still dutifully hanging on the wall and it was large enough for me to see myself. My reflection showed that my eye had changed yet again. I didn’t feel the raging hate flowing through me right now but I was still deeply angry. My eye had lost the purple flame and the green had receded until it just rimmed my red iris. The only thing that hadn’t changed with my eye from the rage shift was the slitted pupil. I don’t understand this right now but quite frankly with everything that’s gone on. I couldn’t give two shits.

I stood on the landing of the stairs from the other side of the apartment looking down into a long street that curls around to the left at the end which was also filled with the Cloud. I noticed that a balcony ran along the length of the wall on the right but ended at the turn. About half way down the street I saw another set of stairs leading up to another apartment opposite the one I’m stood in and bridging the gap between the stairs and the balcony are three planks of wood making a safe passage over the cloud. The Cloud seems to be filling this street but it doesn’t seem to be any higher than the ground floor and it’s not billowing over from the roofs like everywhere else. I suppose something forced the cloud into this street and it’s never been blow back out. I can get to the balcony from the apartment behind me as there is a hole in the wall which leads to a bedroom with another hole in the wall leading out onto the balcony. I don’t want to deal with the Cloud again as its nearly killed me twice already. I groaned with annoyance at having to turn my head a lot more now just so I could get the full picture as I turned around to go back inside the apartment an apple shaped object just below the balcony caught my attention.

I growled angrily at seeing another fucking grenade bouquet. I couldn’t see the trigger point so the best thing I could think of to do would be to set it off. Knowing the fuse length I know I can reach minimal safe distance before it detonates. I reached out with my magic and focused on the string knot holding the three grenades together and once the knot was undone the three grenades fell to the cobblestone road with their pins still in the string. I quickly jumped back and used my wings to propel me through the apartment and out onto the weakened balcony where I lost my eye and hunkered down and placed my forehooves over my head as I braced myself. I mentally counted down the seconds until as expected the three grenades detonated with a thunderous roar. I smiled at my timing and lifted my head and was about to get up when out of nowhere another powerful explosion rocked the Residential District and that was followed by another. The unexpected explosions made me cry out in surprise and I backpedalled into the damaged guard rail causing it and the section of balcony I am standing on to collapse. I beat my wings and hovered in the air where the balcony once was while it fell into the Cloud filled plaza below. At least these wings are good for something.

“What in the name of buggery was that?” I whined after recovering from the shock of the unexpected detonations and hovered back into the apartment.

Stepping back out into the street I was met with a scene of utter chaos. The balcony had been completely destroyed and its debris made a mess of the rubble strewn cobblestone road below. Walls and columns of arches had been blown down to their support beams but surprisingly still held and their rubble added an extra layer of wreckage to climb over. The most surprising thing however is the absence of the Cloud. I suppose the chain reaction of explosions added enough force to disperse the cloud, which is good as it works in my favour. I hadn’t noticed the stairs were damaged as I began to trot down them and one of my hind hooves stood on a loose tile which then slipped caused me to slip down onto my haunches and slide down the stairs bumping my fat ass on the steps until I hit the floor and flopped onto my belly with a pained groan.

“Ow” I moaned and stood up while rubbing at my aching buttocks with my wings. I’m thankful I never lost the baby weight I gained during my previous pregnancy as it gave me a bit of padding back there as otherwise that would have hurt more than it did.

I slowly and cautiously began to trot down the short street. I kept under the partial shelter of the still intact balcony roof as I moved along. Damn those grenades did a real number on this street. As I walked I began to wonder who Collar 15 would be. So far I’ve met an alicorn with a split personality and a once pretty pegasus mare who is scarred and mute. Am I going to be meeting another pony with a horrible back story or am I...

“OW FUCK!” I cried out as something smashed me on the top of my horn and clattered to the floor. I looked down with a balefire glare at what had hit me and found a box of .357 Magnum rounds lying on the floor with a hole in the box from where it hit my horn. I was surprised at this and looked up to see where it had fallen from just to get another box to land on my face, bashing my nose before falling to the floor meet with its brother. “Son-of-a...” I cried out from the stinging sensation in my snout. Bad luck, that’s all I have here. With a snarl of irritation I pocketed the boxes of ammo and looked up at the ruined balcony. The boxes must have been on the balcony and the explosions had knocked them about a bit.

I began to hear the respirator of a Ghost Pony again. I grit my teeth as anger quickly swelled in my chest. I’ve only been here for like a day and I already hate these things. I felt the old and familiar sensation of the magical flame return to my eye as I held out my cybernetic foreleg and triggered my grappling claw to extend from my hoof but kept it in its spike form and spread out my wings and crouched down ready to strike. As soon as that bastard shows itself I’m gonna impale it.

The Ghost Pony hobbled out from around the corner and it immediately saw me, well who couldn’t? I am the brightest coloured pony here. I saw the monster ready another one of those Celestia damned knife spears but before it could launch it at me I launched myself at him. I gave a feral like cry as I beat my wings, taking to the air as I flew at the monster. Before it could throw its spear I thrust my cybernetic hoof forward and jammed the spike of my grapple claw into its head from under its chin before angling my body to bring the rest of my hooves into contact with the monster and pushed it up against the wall with a hard crunch. I felt and heard some of its bones break upon the impact but since none of its body parts were severed the damn thing will regenerate them. I twisted my hoof to force the monster to look at me and I stared down into the glowing green lenses of its mask.

“I am sick to death of you fucking pieces of shit” I growled while twisting the spike. “I’m going to enjoy this” I said with a sadistic grin spreading along my muzzle as I slowly began to part the blades of my grapple claw. I did this once before in Stable 22 on a Spore Carrier. I watched as the creature tried to get out from under me as my blades slowly began to pull the creature’s head apart. Soon the creature stopped struggling as its skull popped and broke apart and the blades cut through its flesh and the fabric of its suit before its head fell apart from being cut into three pieces. I let the body fall to the floor before stamping down hard on the remains of its head once I retracted the blade. “Fucking twat” I growled as I left the body while feeling the sudden rage shift dissipate and began up the street as it curled around to the left.

After a short distance the street turned right and it opened slightly. I noticed two wires above connecting from the roof on one side to a gaping hole on the second floor of the apartment to my right and silhouetted by the light I could make out the shape of a pony sitting in a chair. Well I guess that’s the pony I’m looking for.

I didn’t bother looking around. I was still pissed off from losing my eye. I just want to get this over with so I could get the bloody hell out of here. I walked around until I found a set of stairs leading up to the first floor of the apartment under my destination.

The door opened up into what looked to be a dining room/kitchen area. In the middle of the room sat a large table with six chairs spread about around it, all of which were damaged or toppled over. Against the wall of the stairwell to the left I saw a set of counters and a cooker. I walked inside and looked around, groaning in annoyance with having to turn my head and whole body just to get a better view of the room since I’m half blind now. Around a corner by the door I saw the fridge and in the far right corner of the room I spotted an open door leading out onto the balcony outside. I sighed as I trudged out onto the balcony. I might as well have a look since the door was open. I walked the length of the short L-shaped balcony to the end where I found an ammunition box. I didn’t feel the pleased sensation as usual when finding ammo as I opened the box and peered inside it. With a growl of irritation I turned around and delivered an applebuck to the box and sent it hurtling through the wooden guardrail and crashing down into the street below. “Fucking grenades” I growled as I headed back inside.

I stood at the base of the stairs and took several deep breaths to calm myself down as much as I could before I meet this pony. I don’t want to meet him or her feeling pissed off. I’d rather not get on their bad side. Letting out my breath I calmly trotted up the stairs.

“Have a seat and then we’ll talk” Said the pony in a masculine voice.

I blinked in surprise as the pony seemed to have been expecting me. I mentally facehoofed when I looked back on my journey through the Residential District. I’ve set of basically every damn trap on my way here. Only an abso-bloody-lute idiot would have missed all that. I trotted up to the free chair and sat down. I sighed as I wiggled my rump trying to get comfortable on the hard cushion of the floor chair. I gave up trying to get comfy and turned to look at the pony. I wrinkled my nose as I caught a foul smell of decaying flesh coming from him. As I looked at him I realised why. He’s a ghoul, a surprisingly well preserved ghoul I might add. He has a light bright coat that is slightly mottled with bare skin patches and a well groomed dark brown mane and tail. Above his top lip he has a nicely trimmed moustache. I couldn’t see his eyes as he is wearing a pair of polarized sun glasses which have lost most of their reflectiveness and to complete his look he wore a tattered old tuxedo which he must have taken care of for it have lasted this long. He did look rather handsome despite being a ghoul. He’s the best looking ghoul I’ve ever seen and when he spoke he didn’t have the raspy voice common among ghouls either.

The ghoul turned to regard me as I sat in the seat and raised an eyebrow upon seeing the gaping hole in the right side of my face. “Not a word” I growled at him. He took the hint and turned his head slightly to look out the gaping hole in his apartment wall. I followed his gaze through the hole as its a perfect window to the Sierra Maredre sitting on top of the cliff in the distance.

“The Sierra Maredre, beauty isn’t she. Is she the one who invited you here?” He spoke in a calm smooth voice.

“Or maybe you didn’t catch her voice on the radio. Woke up, confused, like some of the others. At least you’re still breathing”

His voice then turned threatening. “By the way, don’t get up or make any sudden moves, no matter how uncomfortable that chair gets. The cushion’s just for show”

That definitely didn’t sound good. I unconsciously wiggling my rump again against the cushion and now I could feel something else on the hard lump and then a memory entered my mind from a day in New Ponyville when I realised what I’m sat on. I remembered a day Zyon was teaching some new guard ponies for the town to make explosives. She had shown us how to make a shaped charge, something that could be shaped and placed where you wanted it for sneak attacks or traps.

“I’m sat on a shaped charge aren’t I?” I asked looking at him with slight fear in my eye.

“Sounds like you have done some blue collar construction work in your life, your Ma must be proud”

“Don’t you dare mention my mother” I suddenly yelled at him with venom.

The sudden shout made him jump back slightly in his chair but he quickly recovered. “Whatever, but still... Get up with my permission, I’ll blast your ass so far through your head, it’ll turn the moon cherry pie red”

Yeah and you’d kill yourself too pillock.

“So, let’s keep this sweet and polite, and finish our conversation with no misunderstandings”

I nodded, that sounded reasonable. “Ok, you got my attention. I’ll wait till you’re finished”

He seemed to brighten up at that. “And that’s what I’ve missed, a rapt audience. Just because I worked in entertainment, doesn’t mean that I’m a moron. I heard my necktie beeping, I know what that means”

Necktie? I looked to his neck and saw his collar and it then occurred to me, he was talking about his collar.

“I’m part of this somehow. I want out of this contract. And if you put me in it, I’m not going to be too happy. So whatever is going on here, if you’re part of all this? You’re taking orders from me” Oh great.

I groaned internally. If I refuse his demand he’ll likely not follow me and we’ll be stuck as I can’t continue without him and I can’t kill him as it’ll kill me too. Being here is a pain in the flank as you basically don’t have a damn choice in what you do here with this damned collar.

I let out a defeated sigh. “Alright, I’ll co-operate. What do you want...um?”

“Domino, Dean Domino at your service” He said with a cheery voice.

“Alright Domino, what do you want?” I asked. I called him Domino as it sounds better than Dean.

“Good, good, then we are in business. I may be a betting stallion, but I like it when the odds are in our favour. If you’re here with who I think, then I’d rather have you on my side than his. An... ace in the hole” He stopped as he regarded me.

“You don’t want to be here, I want what’s in the Maredre. Real simple” Is it bollocks!

“Alright, I’m in. Let’s get back to the fountain so we can get out of this shit hole”

“Good, good” Domino said as he rose from his chair “We don’t have to go the long way round. I know a shortcut. It’s through the cloud but with me with you I can help you through it” He said with a nod to me. I gingerly stood up and smiled at him slightly.

Domino tilted his head slightly as he saw my wings when I rose from my seat. “You are a white alicorn with one eye?” He said sounding rather bewildered as if he couldn’t believe it.

“I am not...” I stopped and let out my breath with a sigh. “You know what, fine, I’m an alicorn. I can’t be assed correcting anypony anymore. I’ve been doing it for ten years but nopony listens. I just can’t be assed anymore” I grumbled.

“Ok, anyway” Domino craned his neck and turned his head so he could get into one of his jacket pockets. He rummaged about for a minute until he finally pulled back with a slip of paper and an eye-patch clenched in his teeth and motioned for me to take them. I used my magic to pluck them from his mouth. “I found them a few years ago when I was trying to stash something in a fireplace”

I wanted to raise my eyebrow at him but I couldn’t. It was gone of course but I could still feel what remained of the muscles trying to do the motion which sickened me. Sighing I opened the slip of paper and read it.

“Dear Mr Domino

You will soon meet a white alicorn mare who will have lost an eye. I have left you this note and this eye patch to give to her when you meet her. She’ll need them.

Pinkie Pie”

I couldn’t believe what I just read myself. The Ministry Mare knew I was coming to the Maredre, knew I would lose and eye. What the fuck, how is that possible? I’ve heard that Pinkie Pie had foreseen future events seeing ponies such as this Security or Light Bringer and done something to help them but I didn’t believe it. I can’t believe this but it’s too crazy to be false either as she nailed my description down to a T.

“Err, thanks” I muttered still in disbelief as I used my magic to gently slip the eye patch over my eye. I caught myself in the reflection of a nearby mirror and saw how much the patch covered. Thankfully it completely hid the huge hole in my face and made my look more or less normal despite the burn. “Alright, let’s go”

"One second, you know my name, so what's your's?"

"Appletart" I answered.

Domino smiled as we got ready to leave. "You first Applebutt"

We left Domino’s apartment and made our way back down to the street until we came to the turn where I turned right to get to him. “The shortcut is through there” Domino said pointing a hoof at a passage I had missed when I passed by the first time. I groaned, it is full of the Cloud.

“We better run, I don’t want to hang around and die from this shit” I groaned irritably I broke into a quick trot to get through the Cloud. The passage opened up into a very short street with a set of arches on the right. I was glad that the Cloud wasn’t under the arches and the passage at the end.

I found myself in another small plaza with two sets of stairs on either side and a balcony that seemed to run all the way around from the top of each set of stairs but what lay filling the plaza caught my attention. It is a huge slab of metal. In the darkness and red tint of the Villa I couldn’t make it out well but it is a big piece of something.

“What the hell is that?”

“I don’t know to tell you the truth. It’s some goldish coloured hunk of metal that fell out of the sky around ten years ago” Domino answered as he stood beside me. “It has some picture of a swooping bird somewhere on it but that could mean anything”

No way, that’s a piece of the Kodiak. How the hell did it get this far west? Surely those Ion Reactors didn’t have the explosive power to have sent this hunk of metal this far right? If they did, how in buggery did I survive the explosion?

I shook my head to dispel the thoughts as its ancient history right now and I have more pressing matters. Domino opened his mouth to say something else but I had already begun up the stairs through the Cloud filled plaza to the apartment thinking the path is up here. The apartment I found myself in is rather small and didn’t have anything of value and stepped back out onto the balcony. Whatever Domino was doing it was working as I haven’t felt the effects of the Cloud but I didn’t want to take it slow so I quickly made my way into the opposite apartment. I found myself in a one room bedsit and behind a couch I found another glowing hoofprint.

“Oh good” I smiled walking up to the suitcase hidden behind the sofa and opened it.

“Hey, those are my emergency supplies” Domino protested when he caught up to me. I turned and looked at him with a scowl. “Um, well, just leave me something alright” He muttered.

I shook my head and pocketed the hooffull of .357 ammunition that was in the suitcase and left the rest for him. Stepping out onto the stairs and back into the Cloud I groaned when I saw that the path we needed to take is actually next to where we came in. “Oh for the love of...” I whined as we quickly made our way back under the arches.

I coughed once we were out of the Cloud. I suppose whatever Domino was doing to help me in the Cloud had worn off. While I recovered my ears twitched as I began to hear something. I listened until I could make out the sounds of a respirator.

“Another fucking Ghost Pony, Domino do you have a weapon?” I asked as I turned around to look at him. It feels so weird to turn my head so much now just to get a good look at things.

He nodded as he bent his neck so he could stick his muzzle under his jacket and soon pulled back to reveal a mouth operated 9mm Pistol clenched in his jaws. I nodded as I took the BAR off my back. I edged to the mouth of the passage beyond the arch and mentally sighed with relief as the path from here on is free of the Cloud. I nodded to Domino again and we both stepped out into the passage to see a Ghost Pony approaching us.

Domino began firing his pistol and is surprisingly a good shot with it despite how fast he was firing. I on the other hoof having to aim with my left eye was finding it hard to get my aim and two bursts of two rounds went completely wide. “Damn it”

Just as Domino fired the last shot in his pistol and was forced to reload the Ghost Pony slumped to the floor. With the pistol out of his mouth Domino spoke. “It’s not dead, quick, get an axe”

I didn’t have an axe but I did have a Cosmic Knife. I placed my BAR on my back and flew over to the downed Ghost before using my magic to pull the knife from my foreleg and jabbed its sharp blade into its neck and used it like a guillotine to chop its head off.

“I really hate those things” I growled putting my knife away.

“Why do you think I set up all those explosives, shotguns and tripwires” Domino remarked.

“THAT WAS YOU?!” I roared in a sudden fit of rage and whirled around on him. He took a step back in surprise at my sudden shift and despite the sunglasses I could see a slight look of fear on his face as my eye glowed with the hate and anger that filled me. “BECAUSE OF YOU THIS HAPPENED TO ME” I screamed and before I knew what I was doing I had clobbered Domino in the face with my cybernetic hoof and watched as he sprawled out onto the cobblestone road.

I stood over him with my cybernetic leg poised to strike again while my mind was conflicted. It was his fault I lost my eye and I wanted to beat the shit out of him for it but on the other hoof he placed the trap to catch a Ghost Pony and not me. How was he supposed to know I would set it off? I really wanted to smash his face in but I couldn’t as I knew if I killed him I’d die and my children would never see their mother again. Letting out a cry of anger and frustration and slammed my hoof down onto the cobblestone road next to his head which made him let out a startled whine and turned around to face the end of the street where I saw a familiar looking gate. It’s the same locked gate I saw from when I entered the Residential District.

I growled angrily as I stared at the iron gate and began to concentrate my pent up energy into my horn. It began to glow a deep purple as black energy crackled around it as the power grew until with a cry of anger I released a beam of purple and black magic at the gate. The force of the beam burned and warped the iron gate until it finally gave way and swung open. I’ve never used my magic before to fire an offensive beam of energy but any unicorn can do that if they wanted to.

I felt the rage leave me as I released the energy. I panted softly as I turned around to find Domino standing again and holding his cheek where I had walloped him.

“Domino, I’m sorry” I apologised lamely. A simple sorry wouldn’t be enough for that but at this moment I couldn’t do any better.

He removed his hoof which was slightly bloodied and worked his jaw from side to side for moment. I cringed as I saw a hole in his cheek now letting me see into his mouth. I can’t believe I did that.

“I guess I deserved that” He groaned as he opened his mouth wide until it popped. “Ah that’s better”

“No, you didn’t deserve that, I’m sorry” I muttered. I turned back around and started walking towards the gate. “Once we get to the Fountain and Elijah gives us our next objectives sooner we can leave”

Domino nodded his agreement as he fell into step beside me as we left the Residential District and returned to the Fountain and the rest of the ponies I gathered. The next stage is just around the corner and it can’t come quicker for me as I stared up at the hologram.

(An illustration of Appletart's current appearance, drawn by me using Future Twilight's pose as it was just perfect)

Chapter 5: Look before you Step

Fallout Equestria: Broken Steel

Under the Red Cloud

Chapter 5: Look before you Step

Damn it Elijah. Why can’t you warn me about this shit before I’m right in the shit? I growl to myself as I take cover behind a desk inside an office.

I was forced to dive for cover shortly after I entered the clinic from the back door. The door had opened up to a corridor that lead to an intersection, left was another hallway with multiple doors and to the right was the stairs leading down to the ground floor. I had stepped out into this intersection and turned left and moved down the hall only by a couple of steps when Elijah’s voice came through my pipbuck as he said “I’m picking up an emitter signature” He paused for a moment. “Watch out for security holograms, don’t shoot them. Attacking them is useless”. It was as if on cue that a hologram appeared in front of me. At first I stared blankly at it as it was the same none threatening blue hue as the Fountain Hologram and the merchant I saw earlier. The hologram was wearing what looked like the same security armour I’m wearing complete with helmet which made it impossible for me to see its face. The hologram then made a strange sound before its blue hue changed to a warning amber colour. The change caused me to take a step back as a bad feeling washed over me. The pony made of magical light stood up on its hindlegs and raised its forelegs to its head where it then changed to a threatening red and a red light began to glow between its hooves over its forehead. Knowing what the colour red meant. Red is Dead. I quickly bolted for the nearest door which happened to be to my right. I used my wings to give me some extra speed as I dove through the open door as red beams of death started to fly. Once I was through the door I quickly took cover behind a desk.

I grit my teeth as a burning pain began to travel down my left wing and into my back. A quick glance to my wing revealed my wing had gotten singed by a bolt of magic. Thankfully it wasn’t too bad, nothing a healing potion wouldn’t fix. Damn hologram. I won’t be able to kill it unless I can find its emitter or the terminal that controls it and finding them could be difficult. Right now though I’m stuck in this room and most likely gonna end up brown bread once it follows me in here. Fuck.

My ears twitched as I tried to listen for the hologram. It should have found me by now. Taking a deep breath I slowly peeked out from around the drawer compartment of the desk to look through the door. I blinked in confusion as the hologram wasn’t there. “Where in the blue blazers is it?” I ask myself out loud as I move out from behind the desk as quietly as I could. I flatten myself against the wall next to the door and slowly move my head out to peek down the hall where I ran into the hologram. It wasn’t there. I turn to look down towards the intersection and there it is, standing there looking at the sloping ceiling of the stairs.

“Why the fuck did it ignore me?” I mentally ask myself again. I just didn’t understand it. I was right in its sights, why didn’t it follow me?

The hologram turned ninety degrees to look up the hall to the back door for a minute before it turned another ninety degrees and stared up the hall towards me for a moment before it began to move again. In my confusion trying to understand the odd behaviour I forgot to move until the hologram noticed me and turned amber again.

“Shit...” I whine before diving back behind the desk.

I was sure it had me this time but after two minutes of nothing I peeked back out from behind the desk. The hologram turned back to blue and resumed its pre-programmed patrol route.

Okay, now I’m really confused. It saw me, why didn’t it follow me. It saw where I hid. Why didn’t it come in after me?

Wait... It lost me as soon as I hid. It didn’t pursue because it didn’t have a target. I get it now. It has a field of view targeting system. If it loses sight of its target it disengages and resumes its previous directive. So, if I can keep out of its line of sight I’ll be able to get around it.

Hmm, but what about its emitter? It must be close. Hmm, what if it uses a similar projector like the Krogoth’s hologram, a Lightbee. Hmm shooting that would be impossible since I wouldn’t be able to see it and it could be anywhere in the hologram. Oh, I know. I looked back to my saddlebags and used my colourless magic to pluck out an apple shaped grenade with a green band around it to signal that it’s a frag. This grenade will certainly tear its lightbee apart since a hologram is just light and has no mass to block the explosion. Nodding to my course of action I approach the door and pull the pin from the grenade. I could feel the charge building inside the apple as I waited for about five seconds. The hologram by now was about half way up the corridor and I then flung the apple grenade up the hall. For the third time in less than two minutes I dive back behind the desk as an explosion tore though the clinic’s first floor.

The office filled with dust from the hall while I waited for the after effects of the explosion to settle down. I coughed and hacked as I breathed in the dust and plaster that began to settle in a fine powder on the floor and on any other surface as I made my way into the now destroyed hall. The walls, floor and ceiling around the mid way point of the hall were bowing and had lost a lot of their degraded plaster and wood as the grenade had ripped them apart but thankfully the old structure held. The hologram however is gone too. I scan the hall and its depths for any signs of blue, amber or red light but there was nothing in view but dust.

“Thank Celestia” I mutter with relief.

If it’s not Ghost Ponies, its fucking holograms. Ugh, just what else does this place have to piss me off with?

The first floor consisted of the offices of the clinic and it had four of them. All decorated and full of practically the same things. I was able to find a hoofful of healing aids including a Doctor’s Bag and I also found a vending machine code for “Mintals”. In one of the offices I found a key to the basement and in another I read through a terminal which detailed an unpleasant visit from a pony called Dean Domino who didn’t seem happy that some mare had a sore throat. I didn’t feel it was important so I left it there. I had also taken a healing potion for my wing before I made my way to the stairs at the back of the hall which lead me down to the ground floor and in front of me sat one of those blue doors with an “Authorised Personnel” plaque on it.

“Might as well check the basement while I’m here” I said out loud to myself as I levitated the worn old key to the ancient lock and turned the key. There was a satisfying click and the door swung open on its creaky old hinges.

The first thing that came to me was the noise. A loud humming sound reverberated throughout the basement. I can easily identify that sound of the humming as I’ve grown up around such sounds since I was a little filly. The humming is the sound of a working generator. Secondly the basement’s structure is identical to the basement of the Police Station. What is it with basements and underground facilities having the exact same style of architecture?

I followed the short corridor until I came to another one of those security doors and opened it. The door slid down into the floor and it revealed a small but open room. The noise of the generator was now much louder. Inside I could see a table at the end with a terminal and the wall to my left had two windows that looked into where the Clinic’s generator screamed.

I flattened my ears against my skull to try and blot out the screeching of the generator. “Ugh, that sounds like it’s on its last legs” I mutter to myself as I trotted up to the terminal.

The old computer system booted up to reveal a screen displaying power control options for the Clinic.

“Shutdown main generator” I read on the screen. Hmm, turning off the main generator will stop that awful noise and turn off the power. Because this is a Clinic it would need to keep its main systems powered so it’ll have an auxiliary generator that would kick in as soon as it’ll lose its main power. Shutting down the generator will also keep it from probably exploding soon with how badly it was screeching. I can’t deal with this noise any longer so I quickly clicked on the option and soon the generator began to quieten down until it finally stopped and everything went quiet. A moment afterwards the dim lights faded until everything was cast into darkness. Elsewhere in the basement another hum started up but much, much quieter than the main one and shortly after the lights turned back on but a little dimmer than before.

“Thank Celestia that noise stopped”

With nothing else to keep my attention in the basement I walked back out and into the Clinic’s ground floor. The light hanging from the ceiling was glowing about half as bright as before. The corridor stretched on in front of me for as long as the one upstairs but didn’t have any doors on either side. At the end I noticed an open door that opened into an open room. I could see a door frame to the left of the open door and to the right I could see another door frame.

I absent mindedly fluffed my wings as I trotted up the corridor until I came to the door. To my right is another open door that leads into what looked like a lab for an autopsy and to my right I saw the door frame opened into another corridor but this one had lots of doors on either side and it branched around a corner at the end and there at the corner nestled up against the ceiling sat a speaker. I starred at it for a moment before sighing with relief as I noticed the square that would indicate the type of speaker was dark meaning it was powered down and I couldn’t hear the characteristic sound that usually came from the speaker.

I decided to check the open room first. It turned out to be the reception for the Clinic. It had a long counter that stretched almost the length of the room and also had a couple of terminals sitting on top of it. Around the room’s walls before the desk had lots of waiting chairs and a couple of small tables setup for visitors. Some of the chairs looked to have been knocked over like somepony left in a hurry. Something on the counter before me caught my eye and as I stepped up to the countertop I found another holotape. Picking this one up I was informed that I had found a vending machine code for healing potions. Well, I suppose I won’t be hurting for meds now. After pocketing the holotape my attention was again captured by a fluorescent glow coming from the far right corner of the waiting area of the reception. I smiled with delight at finding another Dean’s Stash lying on a chair. “Oh yes”

The case held within it plenty of things, most of it was really just junk, you know, crisps, water and among other things but it also contained ammo for .357 weapons and more Microfusion Cells. It also contained another Police Pistol and... Ugh... Another Cosmic Knife. Goddesses I’m sick of those things, especially when those abominations throw them on those Knife Spears. I’ve been stabbed in the ass by one and had several of them cut me as they whizzed past me. I unconsciously rubbed at my flank where it still had a tear in the fabric where the knife had stabbed me.

After pocketing the goodies I went back into the corridor and then looked in the room I thought was an autopsy lab. I scrunched up my nose at the horrific smell as I stuck my white head inside. The room literally smelled of death and it wasn’t hard to see (and smell) why. The room isn’t large, only about ten feet long and a few feet wide. Lining the back wall were three stretchers and two of these stretchers held the dead bodies of two ponies, headless ponies I might add. I couldn’t set hoof in the room with how powerful the stench was and it was so repulsive. From my position in the door I squinted in the low light at the necks of the dead ponies and just like the one back at the Bunker their necks were burnt, a sign of a collar detonation. I frowned and shook my head. “Two more unlucky tossers” I said to myself. While I shook my head my eyes had noticed something folded up on a table beside the door. Curious I levitated the clothing and let it unfold by gravity while I held it up by its forelegs. The garment turned out to be a suit of black sleek armour. The armour is thin but plenty sturdy and with the sleek design it looks to like it was designed for stealth. While holding it I let my pipbuck register it and frowned at the suit’s damage threshold as it was weaker than the Maredre Security Armour I’m wearing. I was about to put it back until I saw its value. “Seventy five hundred?” I blurted out and quickly stuffed it into my saddlebags. “I can sell that when I get back for a good sum”

Once the suit was safely stuffed in my saddlebags I quickly threw myself back away from the door and began to wretch. Dear goddesses that smell was killing my nostrils. I turned my attention now to the only place I haven’t checked yet in the Clinic. Collar 13 has to be in here somewhere. I began to walk up the corridor and peered into each open door as I walked by. Inside each room it was the same in each one, a cabinet and table and dominating the room a large cylindrical object. The object in question had turned out to be some advanced Auto-Doc. I’ve seen Auto-Docs before but these were different. I turned the corner and came to a dead end. It was then that I started to hear something. It sounded like a dentist drill which was followed by the sound of a vaccum used to clear water or whatever a dentist uses but the most disturbing sound was the thrashing against metal. The sound came from the end room. It sounded like a monster trying to escape a cage. Not wanting to walk into a trap I pulled out my BAR and held it so the barrel pointed at the Auto-Doc sitting in the middle of the room. I approached the medical unit with my gun raised and split my magic to press the release button. The door of the cylindrical device slid open with a hydraulic hiss and several robotic arms folded back up to the roof of the Auto-Doc. I think calling this a Suicide Chamber would have been more appropriate with the things I’m seeing on the ends of the robotic arms. Saws, drills, pincers, etc. Dear goddesses these things are horrible. My attention was then suddenly drawn to the occupant of the Auto-Doc as she stumbled out of the machine but then froze with dread as she came face to face with the muzzle of my BAR.

The pegasus standing before me has a light tan coat with a blond tail. She would have had a mane if not for the fact it looked to have been shaved off, most likely from the auto-doc. The most striking feature about this poor mare is her face. It would have been lovely to look at but it was riddled with scars. It looks like somepony had put this mare’s face together, making her look like Frankenstallion’s monster. She had a scar that encircled her forehead making it look like her head had been opened up and then put back on. As I examined the poor mare my gaze moved down to her neck where I saw the same type of collar I’m wearing, confirming this to be the pony I was looking for but then my gaze turned the bright red and fresh scar on her neck, like her throat had been slit.

“Are you alright?” I asked in concern.

The mare didn’t respond, instead she was staring at something. It took me a moment to realise I still had my heavy automatic rifle pointing at her face.

“Oh cock, sorry” I said quickly pulling the weapon back and placed it back on my back. The mare visibly relaxed a little now that the gun had been pulled away from her.

“Are you alright?” I repeated. The young pegasus opened her mouth to answer but then cringed in great pain which forced her to close her eyes as she screwed up her face in a grimace. When the pain faded she tried again but cringed again but this time she didn’t screw up her face but as she tried to speak, nothing came out, not a sound. She looked pained and confused that she couldn’t utter a single sound but she tried again with the same result.

“Can you talk?” I asked and immediately regretted it as the mare gave me an “Are you serious?” look.

The pegasus reached up with a hoof to her neck to feel at it, her hoof touched at the fresh red scar and she traced it along her neck. The poor pegasus’ eyes widened in shock as she felt the scar but then her eyes turned to confusion when her hoof then collided with her collar making her open her mouth in a silent eep at the unexpected touch and her eyes widened in shock and surprise as she began to feel at her collar. Her eyes widened more and more as she continued to feel at the collar. Her bright blue eyes were full of confusion until her hoof found the latch of the collar. She narrowed her eyes as she began to tug on the latch.

“Whoa stop!” I yelled as I used my magic to pull her hoof away from her collar.

She narrowed her eyes at me with light anger from the invasion of personal space and she yanked her hoof out of my magic. She opened her mouth to say something but cringed again and gave up trying to speak. She instead pointed at me and then shrugged her shoulder in a questioning manner.

“It’s a bomb collar, mess with it like that and it’ll explode” I explained sadly. Her eyes widened in disbelief, shock and fear of the explosive around her neck. She put her hoof back down as she stared at me. I could see her eyes looking me up and down but then her eyes focused on my own neck. At first I thought she was looking at the claw marks that were left behind thanks to those Wretches but then she lifted her hoof and pointed at my neck and tilted her head then pointed at her own neck again. It took me a second for it to click in my mind that she was indicating my collar. “Let’s just say we’re in this together”

The mare shook her head then raised an eyebrow not understanding. I stepped back allowing the mare to fully exit from the torture chamber. Her eyes caught sight of my side and my large wings and she quickly looked up at my forehead and then back to my side as she stepped out. She pointed to my side and then my forehead with a wing then shrugged with a questioning gaze.

I sighed “I’m not an Alicorn if that’s what you’re thinking”

I could see the question in her eyes as she silently mouthed it. “Then what are you?”

“I’m a Winged-Unicorn, fifty percent pegasus and fifty percent unicorn” I explained boredly as I’ve explained this to many ponies in the ten years since my mutation. “End of” I added to prevent further questioning. I took a breath as I then explained to the muted mare about what and why we are collared and here.

She listened but she seemed to take more of an interest when I mentioned Father Elijah, it was like she recognised the name and had some meaning to her but without her able to talk I couldn’t ask her to get an explanation. I doubt she’d be able to explain that with hoof and wing gestures. After I finished with my explanation I asked her a couple of questions such as how did she end up in the Auto-Doc and what sort of weapons she could use. The poor mare did a motion of somepony shoving against something and then indicated her back with her wings as a depiction to what happened to her to end up in the medical machine. To my question about weapons she simply nodded.

“Ok, here” I said as I levitated out a Police Pistol and a Cosmic Knife over to her. “Take these”

The mare nodded and plucked each weapon out of my magic with her mouth and gently stuck them into her tattered saddlebags that I noticed resting against her flank, hiding her cutie-mark.

“We need to get you back to the Fountain for moment, its safe there” I told her. I sighed. “It would be best for you to be in the safety of the Fountain. We are linked by our collars. If one of us dies, we all die. I’d feel better if you were someplace safe”

A light blush appeared on her cheeks at my mention of wanting her to be safe. “I have one last pony to find Blondie, and then we can work on getting out of here” Her blush deepened at my calling her Blondie but she smiled as a result and then nodded. “Oh, um, you don’t mind if I call you Blondie do you, it’s just until you get your voice back?” I asked her since I wouldn’t be able to get a name out of her until she could talk again. The blushing mare nodded with her smile still present.

I smiled softly “Alright then, let’s go” I said turning to the door to the hallway. The pegasus nodded and we began to make our way towards the front door. I turned the corner and began to move down the corridor until I felt a touch to my plump flank. The touch of the hoof to my flank made my wings flare and I blushed from the contact as I quickly turned to face the mare.

The muted pegasus blushed brightly as she realised her hoof had missed my rear armour plate and instead touched my flank. She shook her head trying to dispel the blush and then pointed up with her wing at the corner where the dead speaker hung.

“Oh that” I giggled softly realising that she had poked me to get my attention. “It’s a decayed speaker, if we hang around one too long it’ll cause our collars to explode” I informed her.

She frowned with her blush now gone. She made a face as if thinking then tapped at her collar with her hoof then started to click her tongue to simulate it beeping. Blondie then sat on her haunches and held up one of her forehooves upside down and then brought her other hoof down on top of it as if covering something and clicked her tongue slowly to simulate slowing down the beeping.

“You can... um, block or dampen the signal?” I asked and she nodded smiling that I got it. “Can you do that for all of us?” I asked hopeful. She was about to nod but then shook her head. She then indicated herself with a wing and then wave it to me and back again. “Just between us?” She nodded with a smile again. “How romantic” I joked with a smile as I turned back and started walking again. I missed the blush that spread across her face as I turned.

As luck would have it. As soon as we both left the Clinic we encountered two more Ghost Ponies. I’m getting sick of these things. In front of me I could see one and to our left I could hear another. I turned back to check on Blondie but she quickly whipped out the Police Pistol I gave her and with unexpected precision she had unloaded three shots directly into the Ghost Pony’s head to our left and it fell to the floor. She again surprised me as she put the gun away just as quickly as she got it out and she had then plucked out the Cosmic Knife and then dove at the downed Ghost, knowing that it’ll get back up since it was still intact.

I screamed out in pain as I felt one of those accursed knife spears slice through my left ear and then I got hit in the side of the head by the spear handle as it impacted the door behind me.

“Argh, you son of a bitch” I yelled with pained anger as I turned to face the offending monster. Gritting my teeth I pulled the BAR off my back. The monster started its odd sideways jumps. I followed its movement with my eyes and the gun barrel. I needed to wait for the right moment to fire. I narrowed my eyes with hate while I grit my teeth harder as I followed it moved. In the corner of my eye I saw Blondie rejoin me with a confused look on her face as she watched me keeping my aim on the monster. Finally the creature landed and began to pull itself up. That was it, the moment I needed while it was recovering from its jump. I pulled the trigger of the BAR and fired off three rounds.

“Eat shit and die” I scream with hateful anger as the three powerful rifle rounds slammed into the creatures head. The first shot blew out its mask’s eye, the second punched through its forehead and the third shot ploughed through its unprotected eye and blew out the back of its head and brains. The creature collapsed to the floor with a huge hole in the back of its head. Without a brain I doubt it’ll be getting back up.

After the Ghost Pony died I felt the rage fade and I shook my head as I felt dizzy from the sudden rush of hate and anger. I haven’t felt that much hate for anything for the last five years. I fear the stress of this place is beginning to get to me. Goddesses only knows what that hate and anger will make me do here. I shiver at the thought.

I felt a hoof touch my shoulder and turned to look at Blondie. She looked concerned and her eyes asked the question. “Are you ok?”

I took a deep breath to recover from the sudden hateful rush and nodded. “Yes, I’m ok now, thank you” I said with a weak smile. “C’mon, let’s go” Blondie nodded and we continued but still looked concerned.

It took us a couple of minutes to work our way back to the main gates of the Medical District and then back to the Fountain where we found God waiting for us. The purple alicorn turned and her eyes found Blondie close behind me and she approached her.

“What do we have here? Why, it’s a little doll. Were you carved by a craftspony or by a drunken idiot with a knife? Scars tell a story, some new, some old. The one on your neck is fresh and red” She spoke calmly and slightly darkly before she trotted back to the Fountain.

Oooookay... That was weird.

Blondie just glared after the alicorn.

“Ok, Blondie, I’m going to need you to wait here while I go and find Collar 15 in the Residential District”

I turned to face her and put my organic right forehoof onto her shoulder “Will you be alright alone with God?” I asked with concern for her.

Blondie reached up and took my hoof into her’s and held it softly as she looked up at me. Her eyes looked saddened but she had a question in her eyes. She pointed down the east street and then back to the fountain asking. “Will you come back?”

“Don’t worry, once I find Collar 15 I’ll come back, I promise”

She stared into my eyes for a moment before she let go of my hoof and nodded as she sat down by the fountain to wait. “Don’t worry about God, she won’t hurt you” I said reassuringly before looking back to the alicorn before adding. “Won’t you?” Directed at her.

“Of course not” Was her simple reply.

“Good” I said as I turned and begun down the street for the Residential District.

XXXXX

I groaned as I heaved open the heavy gates to the Residential District of the Villa. I didn’t realise just how heavy they were and it didn’t occur to me to use my magic to open them. The gates opened up to a street with an intersection just a little ways up from the gate and ended at a dead end by a wall. I could see a set of stairs and an iron gate on either side of the dead end. There is also a fountain nestled against the wall of the stairs before the gate. As I stepped into the district and let the large gates close I noticed a dead Ghost Pony lying on the floor with a large canister next to it and just before the stairs I could see the orange glow of an armed Land Mine.

“I’m picking up signals near your location. Detonators! Watch for traps” Father Elijah’s voice rang out from my PipBuck and again making me scream.

“For the love of Luna’s butt hole will you stop doing that” I screamed in anger and frustration. Even his unexpected warnings are starting to piss me off now. Ugh, if I ever meet this stallion face to face I’m gonna sock him one in the bugle.

I approached the dead Ghost Pony and picked up the canister it had laying next to it. The canister looked like a gas tank similar to a propane tank but taller. The canister had a detonator and a sensor module strapped to it which told me it was a makeshift proximity bomb. I decided to pocket the Gas Bomb as I think it’ll come in hoofy later on.

I stood at the opening to the street going to the right of the gate and saw how it curved around to the left. I lifted my mechanical leg and looked at the map screen of my PipBuck. I toggled to the local map and found that the street curved around to a dead end with no other doors or pathways to lead away from it. I shook my head and turned to the dead end of the street facing the gate. I approached the gate and frowned as I found it was locked and judging by the small complex lock it has I doubt I’ll be able to pick it in this dim lighting and I didn’t want to chance breaking the lock so I decided to leave it alone. I instead turned to the fountain and pocketed all of the chips lying inside its basin.

The mine before my hooves started to beep as I approached it and I quickly tapped it on its sensor to disarm it. I sighed with relief as the glowing orange light faded as it disengaged and shut down leaving it harmless. I could have picked it up but I didn’t feel the need to carry this mine. I don’t think it’ll be useful so I decided to leave it there. I walked up the stairs to an open door and a set of breeze blocks which to a set of boards bridging the gap between the top of the stairs and a flat roof on the opposite side. Curious to where the boards lead I looked over to the roof and saw a hole in the wall to an apartment.

“Hmm, might be something useful in there” I said to myself as I climbed up onto the creaky old boards. I feared they’d collapse on me. I mentally facehoofed when I remembered I have wings. The room through the hole in the wall is very dark and I can barely see anything inside. I was about to take a step when I noticed a wire spanning the width of the hole.

“A trip wire” I said to myself as I bent down low to see where the wire was connected. I found it tied off to a metal pole sticking out of the floor. I used my magic to take hold of the wire and began to untie it. Suddenly a loud bang echoed out from the room. I instinctively flattened myself to the floor with my wings spread out from my sides to try to make myself as little as possible. As I dropped I felt something pepper the rear armour plating of my security suit.

“Bollocks” I cried out in shock and surprise. I picked myself up and checked my rump to make sure I hadn’t been hurt but thankfully the buckshot at bounced harmlessly off my armour. I entered the dark room and lit up my horn and there sitting on a small table facing the hole in the wall lay a shotgun in a makeshift cradle with a servo pressing against its trigger. I took note of the wire connected to it which is now slack. “Celestia’s mane, I can’t believe I just triggered this” I groaned to myself in annoyance at triggering such a primitive trap.

Without the danger of a trap going off I was able to explore this room. It turned out to be a living room as it held a couch, a couple of tables, a TV set which had a cracked screen and a chest of drawers. Nestled between the sofa and the corner wall I found an ammunition box which I quickly cleaned out of its Microfusion Cells and hoofful of .357 Magnum Rounds. I need to find more .308 rounds or my BAR will be nothing but a glorified club soon. I opened the drawers to search them one at a time. I found nothing until I opened the bottom drawer and found a picture frame sitting inside. I blinked and used my magic to gently pull it out and sat on my haunches as I then took the frame in my hooves and looked upon the photos sitting inside it which had survived the test of time and still remained clear.

My eyes began to water as I looked at the photos of the family of two ponies and their three foals and my eyes focused on one photo in particular. In the bottom right of the collection of pictures in the frame sat a picture of a mare smiling happily at the camera as she held in her hooves while laying on a hospital bed, three bundles, her three newborn foals. I began to weep seeing these three foals as my mind flooded with memories of my own three foals. I’ve been away from them now for probably two days. I’ve never been this long away from my fillies. Oh Celestia, I hope they are ok. I.. I need to get back to them. The twins, they still need me. Oh goddesses I miss them so much.

I cried for a good few minutes until my despair turned to rage. I’ve been stolen from my family, from my friends and more importantly from infant foals. I threw the photo frame back into the drawer and stepped out onto the roof and yelled with all my pain and anger into the morning sky.

“WHEN I FIND YOU ELIJAH, I’M GOING TO KILL YOU”

I dropped my head as I panted and groaned as I struggled to recover from the sudden shift in emotions and the sudden surge of anger. I quickly began doing some breathing exercises that my husband taught me to regain my composure and my emotions. I can’t lose it hear. I groaned softly to myself as I forced myself to keep going.

I had to drop to the floor again as I trigged another shotgun trap at the open door at the top of the stairs after climbing down from the wooden board bridge. Luckily this time I avoided taking a hit but it still annoyed the hell out of me. This place is so damn dark it’s hard to spot such simple traps.

I completely ignored the room and stepped out onto the top of the stairs outside the other end. It’s really dark on this side. The stairs lead down to a cobble stone path where it then opens up to what seems to be a large open area. Opposite the stairs I’m standing on is another set leading to the opposite side. On the walls from where the other set of stairs lead I can see another balcony that leads around the perimeter of the open area for all I can see. I took a single step to begin going down the stairs when I heard a snap and then three distinct pings as something small and metallic hit the floor.

“Oh cock!”

Knowing what was about to happen I spread my wings and beat them hard as I flung myself back taking to the air as I threw myself out the other side and flew to the gate and hunkered down and spread a wing over me to shield myself from what was about to come. I closed my eyes and braced myself.

KA-BOOM!!!

I felt a peppering of things landing on me followed by the sounds of wood and plaster and slate hitting the floor around me. After most of the bits landed I removed my wing and climbed back up to my hooves and stared at the apartment I was in moments ago.

“Holy Celestia” I gaped as I saw the roof. The roof was blown out and twisted out of shape. I knew a Grenade Bouquet was powerful from past experience but fuck that was more than I expected.

I made my back to the door where I triggered the trap and gaped at the now massive hole in the wall and roof where the door once was. I stared in confusion at ruined wall. “Where’s the brick, where’s the interior wall, the breeze blocks? This is just wood and plasterboard... Talk about cutting corners. Who the flying fuck would approve the construction of this place with this weak structuring?” I shook my head in confusion at the revelation that the Villa wasn’t built to code and moved on.

I found a vending machine in a small alcove at the bottom of the stairs, against the wall of the stairs going up to the next apartment I found another fountain and pocketed the few chips sitting on its rim. I stopped suddenly as listened. My ears swivelled around as I strained myself to hear over the constant rumbles of thunder and the constant howling noise I began to hear the sounds of a Ghost Pony respirator. I flattened myself up against the wall beside the stairs and peeked around the corner and peered into the large open area. The open space is a large rectangle, I can see four raised soil beds with three of them having black withered dead trees inside them, there are also three ammunition boxes and a medical box in the middle of them and the balcony that began from the apartment above me around the length of the rectangle and ended on the far side. The most striking feature here however is the thick red cloud that swirled and hung in the air filling the space. “Oh terrific” I groaned at the sight of the cloud. While I stared around the plaza my eyes caught sight of the glowing green eyes of the Ghost Pony’s mask. I could barely see the creature through the haze of the cloud but it seemed to be on the balcony above, well it wasn’t a threat right now being up there.

The plaza is lined with arches which are pretty much common among the Villa architecture. I kept low and trotted as quietly as I could around the wall until I stepped under the arches under the balcony. The path under the arches was thankfully sheltered by from the cloud allowing me to move from one side to the other without getting affected by the cloud. I stopped about halfway down the side of the plaza as I came to a passage into a tiny square but also because I could hear the hoof steps of the Ghost above me. The Ghost continued unaware of my presence and trotted past above me as it was moving closer to the apartment the stairs would lead to. Curious about the small square I walked through the passage and followed the path around a pointless open square hole in the middle and then I found a suitcase up against the back corner. I grinned as I found another Dean’s Stash.

“Sweet, just how many of these has this pony left behind?” I asked myself as I sat down and opened the case.

The case held another Police Pistol, a 9mm Pistol and a Laser Pistol. I took them and the ammunition that was also inside while also taking a few of the miscellaneous items such as food and also taking the medical items inside, just a couple of healing potions, two bottles of Rad-X and a packet of Rad-Away.

KA-BOOM!!!

“Holy shit!” I screamed in shock and surprise as another large explosion rang out throughout the Residential District. “What the bucking hell was that?”

I rushed out from the small square and stood between one of the arches to the large plaza and looked to my right at the now smoking doorway of the apartment where the balcony started. I blinked and stared as smoke billowed out of the now twisted doorway. It was then that I realised I couldn’t hear the Ghost Pony’s respirator nor could I see its red marker on my EFS.

I giggled to myself as I realised what happened. The Ghost Pony had set off the same type of trap I did just minutes ago. Well, that’s one less Ghost to deal with. I looked out into the cloud and saw the boxes. They seem rather close here. Maybe I can grab the items before the cloud severely hurts me. I took a deep breath, cringing as the burn of the sulphur and copper ran down my throat before I flapped my wings and rocketed to the boxes. While holding my breath I opened the boxes and cleared out the ammunition and then took the healing potions and bobby pins in the medical box. When I got to the boxes I realised there were also three packets of Rad-Away resting on the floor between two ammo boxes which I also pocketed as soon as I found them. I could feel my lungs burning with the lack of oxygen and with my body needing air I gasped and took in a deep breath. A breath that sent my head reeling and my insides heaving and churning as the full effects of the cloud began to take its effects on me. My vision began to blur as my head swam plus the tears forming in my eyes. I cried out in pain from the cloud and then flared my wings and flapped my wings as powerfully as I could while to throw myself out of the cloud.

I came out of the cloud and crashed into the wall of the apartment under the balcony and collapsed onto my side panting and breathing heavily. “Hate... gasp... that fucking... gasp... cloud” I groaned deeply with painful gasps of the semi-fresh air. I lay there for a few minutes getting my breath back before finally pulling myself back up to my hooves and quickly downing two healing potions to recover from the effects of the cloud.

Once recovered from the cloud I shakily climbed the stairs to the open door. I stopped and blinked at the wall beside the door as I found graffiti scrawled on the wall.

“THE FLOORS HAVE TEETH” It warned.

“The floors have teeth?” I repeated. “What’s that suppose to mean?”

I cautiously entered the apartment. The room was in complete disarray as the floor, walls and ceiling around the middle of the room were bowing from the damage they had taken from the grenade explosions and this had also thrown everything in the room every which way. While I searched the mess my eyes focused on the steel construct on the floor next to the hole in the floor. I couldn’t forget what sat on the floor; I lost my leg to an enchanted one. It was a bear-trap what had snapped closed and it was then that I understood the warning outside the door. It meant the bear-trap on the floor. I suppose there must be more of them elsewhere.

I gingerly stepped around the weakened hole in the floor and stepped out onto the balcony which creaked under my weight. I fear the blast had weakened the balcony and quickly moved away from the damaged area. I sighed with relief as the balcony held and I began to make my way along the balcony. There were no other doors on the balcony apart from the door at the very end facing the one I had just left. I began to walk more cautiously as I turned the corner to the last portion of the balcony to the door as I remembered all the previous traps that I’ve triggered and seen. I suspected another trap at the door like the two shotgun traps from earlier. As I neared the door I began to see the outline of a gas bomb against the door frame.

“Please don’t be a mine” I groaned to myself. I breathed a sigh of relief as I came to the open door and found that the bomb was just a gas canister as it didn’t have a detonator or a sensor module. I stepped up to the threshold, my right forehoof standing on the floor of the door frame. As I examined the door I noticed that the canister is also resting against a table.

CRASH!

I whirled my head back around to look behind me, exposing the entire right side of my face to the canister. I could see the opposite door billowing with dust. Breathing out in relief I put my left forehoof down and then heard a click.

“Oh... cock...”

Click... bang...

KA-BOOM!!!