Fallout Equestria: Towards the Future

I looked up at the aerial ballet that was my drill instructor dancing around a young gray mare, as she was supposed to be shooting at the instructor with saddle mounted beam rifles that were loaded with stun gems.

“She’s lasting longer than you did, Flash.” an emerald green mare said to him as he leaned against her while she ran a hoof through his mane.

“Yeah, I told her to keep her guard up and strike when possible,” he said with a confident smile.

I shot him a smirk, “So is that what you did? Because I don’t see her putting her hooves over her head crying and surrendering while getting her flank peppered by the instructor.” I asked as the sarcasm dripped from every word.

He glared at me, “Better than anything you could do Split Dash,” he sat up grinning, “if I recall you barely qualified with the beam rifle, and that is what this training is about… hitting a moving target.” he let out a sharp laugh as he leaned back down.

It was true; I sucked at trying to hit anything with a beam rifle. I preferred to know that if I was fighting for my life that I didn’t have to worry about a weapon jam or the weapon breaking. If I got my hooves on the pony I was supposed to be fighting then I knew if I lost it was my own weakness.

I looked back in time to see the mare fall and land on the clouds that, despite being so soft, knocked the wind out of her.

The Instructor glanced around smiling with glee, “Any other takers?” she asked with such a tone of arrogance that I was sure her ego would suffocate us all.

Flash waved with a big smile, “Drill Instructor!” she looked at him curiously, “Splitstream said he can take you.”

I looked at him with a mixture of anger and amusement. The instructor laughed as she spun to look at me, “Well then Splitstream get up here and prepare for the best flank spank you have ever gotten.”

I raised my eyebrows at that then shrugged, “Might as well get this over with,” I stood up and slowly took to the air.

We turned to face each other; her cocky smile was so wide I thought her head was going to fall back on a hinge. She cocked her head to the side, “So you think you can take me?”

I shrugged, “I guess we're going to find out.”

Her smile faded and her eyes tried to burn my soul out of my head, “I have never lost to a trainee since I became an instructor,” her voice dangerous, “and I would rather kiss a dragon’s ass than let a Dashite want-to-be, beat me.”

I was going to respond by saying something sarcastic but decided that being up here was pushing my luck. The officer standing by the bleachers where everypony else was watching me looked up at us and shouted “READY,” before he blew a whistle.

Before the echo of the whistle died I had the barrel of my beam rifle under her chin. She glared down at me with a mixture of shock and pure rage, but I just smiled at her, “I win…” and her head snapped back as the stun hit her fully under the chin and sent her falling to the clouds below.

*****

I slowly opened my eyes as I started to discover that I was still alive. I tried to sit up but my body wasn’t having any of that as I just flopped back down onto a very old and grimy mattress. I glanced around and noticed that I was in a very old and poorly maintained house.

My scan of the room stopped when I noticed a pink filly with a bright red mane and deep blue eyes staring at me with a yellow crayon hanging out of her mouth. I smiled weakly at her, “Hi,” she didn’t budge, “my name is Splitstream, what’s yours?”

She spoke in softly, “Bubble Gum.”

I continued to smile, “That’s a pretty name,” I coughed a bit as I started to realize I was feeling both hot and cold at the same time… and I was thirsty, “hey Bubble Gum, is it possible to get something to drink?”

She nodded her head. She stood up and put the crayon back into the box where it came from and walked over to a door, “Uncle Silver, he’s awake now,”

A deep very raspy voice called to her, “Oh really? I hadn’t expected him to be awake this soon.”

Bubble Gum walked away from the door and over to a refrigerator and pulled it open. I was watching her hoping she would hurry up as I hear the sound of hooves draw closer to me. I smiled at the filly as she pulled a Sparkle Cola from the fridge and started to pull on the top with her teeth, “Cute filly you have there,” I smiled as I looked up at him and as soon as I made eye contact my heart tried to run off and hide behind my cutie mark for protection.

“Don’t scream… don’t scream…” I said to myself under my breath as the zombie unicorn smiled down at me. I tried to smile back but I couldn’t help think that I looked like I wanted to run away screaming, and if it wasn’t for my body hating my right now I probably would have.

The zombie rolled his eyes, “My guess would be that you are new to the wasteland huh?” I nodded at him, “that would explain why your body is trying to fight a bad infection. You are not used to the atmosphere down here,” he placed a gross flesh rotten leg up to my head, “yeah you're still burning up,”

Bubble Gum walked over with the Sparkle Cola, with its cap on still, sat down and held it up for the unicorn to pop the top off for her. She took the cap and dropped it into a small box next to her as she slowly tipped the soda into my mouth.

A roof temperature, flat, carroty tasting liquid washed over my tongue as I swallowed the contents of the bottle rather quickly, “I never thought that would taste so good flat and warm.” I said trying to say something so the zombie pony wouldn’t eat me. I looked up at him as her ruffled Bubble Gums mane, “Are you going to eat me?”

The zombie looked at me then let out a raspy laugh, “No, Pegasi are far too tough and stringy,” the unicorn laughed. I felt the blood drain from my face, “I prefer fillies, much more tender,” he spun around at Bubble Gum.

I jumped to my hooves… or tied to but just fell over onto the floor, “NO!” I was reaching for him when I started to hear Bubble Gum laughing very loudly. I rolled around till I noticed that he was blowing raspberries into her stomach. I dropped my head to the floor, “You are a very evil zombie, you know that?”

The unicorn looked up at me with a raised eyebrow… or at least I think it was an eyebrow… maybe at one point anyhow, “Zombie? No son, I am what is known as a ghoul, I was exposed to an ungodly amount of radiation and haven’t had the good graces to die… or stay dead anyhow.”

Bubble Gum walked back over to her crayon box and pulled out a new crayon and started coloring. He sat down and looked at me for a few moments before I looked up at him, “What happened to me?”

He let out a long sigh, “I don’t really know. Bubble Gum and I were taking a rest here after a long days travel when you came crashing through three floors almost on top of us,” he fished out a bright red bottle of something. He popped the cap off and floated it over to me, “good thing I was here and that I used to be a doctor, or we wouldn’t be having this conversation. Now drink up.”

I drank the red liquid down. It was flavorless and for some reason I started to feel better. I started to sit up when my whole body decided to let me know that I was in a lot of pain still. I laid back down and closed my eyes, “Kind of wish that fall finished me off.”

Silver looked at me curiously, “Why is that?”

I looked up at the ceiling and reached out a hoof towards it, “I never had anything while I was up there because of my cutie mark,” I let my hoof drop down next to me, “and now I have even less than that.”

He gave me a weak smile before looking up at Bubble Gum, “That little filly had a nice family until a few raiders decided to take everything away from her as well.” I looked at Bubble Gum who was happily coloring while humming a catchy little tune. I felt a little ashamed now, “She was all but broken when I came across her, I didn’t think she would recover the way she did, but I know that is still bothers her greatly,” he looked down at me with a sad look in his eye, “she almost died sitting under an overturned cart alone and in the dark.”

I have to admit that even if no pony liked me I still wasn’t alone, “I…” what was I supposed to say to something like that. So I just rolled over and watched Bubble Gum happily color.

Silver cleared his throat, “I also decided to try something different in regards to the damage to your wing. I hope you will find it satisfactory.”

“My wing?” I looked at him the looked back at my wings and my jaw hit the floor. Both of my wings had a rare piece of Enclave armor covering them. The extremely light weight metal was still a glossy black. The edge along my wing was a metal that was combined with the edge of a dragon claw. I opened my uninjured wing and nearly jumped as a small blade extended from the tip making the edge about 6 inches longer. I relaxed my wing and the blade snapped back inside.

I just gawked at them, “First question… Why?”

He smiled, “Your right wing was badly damaged but not to the point where I couldn’t do anything about it, but I needed to put it into something stable and I’m severely lacking in proper medical supplies for a Pegasus, so I improvised. They made an excellent brace and held your wing in place while it healed.”

I tucked my wind back against my body, “ok second question… Where did you get these and where is the rest of the armor?” I was looking at him more intently than I intended but it just made him laugh.

“I had a really good friend that wore this and he never liked the full armor. He said it was too big for a Pegasus of his... prowess,” he looked at my wings, “and as for the rest of it, I’m not sure. He gave me those and told me to run as we were being overrun by feral ghouls,” he notice my look and quickly changed topics, “a feral ghoul is a pony who is a lot like me except they lost who they were and are mindless zombies. I was able to get out fine being a ghoul myself but he had no hope, so instead of waiting for him to be torn to pieces in front of me I took these and ran.”

He had a look that said he wished it had been him that was back there and his friend survived, “Why me? You don’t even know me?” I said quietly.

He looked up at Bubble Gum who looked up at us and smiled before turning back to her drawing, “Hasn’t stopped me before,” he stood up with a groan, “you should get some rest. Your body will win this fight but it will fight better if you rest it,” with that he walked over to Bubble Gum spoke to her and she nodded looking at me then got up and followed him out of the room.

I laid there listening to the rain when everything that happened to me started to replay in my mind.

I grabbed my head when I reached the point where I found Citrus dead, “Why didn’t I try and see why he killed him? I mean why kill a janitor as old as the complex itself?” I sat there thinking for a few moments until I pulled the pillow I had over my head, “Uh brain, why is you no work right now?” I whined

“Are you an idiot?” said a small voice next to me.

I looked up at bubble Gum as she looked at me with a raised eyebrow, “What?”

She sighed, “Your body is trying to fight a bad infection which is giving you a high fever, which means that your brain is tired and wants rest.” I just stared at her wide eyed. She took my pillow and put it under my head and pulled a musty smelling blanket over my body, “Now you need to try and get some sleep or I will get my uncle to put you to sleep.”

The look she gave me caused me to swallow hard and nod as I slowly put my head down. I started to feel very tired as my head finally had time to relax, “Meh, I will think of what I should do now after a good night’s sleep.” I stretched slowly closed my eyes.

A loud BANG from outside combined with a scream from Bubble Gum told me sleep was going to be a very overrated thing right now.