Fallout Equestria: Don't Fear The Reaper

Fallout Equestria: Don’t Fear The Reaper

By: The Zealot

Chapter 6

It was a short walk before I could see the well, just before the clearing was a large rock outcropping which Sunny hid behind.

“Alright, let’s see if we can take them by surprise, be quite.” She said, lowering herself slightly and stepping carefully from the rock to a bush, I did the same shortly after she moved on.

When I was behind the cover Sunny had previously occupied I saw our targets, five rather large lizar- sorry, geckos. As I looked at them I took a second to look back on what we had learned in the stable, all that I was taught had been lies, we were told that geckos were small, they were huge! Sunny snuck up behind one of the geckos and I did the same to another, quickly she snapped it’s neck, I tried to jam a knife into it’s throat but I missed, causing it to let out a shriek which alerted the the rest of them. Quickly I backed up and put the rifle to it’s skull before pulling the trigger, this had the intended, if messy, effect of blowing it’s head off. I blanched at the sight before turning to the other geckos. I had seen enough blood in the stable that the deaths of these animals didn't shock me as it might have somepony who had not been through the experience of seeing everypony they knew die. I lined up a shot on one of the geckos before remembering something, S.A.T.S. the Stable-Tec Arcane Targeting System. I activated it and watched as time slowed to a crawl and the gecko I was aiming at went alight with green, S.A.T.S. allowed me to target different body parts of the gecko, and gave me a percentage for hit chance. I keyed in two shots to the torso and felt control of my body leave me for a few seconds as S.A.T.S. followed the commands I had given it, I was left with a dead gecko in front of me.

“Well, that could have gone better, anyway, we still got this place clear, let’s move on to the next one. Also, don’t worry about stealth anymore, they probably heard what happened here and will be expecting us…. Damn geckos.” I barely heard the last part which she muttered under her breath, I gave her a simple nod before looking around a collecting the cases from the rounds I fired from my rifle, hopefully I could find somewhere to remake them into real ammo.

As we were walking I heard a scream coming from below a rock outcropping, I ran over and saw a mare getting attacked by geckos, without a second thought I jumped from the ledge onto one of the geckos, stunning it, I turned to another gecko, noticing a strange sword sticking from the abdomen of one of the geckos, paying it no mind I activated S.A.T.S. and keyed a shot to the remaining gecko’s head. Turning back to the gecko I didn't kill I saw it with a gaping hole in it’s chest, not caused by a bullet but from something sharp…. Strange.

“Are you alright? Good, you should get back to the town, it’s dangerous out here with the geckos roaming around.” I said to the mare, noticing that she was wearing some light clothes, probably to help with the sand of the desert, she was a lime colored mare with a light blue mane.

“Y-yes, I’m fine, thank you for saving me. I didn't know there were geckos out here and I was just getting some water. I’ll go back to town and wait until the wells are cleared.” She said, turning around and trotting back up the hill, hopefully back to town.

“I always tell these ponies not to come out here without somepony else, oh well. Good job keeping her from being gecko food, that was the last well anyway. So, what do you say I teach you something else to help you survive out here?” Sunny said, looking down on me from the ledge I had jumped from not minutes before.

“Um, thanks, I guess. Anyway, yeah, anything I can learn to survive out here would be appreciated.” I say, giving her a smile and walking back up the hill to where she was. She started walking off to where a campfire used to be and sat down next to it.

“Alright now. We’re going to be making something folks on the trail call Healing Powder.” She said, taking an old beat up lighter from her armor and using it to start the campfire up anew.

“Now, you’re going to need some Xander Root and some Broc Flower. If I remember correctly there should be some Xander Root by the old schoolhouse, and I think I saw some Broc Flower growing up by the cemetery.” She said, pointing out said locations on a small map she had retrieved from her armor.

“Alright, I'll go get the ingredients, shouldn't be too hard.” I said with a smile before turning towards the marker that had appeared on my EFS, along with an indicator that appeared in the top-left corner of my vision proclaiming ‘Quest Complete: Clear Out The Geckos.’ and then ‘Quest Accepted: By a Campfire on the Trail.’ I assumed that the marker lead to one of the things I would need for this ‘quest’.

I never really questioned how the Pip-Buck made up these quest indicators, nor how it new the locations of needed items. I could understand that it made up it’s map using old pre-war satellites along with the auto-map function built into it, how it marked ponies and things on that map I had no idea.

It was a short walk to the cemetery, barely five minutes. When I arrived there were these huge bug…. Things. As I got closer they started spitting at me or something, and my EFS marked them as hostile. There were around three of them so I just decided to use my magic and slam them all together. Proceeding to do that, I found they were very weak creatures, slamming them together had about crushed all three of them. Leaving to the dirt I looked around for the Broc Flower, Sunny had shown me what they look like before I went to get the ingredients, so it didn't take long for me to find the orange flower. As I was leaving I noticed something peculiar, on one of the graves was an old pre-war snow globe, upon closer inspection I saw it was of Canterlot. With a small shake of my head I turned from the snow globe and made my way down the hill the cemetery was on, and into the town proper so as to get to the schoolhouse.

Getting to the schoolhouse also didn't take long, four minutes at most. Upon entering the yard I was met with the sight of two large praying mantises, it seemed that they had been mutated by the radiation in the wastes. Behind them I could make out the shape of the Xander Root, I got a short look at it before the mantises charged at me, I did the same to them as I had to the bug things, picking them up in my magic I crushed them together with a wet crunching sound. Dropping their mangled bodies to the ground I stepped around them and picked the Xander Root from the earth.

With the ingredients I needed gathered I made my way back to the campfire Sunny was lounging by, I thought for a third time how small Goodsprings really was, it took not five minutes to get from one end to the other, the time it took to get to the wells was also quite short. Upon reaching the campfire I was greeted by Sunny and Cheyenne

“So, I take it you got the Xander Root and Broc Flower? Alright come over here and I’ll show you how to make Healing Powder.” She said as I walked over to her, I sat down a retrieved the ingredients from my pockets.

“Alright, first thing you do is hold the ingredients over the fire to dry them, your magic’ll make that easier.” After she said that I used my magic to levitate the herbs over the flame of the campfire, keeping them there while turning them slowly for a time, before Sunny held her hoof up in a stopping motion.

“That’s good, now the next and final step is easy, just take a bowl or plate or something and grind them together, mix that up in a bag and you have Healing Powder.” She said as I moved the ingredients from the flame, she nudged an old plate towards me with her hoof, so that I might have a surface to grind the ingredients up on.

I wasted no time in using my magic to turn the flower and root into a fine powder, I then picked that up with my magic and dumped it into a small brown canvas bag that Sunny had produced from her armor.

“Now, just rub that on any wounds you have and it should fix you right up, be careful though, it’ll make you a bit woozy if you use too much.” She said, getting to her hooves from her sitting position, I placed the bag into one of my coat pockets after using a string to tie the top of, closing it up.

“Well, I've taught you all I know about surviving out here, that's relevant anyway, any more you’ll have to learn yourself. If you’re planning on leaving, go talk to Amber Light in the saloon before you go.” She said turning from me, she started to walk back towards the town.

“Sunny, thanks for teaching me all of this, I’m sure it’ll be useful when I’m out there on my own. I’ll go see Amber, have a good da- um, night.” I said, only then noticing that the sky had turned from it’s regular muted light to a darker black, how I didn't notice the time earlier, I have no idea.

Sunny gave me a nod and a smile before heading back towards the down, probably to turn in for the night. I followed her into the town and made my way to the alley I had slept in earlier, using my coat as a blanket and my leg as a pillow I once more drifted off into the land of sleep, content with my learnings for the day.

Quest Complete: By a Campfire on the Trail.

Hoofnote: Level Up (Level 4): Survival increased to 35. Perk Gained: By a Campfire: You gain 4 more health each second from food items you cook at campfires and hotplates.