Fallout Equestria: Duty

Fallout Equestria: Duty

Chapter 26

Love

“What the...?”

~O~Frostmane~O~

I awoke in the middle of the night, hearing something outside the captains room. It sounded like a muffled hoof-step, but I couldn't be sure. The Alicorn was creaking from time to time, and the sounds of the waves were also omnipresent. Listening intently, I extracted myself from Firestorm, who didn't seem to hear a thing. The creaking of the door as I opened it sounded like a bomb going off in the relative stillness of the night, but I could still make out the gentle clip clop of hooves on steel.

I stuck my head out of the door, looking over the bridge. The moonlight, which was dimmed considerably by the cloud curtain, illuminated the room only a little, but I could see as if it was daytime. It was something Golden and I had been talking about, while Firestorm had taken Homage flying. My senses were... acting up since my experience with Luna, and my friends theory was that I was slowly developing Alicorn senses. I hadn't understood most of what she had said, but it came down to a considerable sharpening of all of my senses.

While I was still distracted by my thoughts, a shimmer of light came into view outside one of the broken windows. It was blue, and vaguely pony shaped. I held my breath for a moment, as to not be discovered by whatever this was. Strangely, my EFS didn't detect anything. According to the device, we were the only living things aboard the Alicorn.

Observing the blue light, I began to make out the features of a Pony beyond the light. A blue Alicron mare, like the one I had killed in Princess Lunas school for young Unicorns. She was looking directly at me, her face expressionless. Was she using a Stealthbuck? But if she was, then how in Equestria was I able to see her?

“What the buck is going on here?”, I thought, deciding to get some answers.

Crouching low, I closed my armor and formed my Power-Hooves. The mare had obviously seen this, as her expression changed to one of utter confusion as she looked around. I didn't give her any more time to react, as I jumped forward, using my Power-Hooves to increase the force of my attack. The deck beneath me dented slightly as they discharged, and I collided with a very surprised Alicorn. From my past experience with them, I didn't want to take any chances here. Not while Homage and Firestorm were present.

The mares invisibility magic dissipated, as we both broke through the railing that ran around the bridge, and crashed onto the deck below. A look of pain crossed her face, as she landed, back first, on the rusted deck of the ship, one of my forelegs at her throat. I was prepared to kill the mare if she did so much as charge her horn. She did raise her forelegs, and I just wanted to crush her windpipe, when I saw that she wasn't attacking me. Instead, she was turning her face away from me, holding her legs up to protect herself. Having fought their kind before, I was more than confused.

“Huh?”, I said, cocking my head slightly. It just didn't make any sense to me. With the adrenaline in my blood slowly receding, I withdrew my hoof from the mares throat.

“Please... don't hurt me.”, she whimpered, tears filling her eyes. It made me feel bad all of a sudden. Almost as bad as if I had struck another Pony on the street without reason.

“You... You're not here to attack or drag me off, I guess?”, I offered, getting off her. She didn't stand up, but continued to hold up her forelegs to protect her face.

“No... I'm... I'm on watch duty. I've got the night shift tonight.”, the Alicorn said, trying to use her rear legs to put some distance between herself and me.

“Night shift? Watch duty? What are you protecting then? This ship? If it's yours, I'm sorry, we didn't know. We'll leave in the morning.”

The mare just shook her head, hiding behind the debris of an ice-cream machine. At least she tried to hide herself, but I could still see her since the pile of metal didn't even cover half of her body.

“You...”, she whispered, causing me to cock my head even further.

“Ehm... you were... protecting me? Why? Last time I met a group of your kind, you guys weren't at all interested in talking to me. Broke two of my ribs in fact. Not to mention that crazy one who almost electrocuted me.”, I said, not buying the mares story. Suddenly, a yellow blip appeared on my EFS and a purple Alicorn mare landed between me and the blue one. To my surprise, she bowed her head in front of me. Before she addressed me, she threw a glance over at her blue sister, that would have killed the other mare if she had been capable of such a thing. The blue one immediately got up and disappeared into the night sky.

“Please accept my humble apology for my sisters behavior. She was to keep a watch over you while you slept, as per our mothers orders. It was not her place to engage in conversation with you. If my sister has offended you in any way, or has interrupted your sleep, please let me know, and she will be punished accordingly.”, the new arrival said, keeping her eyes closed and her head bowed. She had even fallen to one knee.

“A perfect representation of royal protocol...”, I thought to myself, as I still tried to digest what this mare had just said.

“You... You're here to protect me? OK, I'll ask again. Why? Why does my mother not come in Pony if she wants to see me? And, as I mentioned before, I'm not used to you guys being this tame around me.”, I demanded, causing her to drop her head even further, until her muzzle touched the rusted deck.

“The Great and Powerful Goddess can not come to you in her own flesh and blood, for her body is bound to the Maripony research facility. It is the home of our mother. For the last 187 years, she had believed you had died. When she felt your magical aura in Horseshoe canyon, Moonsingers flock was dispatched to retrieve and protect you. She failed, and so Golden Sunshine was placed at your side. But... our mother is most concerned about your safety, my lady. That is why my flock was sent, to ensure that no harm may befall you. The threat of the Order of Machina, is also being dealt with as we speak.”, she explained, making my ears perk up. So my mother had sent another flock of Alicorns for my protection? I didn't mind the extra Pony power, but if they had the same potential to go insane like the others, I didn't want them anywhere near my... family. And what was that about them fighting the Order?

“The Order is being attacked by Alicorns? Can you give me any details about that?”, I asked, and the mare nodded slightly.

“We have exterminated their positions in the Lunaris canyon and Fillydelphia. The ones that were working on rebuilding the town of Dodge Junction have also been killed. Sadly, we had to wipe the ruins off the map along with them. At this moment, three flocks are fighting in Manehatten, Baltimare and Las Pegasus respectively. They are, along with us, the last of our kind.”, she reported, and I suddenly got a distinct feeling of uneasiness. These Alicorns had been other Ponies before my mother had changed them against their will, and they were throwing themselves into battle for my sake now. It just wasn't right! This was my affair, and I didn't want anypony to die for it other than me.

“How many? How many have you lost?”, I asked, my voice breaking as I imagined how many lives had been lost due to my mistakes. Had I listened to Firestorm back then, Gear Turn would have never been a member of the Moon Skulls. She would have never survived the war, and the Order of Machina would have never existed...

“One thousand-one-hundred-twenty-seven. Right now, only about three hundred of us are left, but our mothers desire to protect you burns in each and every one of them. Each of them is prepared to die for your well being, if that is what is required of them.”

I shook my head violently. I didn't want this. I didn't want this at all. I had never wanted other Ponies to die for me. If I had to throw myself into battle, then that was fine with me. If I died due to my stupid decisions, then it was my own fault. I could live with that. But if I had to command others, and they died in my stead... or worse, if I wasn't even there to command them and they died to protect me from harm.... It was unbearable for me.

“No... I want you to stop that madness! I will stop Gear Turn and her Order of Machina! There is no need for you to help me with that! Send a messenger to my mother this instant to let her know, that I am a grown mare, and that I don't NEED or DESIRE her protection! Tell her that she wasn't there when I would have REALLY needed her, and that I have learned to settle things my own way! Let her KNOW that I am coming to see her SOON enough, and that we will have some words about her practices!”, I shouted at the mare, tears of rage flowing down my armored face. The mare opened her eyes, looking at me sorrowfully.

“She can hear every word you say through my ears, my lady, and she asks for clarification. She is not aware of having failed to help you when you needed her.”, she said in a quiet tone of voice, that showed just how hurt she felt. I guessed that these were not even her own feelings. Golden Sunshine had enlightened me about the whole UNITY thing earlier, and it disgusted me.

“Is my mother still able to watch memory orbs?”, I asked, trying and failing to keep my voice steady. The Alicorn in front of me nodded, and so I summoned up a spell I had learned a long time ago, from a Ministry of Morale Unicorn. It was a spell that created a memory orb, without extracting the memory from a Ponys mind. As the pure black orb appeared in the air in front of me, I poured all the memories of my father, and the nights in which he had come to me, into it. I included the memory of his last attempt to... play with me, as he called it, and how it had resulted in his death.

Every little thing I suffered by his hooves, since my mother had left, went into that orb. The rapes. The shame. The fear and the pain. The rage when I was told that I would never be able to have a foal of my own, and the days I spent in the hospital with internal injuries to my reproductive system. How I had pleaded with the doctor who was treating me, not to send me back to my father, and how he hadn't done anything. All the nights I hadn't slept, due to the fear that my door might crack open at any moment, and the shape of my father would appear in the door frame...

All of this had changed and hardened me. I had been forged in the fires of pain to become a blade for Equestria during the war. I had learned to hide my fear, and to do what had to be done, no matter how much it hurt to move on. The alternative had been to give in and, to this day, I felt that if I gave in, my father would have won. I wasn't willing to give the dead buck that kind of satisfaction. Not in a million years.

And so I had joined the military, to protect others from having similar experiences. Of loosing a parent or both of them, and being forced to live with an abusive caretaker. But most of all, I didn't want to have to be powerless ever again. Nopony would ever be able to do such things to me again, without my consent, without having beaten me half to death beforehoof. When the transfer of my memories was complete, I felt a little dizzy, but did my best to hide it.

“Here. Take it and make sure that my mother watches it. She'll most likely be out of it for a week or two, but this will tell her who I am now. I loved the mare named Lulamoon deeply, but she would never have changed Ponies against their will. It seems that we have both changed, and that neither of us is who she was two hundred years ago. Now go. If I see any of your kind near my family ever again, I will not hesitate to kill them.”, I said sadly, floating the orb over to the purple mare. She looked as if she wanted to say something, when suddenly a golden shield came into being in front of me. Almost at the same moment, a golden light spell shot into the air, illuminating the whole deck.

Looking around, I saw Golden Sunshine, her wings flared out and her horn blazing with magic, stepping out from behind a corner. The crackling sound of Firestorms rifles caught my attention from the catwalk I had caught the other Alicorn on, and I looked at her as well. She too had her wings flared out, Hoof-Claws extended and her armors tail raised behind her back. My friends were ready for a fight it seemed.

“I thought I told you to leave Frostmane alone, Mirage.”, my Alicorn friend said, stepping up next to me. The demeanor of Mirage changed instantly, as she snarled at her white sister.

“I won't take orders from a third generation Alicorn such as yourself. I am only bound to the will of the Goddess!”

“Then it seems we have arrived at an impasse, for I am ordered to make sure that Frostmane is safe, and that her wishes are fulfilled. Seeing as she just told you to get lost, you should better do so, unless you want to face me in battle.”, my friend said coldly, and I could see that she meant it. If the purple mare didn't do as I had said, Golden Sunshine would make her leave, one way or another.

Mirage took one last look at my friend, who was looking down at her with fierce determination in her eyes, before she grabbed the memory orb in her teeth and flew of into the direction of the shore. When she had disappeared into the night, Homage stuck her head out of one of the broken windows of the bridge, observing the scene before her.

“Did I miss something?”, she asked, rubbing one of her eyes with a hoof.

~O~Firestorm~O~

~O~The next morning~O~

After the excitement from last night, we had all went back to sleep so we could get an early start the next day. As it turned out, the repairs on the Alicorn were an easy fix. The generator had shut down when the engines had been damaged, to prevent a critical system failure, but since we didn't plan on moving the ship, I simply disconnected the generators from the engine. Whoever had designed this system had certainly done a good job, for the whole process only required me to pull out four cables and restart the generator.

The spell talismans inside of it were at 65% capacity, which meant that they had enough juice to run all systems aboard the ship for about thirty years, as long as they weren't required to power the engine. Some of the light fixtures had literally exploded when the power came back on, but most of the ships systems were undamaged and operational.

The real prize I had found, was a stash of Pipbucks for the crew. They were slightly bulky and outdated civilian models, but even without being attached to a Ponys leg, some of the functions worked. The radiation meter and the radio were the most important ones in my opinion, for I had given one of them to Homage. She could stick her hoof through the device and pull it back out again, which showed me that she would need a much smaller one to fit her leg.

It didn't matter however. When I had told her that she could now finally listen to the radio, without having to rely on Frostmane or me giving her our Earblooms, the little filly had jumped at me in joy. I also got a pair of saddlebags for her, in which she could carry around her newly acquired Pipbuck until she was old enough to have it fixed onto her leg.

One of them went to Golden Sunshine. The mare didn't want the device at first, but when I explained my reasoning to her, she relented. If all of us had Pipbucks, and knew each others tags, we could find each other, no matter how far we were apart. Since these crew models also came with an inbuilt broadcaster, we could also use them to communicate with one another.

What I didn't tell my Alicorn friend was, that I wanted her to wear it, in case she ran off to see her sisters again. With a Pipbuck, I could find her, and didn't have to rely on my rusty tracking skills.

“This place is pretty amazing.”, Homage said, as we explored the ship together. Golden Sunshine and Frostmane were off exploring different parts of the ship, or so I had thought.

“Yep. It was one of only four of it's kind. Six star pleasure cruisers for the rich. Now this place could hold an entire colony of Ponies, and there would still be enough room to spare.”, I mused, as I pushed open a pair of double doors that were labeled “Saloon”. To my astonishment, two other sets of doors opened at almost exactly the same time, and I could only stare at my marefriend, and Golden Sunshine. Apparently there were several ways to get here, and all four of us had arrived at roughly the same time.

The room was expansive, with tasteful furniture and a red plush carpet that was pleasant to walk on. A bar, with most of it's bottles broken on the floor, was on the far wall, while the center was dominated by a large stage. Screens were mounted on the walls, and I could see a whole array of cameras hanging over the stage. Apparently, whoever was performing was being filmed and the video was projected onto the screens, so none of the high society Ponies had to crane their necks to see the performance. It made me sick to think about how much this must have cost.

“So... what do you guys think? Should we give that mic a little shakedown after two hundred years?”, Homage chuckled as she saw the stunned expressions on our faces. To my surprise, Frostmane was all for it, and the gray little filly cheered gleefully as my marefriend took the stage. I on the other hoof, was already contemplating cybernetic eardrums.

I had heard her singing once, and that had been on a party to celebrate one of our squadmates birthday in the Ministry of Awesome. Everypony had agreed that, no matter what, it wasn't a good idea to let Frostmane get hold of a microphone to sing.

Imagine my surprise, when what I heard come from the speakers, was in fact the lovely voice of my mare, singing one of her favorite songs. Either she had been practicing since the last time I had heard her sing, or it had all been an act before.

“I hear you calling me tenderly...”, she sung, and I could feel my heart melt. ,”... saying come to me. When I'm down with loneliness.”

All three of us stood there, enraptured by her song. I just couldn't avert my eye from hers, as she looked at me from the stage. Her eyes were full of love, and I realized that I had finally gotten through to her. Frostmane was finally, truly returning my feelings towards her.

“I can feel you looking at me, even when we are far apart.”, she went on, and I could feel a tear form in my one eye, as the next line of the song left her lips.

“I believe in your love.”

Suddenly, all the screens around us lit up, showing Frostmanes face on them. Her light blue coat and blue eyes were captured beautifully on them, as the computer running the saloon was working on finding the perfect angle for the cameras. At that moment, I forgot everything around me. Homage and Golden Sunshine didn't seem to exist anymore. All that mattered to me were those beautiful blue eyes, that looked back at me, as my marefriend whispered the final line of her song into the microphone.

“I love you so...”

OooOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOo

That day, before we left the ship behind to continue our mission, Frostmane and I lay with each other as lovers for the first time. We chose the Princess suite for it, and Golden Sunshine took it upon herself to take care of Homage in the meantime, giving us as much time as we wanted.

Writing down the experience would be wrong, for it was something between Frostmane and myself, and I wouldn't want to betray her trust by doing so.

It was already late in the afternoon when we left the ship, but we had decided to leave anyways. If we had stayed for another night, we surely would have found other things to entertain ourselves with, or that needed to be repaired. Gear Turn was just too important to do that. It pained my heart to leave the ship in pursuit of a crazy mare, but she was ours to deal with. It was a matter of honor and responsibility, and we had sworn to hunt her down...

As we touched down on the shore, something caught my attention. Frostmanes ears had perked up, and she seemed to listen intently at something only she could hear.

“There's a fight nearby.”, she suddenly stated, rushing off. I followed, motioning for Golden Sunshine and Homage to stay behind. If there really was a fight, then I didn't want the two of them anywhere near it.

OooOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOo

Frostmane had been right. When we arrived at the scene, I saw a group of about ten Steel Rangers assaulting a caravan. The traders had hidden themselves behind their carts, but the Rangers fire was slowly taking their cover apart. There was one big armored carriage, behind which quite a few of the Ponies were hiding, but I could tell that it was only a matter of time before they were overrun.

My mare was already broadcasting on all frequencies, ordering the Rangers to hold their fire, but they didn't respond. Instead, two of them turned around to open fire on the two of us. I rose up into the air, readying my rifles, as Frostmane barreled into the group of armored Ponies. The two firing on us fell to her Power-Hooves pretty quickly, but one of the others got a hit with his grenade machine gun in on her. The explosion was unable to hurt her, but she was still thrown through the air for a few meters.

My rifles discharged, taking down two more of the Rangers. I hadn't aimed to kill, since I wasn't sure if these Rangers belonged to the Order of Machina, or to the Manehatten chapter of the Rangers proper. To my dismay, their armors crumpled to the ground, the Ponies inside of them having turned to ash.

Landing next to my marefriend, I helped her back to her hooves. The remaining Rangers had retreated, realizing that they were outclassed.

“Thanks a bunch there, Missy!”, came the voice of an old stallion from behind me, and I could see that one of the traders was trotting towards us cautiously.

We learned that this group of Ponies had been attacked and pursued by the Steel Rangers when they had tried to salvage medical supplies from a nearby MoP hospital, and that they were headed towards a settlement near Manehatten. Brothel was the name of the place, which gave me an uneasy feeling, but they could certainly need the protection we could offer. In return, the stallion, whos name was Chain Whip, offered us a discount on all of his wares.

When I inquired what was in the big armored carriage, the stallion waved a hoof at me, saying that it held potentially dangerous cargo.

“If you think it could be dangerous, then maybe we should take a look at it. We're pretty knowledgeable when it comes to pre-war tech.”, Frostmane offered, not revealing our background to the stallion.

“Nah, it's alright. We got a customer up in Brothel who'll pay us a whole lot for the stuff, no matter what it is.”, Chain said, dismissing our offer. I couldn't help but notice that his eyes widened slightly when Frostmane mentioned our two friends....

Footnotes:

Frostmane:

New Perk

Labor of love: You'd do anything to protect your loved ones. You gain a +1 bonus to perception and endurance, if Firestorms, Homages or Golden Sunshines HP are below 50%.

Maximum Level

Firestorm:

New Perk

Labor of love: You'd do anything to protect your loved ones. You gain a +1 bonus to perception and endurance, if Frostmanes, Homages or Golden Sunshines HP are below 50%.

Maximum Level

Golden Sunshine:

New Equipment: Pipbuck

Homage:

New Equipment: Pipbuck