Fallout Equestria - Long Way Home

Chapter 7

Discerning The Transmundane

“A moral compass I have, it’s just... magnetic north tends to wander”

I awoke with a start, my location not coming to my mind for a few seconds. Sitting up

 on the mattress my first thought was to check where Bright was located. Looking over to check the only other bed in the room, he was decidedly absent from his bed. Looking for him was going to be an arduous task. Getting to my feet and then stretching took a minute, while doing this a thought struck me. Did this place have free breakfasts? If they did would they have one of those waffle makers. The more skeptical of my thoughts were suppressed, namely the unlikelihood of finding a power supply in this place coupled with the scarcity of relatively fresh food made the odds of finding waffle making equipment and supplies maddeningly low.

Now up and about in a semi-conscious state, I went about putting my armour on.

You know how after you have an inanimate object for enough time and it serves you well you begin to have an emotional attachment to it. That was me at that moment, I was beginning to think of the Riot Gear as more of a bullet proof second skin. Actually scratch that, it felt more like a badass carapace made out of an advanced chitin. These happy ruminations went through my mind while I went over the increasingly familiar mundane tasks associated with living in a hellhole.

        Five minutes later I was fully equipped, walking out the door with Epilogue slung over my back I began to whistle...poorly.  Jaunty tunes aside, I was seriously wondering about the prospect of a free breakfast of any kind as I strutted down the hall in what I hoped  was the direction of the check-in desk from last night. Before long I realized that I had managed to get lost in a small bed and breakfast, granted it was an alien bed and breakfast, but that fact did little to alleviate my self-disappointment. After some wandering through the halls of this place, I came across a dining room with a couple of patrons. The ponies were talking softly in small groups before they noticed me. I tried to stop the inevitable stares, or worse, that came with my appearance by waving and starting a dialogue.

        “How’s the weather?” I say using the most generic icebreaker known to mankind.

I just hoped perhaps irrationally that the social conventions were the same.

        “Wow never seen a minotaur here before, and one without horns no less.” A white coated unicorn stallion with a pencil thin moustache said to the room.

        What I got from this was, first off these ponies must be somewhat educated, secondly I could pass as a minotaur with my helmet equipped (sometimes), lastly these ponies must be either very stupid or fearless. Thinking further on the subject I realized that the those two features weren’t mutually exclusive.

        Coming back to the goal at hand I wondered if these ponies had seen Bright.

“Have any of you seen a unicorn colt with an orange mane?” I ask to the dining ponies.

        A lime green earth pony mare turned towards me and began to speak.

“He said he was going to the sheriff's office,” She says then pauses seeming to think very hard for a second before continuing. “He also said to tell.. mmm what was his name? Rhymes with steak.. Oh! Right, Cake! He asked us to tell Cake to talk to the innkeeper before looking for him. You wouldn’t be Cake by chance?” she says wanting very badly to know the answer to her inquiry.

        “That would be the name of a pastry, madam. I am Jake of the Far North Deserts, King of the Matriarchal Kingdoms of the Far Eastern Vikings, God of the non denominational denizens of the Holy Land. Anyways, thank you for the information” I said politely.

“You’re welcome, for a waste wanderer you don’t share a lot of those degenerates tendencies.” She said gleefully, my previous conclusion towards her ignorance being affirmed at her acceptance of my titles.

I wasn’t entirely sure what she was referring to; she probably considered me to be eloquent after referencing my multiple job titles of lordship.

“Anyways I have to track down a kid, so bye” I say in the awkward way that I often speak in.

        “Ehem,” grunted the lime green Mare. “We’re called foals during our youth.”

     I walked away from this comment, flipping the bird at her without turning around. She stared for a moment, then immediately came to a conclusion.

        “Farewell to you too, Stranger!” spoke the pony as she waved him goodbye.

Jake heard the utterance of “What a Gentleman!” immediately after exiting the vicinity of the dining room.

Hurrying down the hall, I was happy to have a solid lead on where Bright had gone.  Within a minute I had found my way to the check-in desk. Sitting behind the desk was Sunrise, apparently living up to her name.

        “Hey, some mare told me to talk to you about Bright.” I said at a socially acceptable volume.

   “Um...Mr.Bright said you should meet him at the sheriffs office, something about a bounty?” She said apologetically most likely because of the only vaguely remembered message.

I thought about the information for a second then proceeded to leave the inn while she waited for a thank you or an acknowledgement of any kind. She waited in vain, moving in the streets of a town that could pass as a place in sub-saharan africa (without the talking  talking equines).

It seemed that the inbreds weren’t afraid of me in the slightest, this amused me slightly. I then began chuckling out loud at this thought, maybe laughing for no obvious reason makes you seem mentally unstable but with everything about me having an unsettling effect. It seemed silly to stop, when there were bigger fish to fry.

The sheriff's office was a medium sized brick building that looked like it used to be a pre-war police station, but the real points for originality were scored by the large star badge crudely painted on the front door. This feature of the town led me back to the point that maybe the inbreeding had indeed caused some cranial shrinkage. Upon thinking these thoughts a dissenting self righteous part of my mind argued that maybe most of these ponies are probably illiterate so having an easy to identify symbol would be useful.

Shoving the cognitive dissonance aside for now, I opened the painted door and consequently tread inside the place. Sitting at a desk was my acquaintance Dark Sentry, spotting me he broke out into a smile that seemed genuine.

“Hey is bright here?” I say in a tone that sounded like a worried parent.

“He’s with sheriff Ivory Grip,” He says then begins to speak with a little trepidation “You weren’t shitting me when you said that you wiped out that raider camp”

“I take it you sent someone to go and confirm the destruction?” I ask while feeling good about the roundabout complement. Even if the complement is for your ability to kill people, but whatever i’ll take praise where I can get it.

By this time he looked ready to speak again albeit reluctantly.

“Yeah we made deputy Wintergreen go survey the camp,” He must have sensed my slight non-comprehension. “She’s the pony who left her post, so me and Ivory Grip thought it would be a good idea for her to to do some scout’in.” he answered my unasked question with just enough smugness for a latent accent to bleed through.

“Why are you hiding your accent? If you don’t mind me asking.” I say with the curiosity evident in my voice ,even after it’s filtering by my helmet.

“Well seeing as Bright Surprise might be talk’in with the sheriff right now about this same subject, I guess it’s only right that you should know about it.( he looked like he was devoting a large amount of his brain power deciding on whether to inform me or not.) Hmm…you are his guardian, and you seem like a decent stallion.”

“I won’t tell anyone you can trust me,” I say with some sincerity, while at the same time happy that a world champion poker face is nothing compared to a fully enclosed maximally opaque helmet.

“Well to be perfectly candid i’m not actually from around here, you see I was a wanderin’ the wastes when I came across this little slice of ‘paradise’. The first pony I came across was Ivory Grip, she was guarding the gate alone. I was about your age when we first met. She asked me if I wanted a job, I asked her what the job was.” As he paused to phrase the next part of his story I interjected.

“Lemme guess she gave you a job being a city guard or deputy?”

“Stranger ya got a good head on your shoulders, I’ll give you that. Anyway she helped me in getting citizenship by sayin I was her cousin. Of course I had to start talkin’ like the rest of these ponies.”

        “So I conjecture that Bright is being given a similar offer, probably because this town is lacking competent manpower?” I ask waiting for a confirmation that I was already steeling myself for.

        “Well you see none of these prissy ponies Ivory excluded are really capable of defending themselves never mind the town proper.” He says with a tone indicating that he doesn’t like talking about the state of external affairs.

“So that camp of raiders was a greater threat than it seemed,( he nods making me I pause for a second before speaking again.) So how many capable defenders does this place actually have?” I say with a serious expression on my hidden face.

“Well there’s me, Ivory, and that kid if he joins up.” He says while rubbing the back of his neck with one of those way too flexible forelegs these ponies seemed to have.

“So this place is fucked if a hostile force actually attacks it.,” I say while thinking about the possibilities. First possibility is that I could probably take over this place for myself. Second being the possibility of selling the information about this towns shitty defence force to whatever factions want it. Third possibility I could offer to try and acquire defenders for this place in my travels. Deciding that this place worth the effort to take over myself and that these inhabitants weren’t that terrible swayed me towards the third option.

“So how about if I come across some ponies that help defend this wonderful place, I send em to you and I get paid?” I ask in the sweetest tone I could muster for the occasion.

        “Are you that greedy? Nah you must have a genuine desire to help these folks... right?” He said to me while I was shaking my head at his first remark, and then trying to convey agreement non verbally to his second remark.

“Eh whatever, that way is the door to ivory’s office?” while saying this he had moved a hoof in direction of a hallway further into the building.

Waving goodbye at the stallion as I began to move in the direction he had pointed too. The walk through the grimy corridors reminded me of the many other times I had walked through grimy corridors. I mean is there a single well maintained, clean building on this entire planet. I guess sometimes the the most noticeable things are the things are the things you used to take for granted. My journey to the office was complete when I stepped inside the door to see who was occupying the room.

The two people in question were Bright and who I assumed was Ivory Grip, Ivory grip was a slightly off-colour white unicorn mare wearing stupid fucking aviator sunglasses and a western shirt. On her barding was a gunbelt with a revolver holstered in it. The strange thing was she was actually kinda cute, in the way that these creatures tended to be. I was starting to think that one of the prerequisites to be an authority figure in this world was to be ‘adorable’.

That was as far as my thoughts got before they both turned to me, Bright had a smile on his face I didn’t know if it was caused by my appearance or some other reason. Ivory on the other hand looked caught between trying to be cordial and wanting to unload her firearm in my general direction.

“Bright did you make a fuwind” I say while Ivory’s pupils widened.

Deciding to preempt  a future questions I extended my right arm towards Ivory.

“Yes I killed those raiders, I know what you’re offering the squirt and my name is Jake the paradigm synergizer.” I said quickly while she just stared at me bewildered, this silence fell upon us for about a millisecond before bright started to speak.

“You heard she’s gonna let me be a deputy trainee?” He said happily, I was happy that the kid wouldn’t be in that much danger but I still felt a little responsibility for the kid. If he really stayed here as a guard(in training), then this place would need to be protected if only for his sake. Maybe it was a strange thought and to be honest it would be a huge effort on my part for close to know pay off (other than that fleeting sense of accomplishment).

“How do you know about his possibly induction into the guard.” Her voice was quite feminine but it had a certain hardness to it.

“I heard you talking about it from outside the door,” Hopefully my white lie would be worth a damn I didn’t really want to erode her trust or Dark Sentry’s.

“So an eavesdropper ah…well I guess you would have found out soon enough.” She admitted.

      “Do you keep the initiative secret to keep this towns illusion of exclusivity alive?”

Trying to understand the motives of the authority here would help me to defend this community.

        “Well yes, it’s never been said so eloquently but yes that is why we keep up this facade, it’s also the reason we don’t let outsiders inside, except under odd circumstances.”

While she was saying this to me, my eyes wandered around the room, spotting bright standing in front of a foot locker with a screwdriver and bobby pin inserted in the lock. Not knowing what he hoped to find in the locker I decided to keep the sheriffs attention on me.

“So about that reward?” I asked in my helmet enhanced command tone.

In response she cleared her throat and began shifting from hoof to hoof, she altogether had a look of evasion about her.

        “Well uh the reward was five hundred caps and a key to an abandoned house here but you probably weren’t looking to live here?”  While she was saying this I perked up a considerable amount, now it wasn’t because of the offered currency that was paltry compared to a potential base of operation in a kind of secured area.

        “Fucking deal, give me the keys and show me where this place is at.” I answered her question quickly and against what she how she expected me answer. She probably thought I wanted more goddamn bottle caps.

        Our conversation was interrupted by the screech of a centuries old locker opening.

Bright turned towards us then shrugged his shoulders after that he resumed messing with the locker. Ivory and I were turning back towards each other when “Woo... four caps, and a grenade ‘Tear Gas’ hey do you know what this is.” He exclaimed while reading the tear gas canister after reading that he looked at me expecting an answer.

Luckily I had an answer, “It’s a non-lethal irritating gas, police departments use it when people riot. Well atleast that is what tear gas is where I come from.” He seemed satisfied by that explanation.

“Question?” I ask Ivory.

“What’s your question?” She responds while blowing a tuft of hair out of her eyes.

        “You have any more work for an aspiring mercenary?” I inquire while rubbing my hands together.

        “Well there is a slaver encampment to the south east of here?” She answered automatically, the information seeming to leave her lips without any conscious thought on her part.

        “What will you pay me for clearing it out,” I wanted to know so that I could plan my next move.

        “How about two thousand caps and the towns goodwill?” Her voice had acquired a saccharine quality to it that led me to believe that I was getting screwed but I decided not to voice that concern.

“Well if you mark the approximate location down for me and get me my key plus those caps, then we have a deal.”

She grinned at me.

---===*===---

Walking through the streets again with a key in my pocket and some more bloody bottle caps, I decided to try to find a weapons dealer. So I wandered the Bazaar (their name for the market place not mine) for awhile, the ubiquitous cloud cover giving this place a dreary atmosphere. Around me the townspeople weren’t bothered by my presence at all.

Below their attention perhaps. My search for a weapons trader finally bore fruit when I spotted an actual building at the end of a street a block away from the marketplace; the only thing designating it as a gun store was a crudely painted mural of a pony with a pistol in it’s mouth.

Venturing forth with my the building in front of me I was happy just to be a simple consumer, if only for a little while. I just had to minimize that incessant jingling in some way.

^000^

The shop pony was apprehensive about me until I showed him my proverbial massive coin purse. Sadly he didn’t have any sidearms with a grip designed for hands or claws for that matter, however he did have a grenades he was willing to part with for a cost.

I left that building with a heightened ability to wreck shit, always something to look forward to. Well the next thing on my itinerary was to find my new residence, remembering the location that Ivory had told me before I had left her office I knew that I needed to cross the marketplace yet again. When I was moving through the marketplace my stomach rumbled, this reminded me to top off my food supplies. Luckily there was a stall selling food with a green mare sitting behind it, deciding that the closest place to me  would obviously be the best place to buy food.

“What will it be sir…?” The vendor mare asked me as I approached the stall.

“Got any beef, some pasta would be nice as well.”

“Well I got some brahmin steak and some mac and cheese” her response was cheery with a smile as well.

“I’ll take that crap and any all of your snack cakes, wait is that beef jerky?” I pointed at meat sitting on a barrel behind her.

        “Uh yes beef jerky,( She said the word beef jerky carefully almost as if she had never heard them before just then).  That together will be sixty seven caps Mr…” She says while I practically drooled at the idea of prepared food.

I just hoped my house had a functioning range. I guess it would have to be electrical and be hooked up to one of those spark batteries. Her tapping me on the shoulder broke me out of my torpor.

“Oh yeah, just call me Jake please miss…? she looked up at me as she went about getting the things her now lucid customer had just bought.

“I’m Gumdrop by the way, also do you want the stuff in a bag?” Gumdrop saying this while looking into the red eyes of my helmet.

“That sounds good ( While I fumbled around with my bag managing to find a bag marked one-hundred caps.) Here keep the change Gumdrop.”

Grabbing the burlap sack that held my food. I was ready to depart for my new home,

but before I could start doing that she thanked me for the extra caps, I  said  some nonsense about keeping up the good work. Leaving a happy mare behind me I set off again towards my hopefully temporary base of operations.

        After a few minutes of walking in the direction of what Ivory said was the location of the dwelling. I was disappointed to come across what seemed to be an empty lot, however upon further examination the lot had the a trench that led deeper into the ground. Steep stairs leading down to a door, the visible part of the structure (namely the frame around the door). Made it look like a sturdy fifties era fallout shelter. My observations duly noted I started walking down the stairs. Setting my bags down in front of the steel door I rifled through my pants pockets for the key. Finding it rather quickly seeing as I had only one key on me, I opened the door. The inside was would have been pitch black except for the light streaming in from the open doorway. Walking inside with my pipboy light enabled I looked around, spotting a florescent light bulb hanging from the ceiling I followed the cable it was connected to. The cable was end was sitting near a couple spark batteries, Walking to the batteries I quickly connected one of the batteries to the light bulbs cable. Near instantaneously the room was flooded with that glorious slightly off white light that pervades public buildings where I come from.

With the room now lit up sufficiently I disengaged my Pipboy light.  I then looked around the medium sized square shaped concrete room. The floors were dusty but that wasn’t what interested me, in the room there were two tall lockers next to a workbench.

A ammo reloading bench was situated near that, on the other side of the room sat a table with a hot plate on top of it along with a coffee maker. Along the side of the room opposite to the door was a twin sized bed, with a decent sized book shelf. All in all this place would work for what I needed it to do. However my stomachs growling decided what I would do next for me.

                                        ---===*===---

One dinner later I was sitting on the bed reading one of the books on the shelf, I had found a lantern under the workbench a few hours ago. Reading by electric light was rather mundane however the book I was reading had piqued my interest more than the rest; titled AN INTRODUCTION TO ARCANO TECHNOLOGIE the book dealt with how to set up basic power grids and how to repair household appliances. There was an entire chapter about toaster repair, as strange as the book was the application of magical energy seemed analogous to electrical engineering. I wanted to know if this universe had entirely knew force carrier; or maybe the standard model of physics is entirely useless here.

That was a scary thought all on it’s own.

        With that nightmare fuel fresh in my mind I decided that sleeping would be a good idea, setting off early on the morrow to kill some shit sounded like a good plan.

                                ---===*===---

        Climbing out of my bunker after an early morning equipment check and breakfast, I let my eyes settle on the skies for a moment. Did that cloud cover ever go away? Fighting my urge for my body to stay static and mind to wander, I set the slavers encampment as my destination. I took a breath of air the fact that it was entirely differents worlds air still felt strange in my mind.

        Walking through the town towards the gates was slightly strange, it appeared as though not a single person was awake at seven in the morning. Passing the town gates I gave a salute to the guards guarding the gate. Now outside of the town I estimated that it would take about two hours to reach the slaver camp. My mind had room to think in the desolate atmosphere of the wastes, I wondered what I would be doing a week from now.

Hell I wondered what I would be doing a month from now. It started to dawn on me that this place was actually pretty dangerous, I mean less than three days ago a crazy chick all most roasted me. What she would have done with my body i hesitated to think about.

        On my path around an hour after I left First Estate, I came upon the ruins of a housing development. It seemed as though this neighborhood wasn’t spared the devastation that had visited this land. Deciding that it wouldn’t be a good use of my time to investigate the ruins; I continued down the blacktop towards my showdown with these slavers. What kind of people had lived there before this civilisation had decided to fuck itself with magical nukes? These ponies seemed to have reached a level of development that rivaled my homeland.  My mind was filled with these thoughts for the rest of my journey.                                                         ---===*===---

        When I was only a short distance away from the camp I grabbed Epilogue from my back and began surveying the landscape there was a hill in front of where the camp was approximately located. It seemed unguarded so climbing it seemed to be in my best interests. Before I could start walking I noticed a single individual moving approaching from behind the hill. Unfortunately there wasn’t any cover around me the only noticeable feature being the railroad tracks I had been following. The contact was still hundreds of feet away, but moving in my direction slowly.

Meanwhile I was running towards a boulder at the base of the hill, I hoped that I could avoid being detected for now.  I heard the sound of a rifle being discharged and then the sound of striking the ground around me. Slowing down and then crouching I leveled epilogue at the target; the scope showed me in greater detail who exactly was shooting at me. Before firing I saw that the assailant was a brown coated unicorn stallion wearing the angry lovechild of football padding and a fast food uniform. Epilogue sharply barked twice sending one bullet into his chest and another through it’s braincase.

One target down I lowered epilogue and decided to continue up that hill. I could was hearing yells being exchanged, apparently the inhabitants of the camp heard the gunfire exchange. However their first responders were just getting to their deceased comrade by the time I was at the top of said hill. Looking down at the camp I was surprised to find that it wasn’t a couple of tents like I assumed it would be; It seemed to be a antebellum railroad depot. The place was buzzing with frantic activity, there were easily a two dozen slavers  there. “She fucked me, goddamit Ivory” I screamed inside, now would I try to escape or would fight all these individuals. Bullets started to erupt around me, apparently my crouching skills were insufficient to render me invisible. Turning towards the slavers that had found the already slain slaver, I entered vats. The feeling of calm sweeping over me as my perception of time slowed to a crawl. Targeting the enemies that were the armed the most effectively, the total enemy count for the advanced group totaled five. Two of them armed with lever action rifles, the rest having tire irons and wooden boards.

   My Vats aimed shots rang out, slaying one of rifle wielders outright the other was hit in the chest and thrown down the hill. Seeing their better armed co-workers slain with very little effort the other slavers literally turned tail and ran, although they would have been easy pickings I turned my attention to the problem of the other slavers. Turning around I saw the slaver camp for a split second. A loud gunshot rang out and nigh simultaneously I felt something impact my chest, the bullet knocked me on my back. I stayed still for a second to check my chest. There was a decent sized dent in the plating, I could also feel a cracked rib in my chest under the dent. I thrusted the pain aside in my mind securing my rifle in my hands before crawling up to the precipice of the hill.

The sound of rustling brought my attention back to the adversaries I had spared. They were approaching me weapons lowered, I assumed that they thought the rifle shot had killed me. I stayed static long enough for them to lose their fear of me. Then a moment later I flipped over Epilogue quickly being aimed at the nearest slaver. My adrenaline enhanced reflexes popped off a series of shots, they hit their mark. The rest of the melee opponents were quickly eradicated. I took no time to resume crawling to firing position at the top of the hill. Looking once more at the camp I saw a group of slavers moving up the hill aiming their weapons in my general direction.

“Well fuck” I exclaim while sighting in more of the slavers. After some sloppy center mass shots my magazine ran dry, the slavers took this moment to return fire. I went reloading while shots pinged around me while a couple hit home, the low caliber rounds doing little more than pinging off my armoured chest. Dispatching the slavers took a little while, although I was collecting a bunch of bruises under my plating.  Looking through my scope at the closest warehouse entrance; I spotted no movement they’re probably holed up deeper in the building. Searching the corpses was my next highest priority, In all of my searching I grabbed all the useful things they had on them. Namely their ammunition mostly nine millimeter with a couple slavers having three fifty seven rounds.

^Crack^

The fucker that had sniped me last time fired again, I took that as a sign to get behind that hill. Hopefully that would give me time to come up with a plan for getting rid of the rest of them. A minute or two later I seemed to be out of that snipers range...probably.

Well if I tried to enter the building they could probably corner me and then proceed to beat me to death; so no go on that. Hey wait that place was actually made partially of timber, and I had one plasma grenade left. I guess that is the best plan I can think of, time to incinerate some equines. Steeling myself for the possibility of being hit by that damn sniper again I ran up the hill once more. Man strategic withdrawal is the best tactic ever, I then smiled a little when the lewd connotations of that thought hit me.

        I crested the hill for the… fuck it i’m not countin’ how many times I have climbed that hill. Surprisingly I made close to the entrance to the warehouse, which now that I was closer realized was a loading dock for I guess big ...chariots.  This conclusion was supported by the shipping pallets strewn around the area, one of which had some fifty five gallon drums on top of it. This particular shipping pallet also held the distinction of being the place where I was hiding behind for the moment. Letting Epilogue hang from it’s sling in front of me for a moment, I went to grab my last plasma grenade. I could see somewhat far into the building, well far enough to identify which parts were made of flammable materials.

        The place was filled with shipping pallets I could see why there some outside, the things were spilling out of the building like someone who just ate an all you can eat buffet that just got their stomach slit open. The occasional hole in the roof would feed the flames, I felt there was a high probability for charbroiled pony. Arming the explosive I kissed the  green before throwing it into an aisle between tall stacks of pallets.

        The sickly green of the plasma shot out in a sphere of hellfire, igniting any thing close to flammable along with destabilizing the pallet stacks closest to ground zero. Which in turn scattered the burning debris even more. I just stared at the inferno that was my doing for a moment before climbing up the hill to watch my handiwork from a better vantage point.

Putting the butt of epilogue against my shoulder before advancing in case that sniper shot at me once more, also if any of the slavers escaped the blaze and attacked me I would be ready.

---===*===---

          The sniper must have been evacuating or something because they didn’t fire at me while I stood once more at the top of the hill. A few minutes after the initial spark I could hear screams coming from the building. It made me simultaneously shiver while giving me the impulse to laugh. Suppressing my urge to giggle manicly wasn’t hard but the idea that I even had such an impulse scared the fuck out of me. I began walking around the building, partly separate myself from that terrible impulse and to get kill any stragglers. Thinking while doing these actions my thoughts were punctuated by explosions emanating from the building. Ok so i’m on an alien planet killing shit wearing advanced armour, acting with very little remorse. Wait...that makes me a predator, so I guess I should be on the lookout for pony Arnold Schwarzenegger. Letting out a chuckle at that, I then wanted to head ‘home’.

---===*===---

On the way back to First Estate I listed to my radio for awhile, there was this masculine pony telling the listeners about wasteland news. In between music of course; the thing that interested me the most was his mention of a heroine called the stable dweller and her massacre of some townspeople in this shithole called Arbu. He sounded pretty unhappy, maybe there was some deeper relationship between the DJ and this Stable dweller.

About a mile away from First Estate I heard something much more intriguing.

DJ what’s his face talked about an enigmatic Biped burning down a slaver camp. Apparently getting rid or slavers and scum was part of okay, but my methods were excessive. That was the crux of the issue, under what circumstances can you justify slaughter ?

---===*===---

Walking through the gates once again, I passed by Dark Sentry. He looked at me with fear in his eyes, had the townsfolk already heard of my mission success. Their knowledge would make my confrontation with Ivory more interesting.The ponies in the street seemed much more wary of me. Swiftly moving in the direction of the sheriffs office I grunted with every other step I took; when the adrenaline had worn off I was made very aware of my abused ribs.

Throwing the door open I glimpsed one of the indigenous ponies sitting at the receptionist desk, she actually attempted to hide under the desk. Striding down the hall after watching that display, I merely let out a snort at her overt terror. Looking  down the hallway, I was surprised to see Ivory standing there revolver held in her mouth glaring at me.

“Don’t get pissy, you sent me on a suicide mission!!” I yelled at her while pointing an accusatory finger at the bitch.

She puts her gun back in it’s holster before turning her head back towards me.

“A caravanner told Dark about the camp, the caravanner didn’t give any details.” She says while trying to stay calm.

“That self righteous DJ said I roasted them all alive; Do you believe him?” I ask while my anger cooled down from that flare up.

“No…..maybe?” She says with her initial confidence buckling after looking in my eyes for a moment.

“Good you passed, ya know why?” I ask in a civil tone.

“I was right?” Her voice was now returning to normal.

“You were right because I didn’t roast them all; the rest I shot.” I growl at her and perhaps at the universe for putting me in this situation.

“Well good for you do you want a trophy? You wanna flip shit well do it outside of this town.”  She continued, I wondered what she was trying to do. “You’re pissed because the extermination mission, which I must add you were fucking giddy to do when I told you about it. Wasn’t a celestia damned cake walk, and guess what to get the job done you had to massacre the degenerates. What is it? you afraid of cracking. Acting like a rookie guard who just put their first raider down!!!” She was saying in a voice oddly reminiscent of a little league baseball coach trying to get a kid to play again after skinning their knee.

“I could hear them screaming….” I choked out, the horror of my actions fully registering in my mind.

“Do you know how many screams those slavers have produced? How many more they would have made other ponies scream, if they were given the choice.”  She says with cold pragmaticism.“You wouldn’t understand, pfft” I say while walking out of the room.

“You still want the reward?” she says trying to keep me from me being bummed, but she didn’t understand that all teenage humans are intrinsically bummed. At all times…

I held my hand out towards her, while saying “Just hand over the fucking bottle caps, actually thanks for the reminder.”

As she rifled through her desk for the caps, I heard her mutter under her breath.

“He’s either a conceited asshole, or a whiny bitch.”

“You’re more right than you could possibly know.” I responded in agreement.

She let out a huff, while dropping a bag of caps in my hands with her telekinesis.

“Now can you please get out!” She says while pointing a hoof towards the door.

“Hey do you have any more jobs that need to be done?” I say, trying to stay employed.

“Not really, and if I did the job wouldn’t go to you. You’d probably try to get the city to pay for your goddess damned therapist bills.” She snaps at me, but by that time I was closing the distance to the door.

Leaving the office I was wondering where you would find such a therapist, nevermind if their physiological models would work for a human psyche. That lead back to the question of the similarities of humans and the native equines.

A yawn escaped my lips as I left the building, it seemed that marching the entire day tends to catch up with you. After quickly plotting a course back to my little bunker, I fell into a slow walking pace brought on by the amount of walking I had done in the last few days.

After a few minutes of walking thru the quiet streets I heard some poorly suppressed screams. Some heroic impulse seemed to possess me as I ran in the direction of the screams. The sounds were coming from a dark alley, activating my night vision and pulling Epilogue from my back were the only things I had time to do before entering the alleyway.

The sight that awaited me was bad, but not as terrible as It could have been. There was a mare forced onto her stomach with a hockey masked stallion on top of her. Her eyes were reddened and wet, his front hoof holding her mouth closed. It didn’t look like he had entered her yet and he never would. I ascertained all of this in a split second spread out as long as I stayed in vats. It seemed I had learned how to accomplish more complex thinking in vats, but that realization would have to wait. I dropped out of vats just as both rapist and victim realized I was there.

“GET THE FUCK OFF OF HER!!!” It looking back down at the mare for a second I realized that she was the food stand mare… and I couldn’t remember her name.

The hockey masked stallion had dismounted and had began running as fast as humanly equinly possible away from me. I then activated vats again and targeted his left hind leg. The sound of gunfire penetrated the silence of the town exactly twice. One slug had missed the slim target; the other had liquified his kneecap he fell limply to the ground. Leaving gumdrop where she was at the second and jogged over to the stallion. He seemed to be unconscious, his calm breathing supported that conclusion. I proceeded to examine his leg; the lower part of the damaged leg was very close to amputated. The leg was only held on by a few stretched tendons, the wound was continually oozing blood on the ground.

“Thank celestia you were there… uh what was your name again?” The almost rape victim says to me. I was thankful she forgot my name as well it made me feel less awkward.

“Miss I’m Jake, also I kinda forgot your name as well.” I went about saying while awkwardly rubbing my neck yet again, all the while the unconscious rapist was laying on the broken concrete bleeding.

“I’m Gumdrop and again thanks for getting that creep off.” She says exuding happiness at my actions.

“You’re welcome, now should I just grab him and give him to the guard?” I ask wondering what to do in such instances.

“Um…we could just leave and not deal with the mess?” She offers innocently.

“Good idea, wanna chill at my place?” I ask her without thinking.

“Will the guard check there?” She asks trying not to be jailed.

“Maybe, but they're not going to force their way inside with me at the doorway.” I say nonchalantly.

“Okay so your place it is, wait do think the guard will see all the stolen shit he has on him?” She drew my attention to the saddle bags stuffed full of jewelry. Would the sheriff think that this was a case of self defense? Well there was only one way to find out.

       “Follow me,” I say while breaking into a brisk jog in the direction of my bunker.

                                                ---===*===---

We slowed to a walk after we got far enough away from the scene of the shooting. Upon entering my house she stayed by the doorway while I activated the lighting.

“So this is my place,” I say simply our conversation dieing after our escape from the crime scene. I wondered why she seemed to move past such a traumatic event so quickly.

“It’s small and dingy, um yeah that sums this place up nicely.” She says to me candidly.

“I take it you don’t like the bunker aesthetic?” I say merrily.

“Yeah really doesn’t do anything for me; bunkers are just too dreary for me.” I couldn’t tell if it was sarcasm or if she honestly disliked bare concrete walls. This led my train of thought to derail slightly as I thought about the mare who lived in a bunker.

“Hello!” she bopped me on the chest before continuing. “I have been expecting a witty retort for awhile now.”

“Sorry, just kinda spaced out for a second.” I say apologetically.

“That was pretty obvious,” She said before letting out a small laugh.

“Just was thinking about an acquaintance.” I say before shaking my head vigorously, in a  vain attempt to get rid of the sleepiness that was inexorably increasing.  “Anyway you can stay for awhile but i’m gonna need some sleep soon.” I say in the middle of two loud yawns.

“That’s okay I don’t think they’re gonna be going door to door, besides I wouldn’t want to impose.” She responds with confidence, I guess her confidence is probably owed to my helping her earlier. That thought gives me a contented feeling.

“Let me unlock the door for you,” I say while doing the action.

As she was stepping out of the door she uttered one last thank you to me. It seemed that the most efficient way to help people here was the use of vigilante justice. Walking over to the hotplate I began to cook myself some more mac and cheese. As I was doing this mundane but beneficial task, my mind was thinking back to the events of the day.

Violence seemed to be the prevailing theme. I guess if these ponies want to see me as some evil vanquishing creature; I’m not going to stop them. Eating used to be an enjoyable occasion, now in this place I was beginning to detest the act. After eating I did nothing more than strip my armour off and fall into a deep sleep.

---===*===---

Waking up on an alien world was only starting to become mundane, as I stretched upon leaving the bed. Hmm… I wonder if that bed and breakfast is actually any good. Maybe I should check on bright after eating, I wonder how well he’s doing in his guard training.

                                        ---===*===---

  In short he was doing well and somewhat happy to see me; the place did serve me and it was pretty good.

While I was wolfing down some scrambled eggs, a stallion approached me.

“Do you have a moment?” The stallion asked politely; he was a white coated unicorn stallion with a top hat on.

        “I have all the time in the world.” I said between animalistic consumption of eggs, I was thinking about why I desired the protein so much. Probably from all the exercise I’ve been doing plus the demands of the strength implant.

        “Well you see I have a cousin in baltimare, and with the red eyes slavers about. I can’t find a courier to carry the message.” He seemed pleased just to explain what he wanted me to do.

        “Just how far away is baltimare? Equally important is the question of payment?” I ask two very pertinent questions.

“A weeks travel south give or take a couple days, your payment is a hundred caps now and nine hundred caps when you give him the message.”  He explains confidently

“That’s alot of caps for a letter to a relative, and he probably doesn’t know about such an agreement. I’m just hoping he’s kind enough and wealthy enough to actually pay me.” I inquire about the strangeness of the deal.

“His name is Pearldiver and he owns a large caravan company, He needs to receive this message as soon as possible.” He had lost that veneer of confidence and his desperation was now showing through.

“If he doesn’t pay me then we're gonna have a friendly chat, angry alien to weak stallion.” I threaten with a cold tone voice, indicative of the certainty of the statement.

He pulls out a sealed envelope and hands it to me with a bag of caps.

“Now do you have a map so that I can mark the destination down in my Pipboy?” I ask pleasantly trying to leave the previous unpleasantness of the conversation behind.

        “Hold out your arm please,” I did as asked.

“There you go, when will you leave for baltimare?” He asks also ready to leave my violent threats behind.

        “Later today probably,” I answer his reasonable question

“Well good day to you, good luck on your mission.” He says while quickly exiting the bed and breakfast.

        I look down for a moment at my empty plate thinking about what I just agreed to do. Being a mailman is a nice change of pace… I guess. First things first I’m gonna need some supplies for the trip. I wonder if Gumdrop is selling at the market the market today.

        I leave the diner portion of the bed and breakfast, but not before leaving a tip.

Stepping out into the streets of the town I once again looked at the cloudy skies, I miss the clear skies of my home. Shaking my head in an attempt to disperse those thoughts, I remembered what I came here to do.

        Gumdrop was selling food like nothing had happened. I guess when your is that shitty you get over things that almost happened pretty quickly.

        “I’m gonna be out of town for awhile and I need some food. Do you have anymore brahmin?” I say to her in lieu of a hello.

“Good for you why are you leaving?” She seemed worried about me, damn emotional attachment.

“I’m delivering a package to someone in baltimare.” I say while wondering why all their cities were named after fucking horse puns.

“I’m actually out of brahmin but I think you’ll like these MREs” She says enthusiastically.

“How much for like ten of those?”

“For you,” she taps her hoof on her chin for a second before finishing, “twenty caps.”

“Are they all vegetarian?” My recent cravings for meat were surfacing with a vengeance.

“Well...yes; do you still want them?” She says trying to angle in some sort of business for herself.

        “Yeah, ill buy em', but you got any more Brahmin meat?” I say with a little bit of my native drawl slipping out. Oh how I hated that little bit of accent that sometimes bled through when I was speaking.

        “I have some bloatsprite meat...if you want it; how about 5 caps a piece for the meat?” Her tone indicating that the meat wasn't a big seller.

“I'll take eight of the bloatsprite meat and ten of those MREs.” I say with a little bit of carnivorous intent in my voice. Hope she doesn't think I'm hitting on her. I guess she is kinda cute...Fuck you brain she's still an alien. Yeah well so are you, gotta get laid sometime righ-; Nope not dealing with that right now, thats future Jake's problem.

During my little bout of internal conflict she had been wrapping up my purchase; I pushed my cognitive dissonance aside to deal with later.

        “That will be sixty caps Jake.” She stated plainly while I dug in my bags to get the caps.

“There you go, I'll be gone for awhile so stay safe.” I say earnestly while I handed her the caps before leaving her stand and then slightly later her city.

                                                ---===*===---

        The next few days of my journey mostly consisted of me walking the majority of the day (and sometimes into the night) before finding a derelict building and sleeping on whatever I could find in there. The only thing of note that happened during those four days were the discovery of those zombie ponies. That ended with me a few bullets less than when I started off my trek, but it did also give me some needed target practice. By the time I entered the rest stop for the first time I had gotten good enough to hit a moving ghoul in the head from seventy five yards away while moving back wards. Without Vats no less.

        The rest stop looked quite mundane, broken windows, signs of being picked clean by scavengers years before. Ya know the works, moving into the place my compass made it quite clear that the place was full of hostiles. I couldn't hear any signs of pony habitation, but that didn't stop me from moving as quietly as possible to the door. Breaching the door with a door kick that had been perfected during my journey I was kind of annoyed to find out that the hostiles were a bunch a rad roaches. They may be able to survive a nuclear war and with being decapitated but, a steel-capped boot made swift work of them.

                                ---===*===---

I opened the door to the garage tentatively, because I had found a couple buildings with rigged shotguns set up to blast anybody who set off the trip wire. I swiveled my head a few times looking for traps. Seeing as it was all clear I moved into the room heading in the direction of the workbench I had spotted in my trap sweep. On the work bench was a book titled Twilight’s Electronics. Well I love my technical literature. While I was bending over slightly to pick up the book, I spotted what looked like an electrical switch embedded into the floor near the work bench. When the book was sitting comfortably in my backpack, I got on my hands and knees and examined the switch. The switch upon further examination looked very similar to a garage door opener.

“That's probably what it is?” my habit of saying things out loud becoming apparent to once again.

        Activating the switch, I let out a sigh as nothing occurred. As I got up a mechanical whirring hit my ears. The floor in the middle of the room opened up as what looked like a mine elevator came to a stop above the hole in the floor. So should I get into the mysterious elevator to who knows where? Eh why not this place is rather boring. When I stepped onto the platform I read a sign, It said that the thing wasn't a cargo elevator but a mass evacuation elevator. So a secret exit built into an out of the way garage, that just screams secret facility. I guess my choices are A. stay away and keep the relative safety you possess or B. go into the place in an attempt to find useful things.

        Choosing option B I activated the elevators return function. I stood nervously as the centuries old elevator descended down the medium sized shaft. At the bottom I step out of the contraption to see a mechanical door similar to the ones in the ranger base. It looked to be an airtight door, that indicated that these ponies were messing with something dangerous.

        I walked over and opened the door, a door identical to this one was on the other side of the short passage. I moved forward to open the door, but a panel with lights glowing drew my attention. It listed various emergencies in order of severity, from radiation leaks to flu epidemics it was all there. However the two emergencies that were lit up were 'Biological contamination' and 'Chemical Accident'. This jogged my memory, the Riot Gear had a re-breather system to protect the wearer from toxic outside conditions. Smiling as I pulled up the misc section of the data tab on my pipboy. Reading up on the operation of the re-breather I was happy to find it had a the ability to provide breathable air for up to three hours of continuous use. That along with the total coverage my armor provides, should allow me to survive any toxic gas.

        Turning on the re-breather I opened the door and stepped into the bunker. The air of the bunker had a yellow tint to it. A mustard yellow tint, these idiots had flooded the place with chlorine gas. I was glad to hear the faint whirring noise of the re-breather along with the louder sound of my own breathing as it bounced around inside my helmet. The entry way had opened to a hallway. As I looked down the hallway I spotted a sign; Arcane Weaponry Lab →

That drew my attention, and that was the way I went. The hallways were almost silent, but almost was the operative term. I could hear some noise coming from the pipes that hung over the corridors. Wait, is the noise coming from something that's alive in this place? Maybe it's just a machine that still works making that noise...Probably.

        My thoughts were switched to something more concrete than idle speculation. I had arrived at the door to the Lab. A small sense of deja vu struck me as I strode into the room( the door having been left unlocked.) The room was covered with rusted garbage and somehow functioning terminals. The amount of corrosion on anything didn't surprise me, chlorine is pretty reactive. While searching the room for anything still salvageable I came across some untouched white metallic cylinders. The act o picking one up caused my Pipboy to issue a beep and point me to the ammo tab of my inventory.

Alien Power Cells

        So the Pipboy registers the alien stuff as ammunition;that means that the assholes that made this thing had knowledge of alien technology. Enough knowledge to include what the cells were made for in the Pip-boy’s memory. But this place is on another world entirely, so the governments of both worlds hid the knowledge of extraterrestrials from their respective populaces. Wait if the same aliens tech existed on both worlds, either the aliens had the ability to travel between dimensions ( not to mention their interstellar travel capabilities). Or the same exact alien technology existed in both worlds.

        And if these aliens can travel back and forth, then there's a possibility of getting a ride home. But that would require a whole lot of things to work. “Fuck,” well atleast I have an idea about getting home. An idea so full of assumptions that it just might succeed. First off, find some goddamn aliens! (Wait wasn't that like the entire plot of x-files) at that moment my re-breather beeped twice telling me it had two hours of air left. Well I should probably search those terminals for clues. A hacked terminal gave me a bunch of files, the only problem was the fact that they were heavily encrypted. A bit of good news was that the terminals were hooked up to a intranet network that was administrated by a terminal in the head researchers office. And presumably the administrator had a decryption code.

        I checked the time on my Pipboy and it turned out that I had an hour thirty-seven minutes left of breathable air left. Figuring out network connections is hard work, and the fact that the atmosphere in the room was laced with chlorine didn't help matters much. With the clock running I had to find the head researchers office fast. I remembered seeing a map of the facility in the halls. I jogged over there quickly locating the room quickly enough, I then heard a queer chirping from behind me. I turned around just in time to see an eyeless insecisiod creature charge me. I didn't have time to grab Epilogue so I went into vats instead. I had never entered Vats before now without a weapon in my hands, so conseqently when I targeted the creature in vats It showed up as an unarmed attack. I knew that I can't throw a punch to save my life, so I exited Vats just long enough to grab my bowie knife from it's sheath. Now when I targeted the creature It showed me the hit chances for a knife attack. Fuck it I’m not going to live forever. I left Vats just as the creature sent me to the ground. It's body was perched over me as I fought to keep it off of me. The creatures mouth was open and salivating. With my knife still in my right hand I stabbed the thing just below the head.

The body of the creature went rigid as the knife cut into it's spinal cord. I pushed the body of the thing off of me before getting up. The chlorine breather was quadrupedal and around five feet tall. After making that observation I decided to look down at myself, the creatures clawed feet had left scratches on my breast plate and sliced up my duster a little. Well I'll learn how to sew later. Remembering my original objective I set off again for the head researcher's office.

The office was actually locked, and I didn't want to use any explosives to open the door. That along with my lack of screwdriver and bobby pin left me with the last option. The terminal that unlocked the door. This terminal was pretty hard; the password was eight letters long. After a backing out a few times I figured out the password, 'Xenoflux' I guess that the alien shit that the place worked with inspired that?

        Hitting enter on the open door command unlocked the door, which in turn allowed me to walk inside the office. Upon entering I decided that closing the door behind me would be a good idea. Hearing the strained hiss of the pneumatics in the door assured me I had a little bit of security. That thing in hallway about gave me a heart attack.

        The room itself happened to be pretty mundane there was a desk with a terminal on it near the back of the room facing towards the doorway, a few filing cabinets along the wall, and the walls were covered in posters. Walking over to the desk I looked behind it and saw the skeletal remains of a pony. Ignoring the body I proceeded to search the desk finding a holodisk labeled decryption matrix one along with a faded steel flask. Also in the desk was a bottle of cyanide pills along with a signed resignation from the researcher. So the pony was guilty about killing themselves even when fucking aliens that breath chlorine were clawing at the door. OK...thats just strange.

        The terminal on the desk was my next objective, it had an eight letter password as well and one of the potential passwords was again 'Xenoflux'. What the hell, I entered in Xenoflux yet again and to the joy of the cynical part of my mind the terminal was unlocked. Once it was unlocked there were a set of commands, first was to unlock a safe in the room. Second was a command to induce reactor overload. Third was a command to flood the base with poison gas. Under all of these was a terminal entry simply called 'Final will and testament'.

        Reading it in spite of the fact I had only an hour left of breathable air left. Inside was the researcher's moral qualms with the biological research being done on the alien specimens. He stated that these experiments were an affront to everything that was still good in the world. Those were his reasons to activate the chlorine distribution systems. He also hoped the public would find out about these secret facilities.

        Time to leave this place. Should I blow it up before leaving? Yeah why not... The hidden safe in the room contained a three fifty seven magnum revolver with a few shells along side a map of equestria with a location circled interestingly there was a box of thirty five point five six rounds labeled star-metal. After grabbing the stuff I looked back at the terminal, after selecting the overload reactor command there was an option to set a delay. Selecting half an hour delay, I then activated the overload sequence. I then clicked the safety off on Epilogue before jogging towards the door. The moment after I opened the door I noticed that there were three eyeless alien things standing outside the door. Opening Vats up I quickly targeted three head shots to the aliens standing right in front of me. As time sped up once more Epilogue lived up to it's name, ending their lives and I guess their stories. The next few minutes passed in a blur with some frantic shooting and running to the entrance where the elevator was parked. I left arrived in the garage with only five minutes before detonation.

        All out sprinting consumed me as the time ticked down. I was a two or three hundred meters away when the building imploded. I then walked closer to it so that I could survey the crater. All that was left was a smoking hole in the ground with red hot pieces of metal sitting at the bottom.

                        I then saw a few dark spots descending downward towards my position. Know idea what those things are...should probably find cover. I then ran towards a ditch I had seen when I had been walking this way.

        I had just enough time to crouch in the ditch, before the dark spots landed. They looked like ponies except they had wings and scorpion tales.

        “Investigative patrol 023 to neighvarro... we have landed at the imploded location.” I heard one of the creature say out loud, wait are they just wearing armor with a radio inside. I decided to stay quiet seeing as they didn't notice me. “There are trace amounts of chlorine gas along with signs of a reactor overload.” Silence had fell upon the group as I assumed the one in charge was given more instruction.

        “Affirmative neighvarro command, we will complete perimeter sweep.” Dammit, time to leave. But just in case I better switch to Armour Piercing rounds. As I swapped magazines one of the ponies heard the noise and looked in my direction. The pony then proceeded to yell and point it's hoof at me. I pointed Epilogue at it in turn and waited for it's comrades to speak to me. The pointer aimed it's rifles at me in turn. Faster than I would have thought the rest of the ponies aimed at me.

I just kept my weapon aimed at the one that had spotted me.

        “I don't know what you are, but you are aiming a weapon at a member of the Grand Pegasus Enclave. And that's one hell of a bad idea.” The pegasus in charge says to me while his weapons capacitors charged.

                “Well, I just want to be on my way. I'm not looking for trouble, but if you want it I can give it.” I say while thinking that a good bluff could save my life; I mean there were four of them and one of me.

        “First question, did you overload the reactor of that place?” He asks with a tone indicating that he didn't want to have a fight on his hands (or hooves rather)

        “Yes I activated the overload sequence. Because the place was flooded with chlorine and I didn't want anybody to die trying to scavenge the place.” I say trying to sound as altruistic as I could.

        “Well then how did you trigger the core if it was filled with toxic gas?” He says plainly.

“I have a re-breather in my armor, that's all you need to know.” I answer with the only way I really could, the honest way.

“That's some nice equipment for a minotaur, especially a hornless one.” He says while his underlings chuckle.

        “May I leave now, preferably without getting shot in the back?” I say while lowering my gun slightly.

        “We are supposed to take wasters that do things like blowing up bunkers for questioning. But I don't think you would like that; am I right? ( he asks the question rhetorically) Anyway we have the answers we came here for.” As he was saying this I saw him gesture at one of his squaddies.

        The squaddie was charging his weapons I could hear it. Well these winged assholes asked for it. I entered Vats and targeted the one who was getting ready to fire, two head shots locked in. The leader was going to get a bullet to the back of his head, and then one other get's two head shots. I exited Vat's and fired just as the one tasked with shooting me was fully turned around. The head of that one was turned to mush inside of the helmet, the commander had a bullet graze his helmet creating a but load of sparks but little damage. The squaddie I had targeted was now without a head as well. But as I regained control of my body the commander was firing two beam rifles at me. I felt the heat of blasts being absorbed by my chest plate, as I ducked into the meager cover the ditch provided. The pegasus that had been left unscathed thus far was now aiming a rifle with a glowing green tip at me. I fired at the commander hitting his chest and sending him to the ground. I then felt the blistering heat of a plasma bolt pass by my head. Another bolt then struck me in the chest, the armor protecting me from the majority of the damage but it still broiled my chest. I then sprinted right at the pegasus while letting out a pain filled grunt. I felt another fly past me, the pegasus seemed to be losing accuracy as I closed the distance. Before he could fire again I dropped to my knees and popped off a burst. The three rounds I let loose struck center mass; I watched as it fell to the ground. It stilled showed up on my IFF, leaving me to draw my blade and try and pry off it's armor. While I looked for a seam in the armor, my chest was screaming in pain. I finally found a button on the underside of the helmet, when I pulled the helmet off. I saw an orange coated stallion with close cropped red mane looking at me.

        “I'm sorry I had to do that, and I think that you're mortally wounded.” I say with sorrow; the fact that I had to kill all of these sapient creatures is terrible.

        He replied by spitting a blood and saliva mix at my face, again thankful for my helmet I ask. “I have a cyanide pill if you want, it'll save you some pain.” Unfortunately his life ended just as I finished saying that.

        Now I got up and walked over to the place where the commander had fallen. Activating the release on the helmet quickly this time, I was somewhat surprised to see a mare under that helmet.

        “Now what could possibly have motivated you to tell that soldier to fire on me?” I ask quickly. I needed to know why this easy to avoid conflict had occurred.

        “Standing orders are to fire on anything that hasn't been cataloged yet, and your clearly not a minotaur, plus your gear is beyond anything a fucking waste lander should have.” She is seething by the last part.

        “You're right about one thing, I'm not a minotaur (which I punctuate by taking off my helmet).” I say sad at the reason these guys shot at me.

        “Can you kill me like you offered to that last guy?” The mare with a pink coat and ruby coloured hair asks.

        “No, you're not mortally wounded. In fact I believe I missed any thing vital on you, so you're going to have to live with the fact you couldn't use discretion when choosing targets. The death of your underlings is your burden and you're gonna carry it for the rest of your life.” I say while checking through the compartments of the one of her deceased underlings. I found a couple of bottles of purple liquid labeled 'health potion'. She didn't have time to stop me as force fed the potion to her.

        “When neighvarro command finds me, the enclave will put a bounty on your head so large you can't walk to hooves without getting attacked.” She yells out at me after I had left her lying on the ground. I think I killed the power in her power armor. The rest of her squad had some rations and healing potions on them along with ammunition for the energy weapons. While I was throwing all of that into my bag I remembered the chlorine immersion that I had been in just a few minutes ago. I checked all of my items for problems, luckily the only thing that looked tainted was the last of my bloat sprite meat. All of my ammunition and other things were in sealed packages so they were fine. I then threw my new acquisitions into my bag along with a laser pistol that one of them had been carrying. As I left the mare in her powerless power armor, I heard the crack of thunder. Rain was on the way, so I continued walking the lonesome road.

        End of Chapter Seven

Footnote- Level Up

Intense Training-Charisma

The loneliness of the wastes has changed you and friendly conversation is now an end, in and of itself. This won’t give them their lives back, nothing can.

Armor Perk-

Riot Suppression- The whole world is just aching to be brought into line and you are just the person to do it. You're a lawman in the loosest sense of the word, but that suits you just fine.

You gain 10% more damage with weapons riot police or swat teams might use. ( Riot shotguns, Marksmen Carbines, Service rifles, and any sub machine gun)

You also gain unique dialogue options.