Fallout Equestria: Thorncroft

by ErrantIndy

Rating: teen
Tags: Crossover, My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic, Dark, Original Character, Adventure
Length: 7208

The lessons of the balefire forgotten, a mule must face a repetition of the past.

In a remote corner of Equestria, the lessons writ by balefire have been forgotten. For the very same reasons zebras and ponies nearly obliterated each other, the donkeys of Kansass and the ponies of Missurrey stand ready to repeat the past. Into this simmering border war wanders a mule on her own mission.

As soon as she remembers what that mission was...

(Thanks to Kashin for the cover image)

Published 2011-11-11 05:26:39 UTC
Last updated 2012-02-01 21:24:07 UTC

Prologue

War. War never changes

Ponies and zebras stood opposed to each other long ago. Ghouls and those folk with luxury to remember history say it was a scarcity of resources that brought balefire and poison sweeping across the world. I’m not an especially smart creature and I wasn’t there, so I’m not going to say they were wrong. But I know they aren’t completely right either.

Ponies and zebras hated each other on a more personal level. It was their fear of the each other, the unknown. Journals, posters, books, and memory orbs scream it at any creature that’ll take a look. Maybe their prejudice didn’t pull release levers and turn the keys, but it did fan the balefires.

Two centuries and an excessive amount of balefire later, and we haven’t learned a thing.

Far in the East of Equestria, beyond Hoofington and even Stalliongrad, are, or at least were, the Royal Provinces of Kansass and Missurrey. Kansass had been given to donkeys and mules fleeing the prejudice of their homeland of Asinus. They were adherents of the Royal Sisters. Loving them as much as they loved ordinary ponies, hence the mules and their major reason leaving Asinus. Celestia awarded them land and a place in Equestria. And they lived happily for many centuries.

The ponies of Missurrey were not happy.

The immigrants to Kansass were recipients of some of the best farm land in that corner of Equestria. The ponies protested to the Princess, but she would have none of it. Missurrey had enough arable land but it also had trade and industry that the donkey and mules of Kansass did not. The ponies seethed but knew they would not get help from above.

Then the balefire came,

And then things got worse...

~ ~ ~

Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.

At the moment, I’m not sure about a lot of things.

What I can be pretty sure of is: folks are supposed to have two working eyes.

I stopped beside the pond for a moment, glancing down at the reflection. The creature in the water still had only one eye. The one on the left was bleeding pulp. I’d made myself stop touching it a while ago, along with its larger, matching wound on the back side of my skull. That one wasn’t much better than my eye.

I leaned down and smelt the water. I don’t know why really. It smelt okay. I took a couple of tentative sips; it also tasted okay. I drank my fill and stayed at the water’s edge, resting. I looked down at the creature in the water.

Another thing I was fairly certain of is that no creature’s supposed to meander about the great wide open as messed up as I was.

I could see more wounds, freshly healed or healing. All down my grey hide I’d been cut, bitten, and burned. I’d been bleeding from my rump a while back, but I don’t think about that. I’d even had chunks bitten and torn from long ears. I figured I should have been dead at some point.

However, something I was dead set about was that I should know how I got this way.

Who those dead ponies and that dead donkey I’d woken amongst were.

What that dead mare had been doing curled around me while empty bottles lay in front of my muzzle.

Where the hell I was.

Why I was so sure I had to head on the straight course, I’d been following for days.

Oh, and my name would be good at some point.

Like I said, I’m unsure about a lot of things...

Footnote

????????

S.P.E.C.I.A.L.

Strength: 7
Perception: 6
Endurance: 8
Charisma: 4
Intelligence: 6
Agility: 6
Luck: 3

Traits:

Heavy Hooved: You stomp harder, not better. Your attacks are very brutal, but lack finesse. You rarely cause a critical hit, but you always do more melee damage. Really, with your luck what could you hope for?

Prairie Paranormal: This unleashes the most bizarre and silly elements of post-apocalyptic Equestria. Not for the faint of heart or the serious of temperament. All that empty space and corn fields can’t mean anything good...

Not Right in the Head: Someone’s messed you up bad, rattled yer noggin, given you a street corner lobotomy. Things may come back; things may not. But, hey! It’s free!

This fanfiction is based on Fallout Equestria by Kkat; a familiarity with the source material may aid your understanding.

You can read Fallout Equestria by Kkat on Equestria Daily.

The Fallout: Equestria logo used above was designed by DotRook, who, according to the original deviantArt page, allows usage in supplementary materials created for and associated with the series. Images really do make a difference, so he has our eternal gratitude and respect.

If you enjoy Fallout Equestria Side Stories, you will want to check the Fallout Equestria Side Stories post on Equestria Daily and the Fallout Equestria Side Stories thread on Ponychan

The Ponychan group is also a hatching ground that you can join if you want to share your experience, writing, or comments with us.

A grateful thanks goes to all the folk at the FOE protodoc hatching ground for their help and review, especially Kibugamikenzo. Much of this could not have been possible without them. The rest of it is all my doing...mostly the bad.

Ch. 1 Deus Ex Concertina

Chapter One: Deus Ex Concertina

“When you can't gallop, you crawl, and when you can't crawl - when you can't do that...”

I was actually getting worse. I know now that no one in the Wastes should be surprised. Things always got worse, except when they get better, but those times are so few and far between they might as well not exist. However to my bullet-whisked brain, I’d figured getting shot in the head and mutilated to death and back ought to be the lowest of low points.

Nope, I was startled how I wrong I was. I’d trudged across the wind-swept sea of grass for days. I wasn’t sure how I knew it, but I could find good, clean water. I guess it was instinct. I’d get thirsty, and then I’d go find water like I knew the area. I knew I could eat the grass I was walking through, so I didn’t go hungry. I couldn’t die. I wouldn’t allow myself to die. I had somewhere to be. Somewhere I...I had not a clue where this somewhere was...or what or who...was at this somewhere. It was somewhere, and at the moment I had nothing other than the few minutiae I’d remembered thus far rattling around in my skull. I needed this. I needed something to keep my hooves moving.

And so I did. I didn’t sleep much during those blurred days. I walked and walked. When I did stop, I only did because I was exhausted. I had somewhere to be.

Well, to be honest, I didn’t want to sleep anyways, not until I was so exhausted I was falling unconscious. I found I slept best that way. I didn’t dream that way. The first few days I’d tried to sleep in a normal way like my instincts seemed to say I slept. The nightmare was horrible. It was the same one over and over. No hint to my life before the bullet through my eye. All the nightmares were cutting, burning, and then blackness. Cutting, burning, and blackness. Cut. Burn. Black. Over and over the nightmare repeated. I didn’t sleep those nights I tried.

So I stopped sleeping. Falling over exhausted was working much better for me, mentally. Physically however, I was falling apart. I’d been in dull pain when I’d first awoken. But since I’d been walking the pain had become excruciating. Every stride felt like it was tearing my wounds open. A quick glance at my sides and flanks proved that it wasn’t just a feeling. I was bleeding again.

I had to to keep going. I had to keep following this...this.

Dammit, why didn’t I know what to call this thing? I don’t know even what it is. It was as much instinct as finding fresh water, as noting the grass was good to eat, as anything that’d kept me going thus far. It was...a feeling in my hooves. Sound’s stupid when I think about it that way, don’t it? But that’s exactly what it is. Every time I step, I can feel myself pulled in a direction, but not in my hooves...dammit, Celestia on....

Celestia...

Great another stupid blank. Who was she? And what was she doing on a pogo-stick?

Okay, what I do know. I feel a connection to my mysterious, invisible path when I set a hoof on the ground, but its pull is higher up in my chest. It’d tugged me along urgently, unerringly. If I wasn’t skipping sleep already for the nightmare, I would be for this. All that mattered was getting to the other end of this path. It frightened me a little really. In my gut, I felt I really didn’t want to reach my destination; I had to. But I was more scared that the tug would stop, and my only link to the world would be severed.

That I w...that....that...that was new.

I stopped and looked up from the grass I’d been staring at. The terrain rolled gently in every direction. Grass waved over the hills in every direction except directly in front of me. There a short distance...well relatively short, considering the distance I’d walked thus far, was a long strip of black rock, a...road. Road! Something new to remember, sweet merciful Celestia? Two things to remember! The remembrance has been doubled!

So Celestia’s a merciful pogo-sticker, good to know...why do I remember what a pogo-stick is when I’ve forgotten so much else?

Anyways as interesting as thoroughfare epiphanies were, that wasn’t what I stopped for. Something...some things were around me. I turned around looking behind me. Nothing. I looked left and then right. Nothing. I frowned. “H-hello?” I asked, pausing for an answer. Still nothing. I frowned. I sniffed the air cautiously and froze.

There was a scent on the wind.

My gut told me this was bad scent. I backed up. I couldn’t see what it was or where it was. I couldn’t hear anything. But I knew something...no things were around...around me. They were surrounding me. I looked around again. Nothing, still bucking nothing.

My hooves. It was in my hooves. Just like my path, I could feel them in my hooves and then in my chest. I could feel them, their steps. There were two in front of me, one to my right, and the one to my left trying to slip around behind me.

Buck me. Celestia, buck me hard with a....wow, this Celestia did dirty things to folk...

I had to keep my head swiveling about to compensate for the one eyeball in my skull. I couldn’t see a damn thing, and I doubt another eye’d help much. I also couldn’t hear any...my big internal monologue...a hissing rattle started behind me. I jumped and spun, looking into the grass as my addled brain screamed, SNAKE!

Snakes, why’d it have to be sn...weren’t snake supposed to have, you know, no legs? Why did this one have four that were coiling to pounce...

CELESTIASHOLYMAREFIRE!

I threw myself out of the way as the thin air shimmered and suddenly became much thicker. My eye widened. Dog-snakes! Wait that’s not right...coyote-snakes! How was that better to know, brain? How? This was the ugliest...which ya know isn’t a real insult considering how much remembered...but it was powerfully ugly creature. The body of the coyote, the tail and head of snake. Oh, and it had a snake’s fangs, dripping with venom.

It skidded around at the end of its jump and turned back towards me, looking hungry. Its tail was a blur as it stalked towards me. I could feel its fellow coyote-snakes moving to surround me again. I bit my lip as I considered my situation. I didn’t think I could make a break for it. I was bone tired, and that thing had moved quick. My gut told me the four of them would run me down lickety-split. I had to fight.

Did I know how to fight?

I’d find out soon enough. As I dithered, one of those I couldn’t see circled behind me. I could feel that now familiar coiling. I threw a glanced over my shoulder in time to see the air shimmer and one of those things appear, leaping for my flanks. My lovely, lovely instincts took over for my battered brain, and it surprised me and my attacker.

I pushed my hind legs off the ground, drew them in, and snapped them out with a ferocity I didn’t know I had. My small hooves struck the beast square in the head. It flipped back over, bouncing into the grass behind me.

I craned my neck down and gaped at my hooves. Wow. That was cool. My gut screamed as me, and looked back up. The rest had decided to rush me. The first get my attention was the nearest, the one leaping for my face. No, thank you, abomination of nature; I’ve had enough facial alterations for one lifetime. I reared up and flailed my hooves down at my opponent. One hoof connected and thrust the creature down under me. I let myself drop, bringing my fore hooves down on its body. The scream it made as its midsection crunched under my weight chilled my bones.

I jumped back off it. It wasn’t dead, but it definitely wasn’t going anywhere from the way it was flopping. There were two more still, in front of of me now. I kept backing away. These two were more cautious, probably more crafty.

They were probably going to attack at the same time from different sides, my brain supplied, getting back into the fight, literally and figuratively.

Howdy, brain, glad to have you along. Okay, they were getting ready to...the two rippled into existence far from me. They sent wary glances my way, but their attention was on their crippled companion. Hmm...so they were going to care for...strike that. They pounced on their wounded pack mate and sunk their fangs into him. The coyote-snake squealed as it shook and convulsed.

Don’t get bit.

Thanks, brain, I figured that out for myself. I kept up my steady retreat. The two kept pumping venom into their “friend” for a moment longer and then withdrew. With nary a glanced towards me they immediately began feasting. I took advantage and took off at a gallop. Apparently, I’d ended up on the path because I felt the tug and followed it straight towards the road.

Adrenaline is a wonderful thing. I was making great time, probably made up for the time the fight took. But as I neared the road, the adrenaline began to ebb, and the pain it’d masked roared back pack up my limbs and into my body. I looked at my my abused hide. I was bleeding enough I couldn’t tell if I’d gotten tagged in the fight. Well, I wasn’t foaming at the mouth or convulsing in the prairie grass, so I wasn’t going to die yet.

That fight had been something else. I’d moved smoothly, dodging and kicking. Those kicks, especially that buck, had been stunning. It sure wasn’t my memory...muscle memory then. What was I? What had I been? A part of me was proud. I’d defended myself. I was alive! But another part was grave. I hadn’t done wrong, but I was still wary of myself, my strength.

That was introspection that’d get me nowhere at the moment. I didn’t have enough answers for any sort of question. I hoped I would soon. What I did have now was a road. A cracked, black road that stretched ahead of me and in either direction to the far horizon. It was as empty as the prairie had been, but I didn’t know if that was good or bad. I was back down to my usual pace of a pained shuffle that I’d found to be so efficient during my travels thus far. I just had to keep following the trail, and eventually I’d get where I was going.

Sure.

Until I hit the road.

The moment I was totally onto the rocky black top my trail disappeared. I wish I could say I took this rationally, calmly.

I freaked the buck out.

I quickly discovered Celestia was a dirty, dirty mare from the things I recalled out loud about her. I just as quickly discovered I couldn’t find the trail again for the life of me. I crossed the road and searched. I couldn’t feel it in my hooves. I couldn’t see any tracks. I couldn’t smell anything. I walked one direction for a bit, finding nothing. I went the other direction. Nothing. I crossed back over to where the trail ended. I desperately trotted up and down the shoulder, ignoring my pain.

Nothing.

Nothing.

I stopped at the last trace of my trail, my life line. My screaming legs buckled under me and fell into the gravel. I pressed my nose into the invisible trace in the gravel, hoping I would gain some hint, some further clue to what I was supposed to do. What was I supposed to do? I couldn’t feel it. Where could it have gone? It wasn’t on the road or on either side. What was the trail?

Had there...had there ever been a trail?

Had I been following madness?

Was all of this my bullet-bucked brain beguiling me?

I leaned my head all the way down, pressing my forehead down into the rocks until it hurt. Dammit, brain you got me here. Where to now? WHERE! I lifted my head, pebbles slowly falling from the indentions in my forehead. I began to cry. I hadn’t cried for anything since I woke up. Not the pain. Not my confused state. Not for the bodies that’d been around me when I awoke.

“Celestia. Celestia, I...I don’t know who ya are, but-but it seems right to talk to ya. I know I’ve thought some horrible things about ya....but I...but.” I lowered my head and curled it to my side. “You’re the only folk I know. I don’t have any other to turn to. Please, what do I do...don’t leave me here.” I squeezed my eye shut. I waited.

And waited.

And waited.

The brightness beyond my eyelid grew dim. The evening air was chilling.

Who was I kidding? I’d lost my mind along with everything else about me. How could I expect some nasty filly I’d never met to magically pull my flanks out of this? I should just lay down and die.

“A eastern ranch is just a branch of Nowhere Junction to me.

Give me the city where livin's pretty and the mares wear finery.”

And if she’s gonna caterwaul like that she can leave me to die. Seriously, with a voice like that. Finally. I looked up and around.

“East is east and west is west

And the wrong one I have chose

Let's go where you'll keep on wearin'

Those frills and flowers and buttons and bows

Rings and things and buttons and bows”

I’ll give Celestia one thing. She thinks she’s a funny bitch. Coming down the road and heading into the setting sun was thoroughly ridiculous creature. He, I guessed he was a he, was tiny grey-furred equine. His eyes were shut, a broad smile on his short face. He was bouncing along happily, singing in time to the tune he played on the contraption on his back. It was some saddle-mounted instrument that extended and contracting and made oddly musical honk as the creature bounced and danced down the road. As he came further the down the road, I saw he was pulling a small tarp-covered wagon behind him. He kept coming, oblivious to me as he enjoyed his song.

“Don't bury me in this lone prairie- Oh!” He broke song and finally opened his eyes as he came up beside me. He skidded a bit further, trying to bring his wagon to a stop. When he finally stopped, he began turning the wagon so he could look at me. “But maybe we should bury you, friend. You look awful.”

I looked at him for a moment longer and laid my head back down.

“Um, ma'am? Molly? Hello?”

No thanks, Celestia. I think I’ll just get with that dying plan...

Footnote:

Level Up!

Two Tagged Skills Remembered!
-Survival
-Unarmed

Skills up!
-Survival: 42
-Unarmed: 44

Perk Remembered!

-“Special” Connection I : You have a special connection to the land! Whatever that means...

This fanfiction is based on Fallout Equestria by Kkat; a familiarity with the source material may aid your understanding.

You can read Fallout Equestria by Kkat on Equestria Daily.

The Fallout: Equestria logo used above was designed by DotRook, who, according to the original deviantArt page, allows usage in supplementary materials created for and associated with the series. Images really do make a difference, so he has our eternal gratitude and respect.

If you enjoy Fallout Equestria Side Stories, you will want to check the Fallout Equestria Side Stories post on Equestria Daily and the Fallout Equestria Side Stories thread on Ponychan

The Ponychan group is also a hatching ground that you can join if you want to share your experience, writing, or comments with us.

The song I mention is “Buttons and Bows,” an old song from the 1940s. The best version, in my opinion, is the one that won it an Oscar for Best Original Song from the Bob Hope movie The Paleface.

A grateful thanks goes to all the folk at the FOE protodoc hatching ground for their help and review, especially No One, Triple B, Kibugamikenzo, and a friendly hobo. Much of this could not have been possible without them. The rest of it is all my doing...mostly the bad.

Ch. 2 The Kindness of Strangers

Thorncroft

Chapter Two: The Kindness of Strangers

Remember that everyone you meet is afraid of something, loves something and has lost something...

I had decided to die. I didn’t know where I was supposed to go from here. I didn’t know who I was, and death preferable to what was happening.

“I know you couldn’t have fallen asleep that quickly.”

I opened my eye and rolled it in the small equine’s direction. “Leave me alone.”

He frowned at me and unhitched himself from his wagon. “Now, now. Molly, what’s the matter?”

I lifted my head quickly. “Do ya know me?”

The stranger cocked his head. “I think I’d remember someone with a...distinctive coat like yours.” It was my turn to frown, looking back over my hide. Nothing was special about my dirty grey coat. No, what was special was where there wasn’t any fur, my wounds.

I lowered my head again. “I thought you knew my name.”

He froze for a moment. “Knew your...” He took another couple steps towards me. I could almost feel his eyes on me. “Sweet Mares above, those are fresh!”

I sighed. “They’re not. They’re days old.”

“How long, molly?”

I looked back up at him. I could see the pity in his eyes. I sneered. “Days. Longer. None yer business. And stop callin’ me that.” I closed my eye and grit my teeth as I got to my hooves. I didn’t want to see him looking at me like that. Although, mostly, moving hurt like hell. My joints groaned and my scars burned as I started to get up.

I stopped when I felt a hoof on brushing along my cheek, moving my unruly mane out of my face. I opened my eye and found the other creature staring at my other eye, the missing one. He was silent. Pity had disappeared from his eyes. His face, blank for a moment, just looked over mine. I tried to pull away. His forehoof moved under my chin and pulled me to face him. “Who did this to you?”

Blank was gone.

Anger remained. It looked so out of place on the little creature.

It looked so out of place. It looked so familiar. My legs felt wobbly all of suddenly. My hooves scrapped against the gravel in the roadbed, and I fell down...

~ ~ ~

...on to a wood floor. The grain was so close. I could feel it under my chin, my hooves, my chest. I could see it with my own two eyes.

Anger remained, as did Pain.

I couldn’t scream anymore. I wouldn’t allow myself. Not when they’d cut me. Not when they’d burn me.

Not,

Not,

Not when they’d...surround me.

I couldn’t scream.

There had been enough screaming in the house.

I wouldn’t scream.

I wouldn’t give him the satisfaction.

I looked up from the wood. I saw him.

Him.

That bastard. That short, Kansass motherbucker.

The donkey sat in my father’s chair. He’d hadn’t participated in the ‘festivities.’ He’d just watched. All the screaming, all the sobbing, all the pain, and he’d just watched with that smug, self-satisfied smile. He hadn’t reacted any other way. Any other jack would have gotten a rise out of of all this. Not him, he couldn’t.

A weight, a creature got off me. My teeth grit against each other. I wouldn’t let my body betray me.

The donkey got up and sauntered over to me. He put a hoof under my chin to tip my head up towards his. I didn’t move. I wasn’t going to give-

“Red, Saltlick, a jaw please?”

Teeth closed on my ears and hauled back on my head. I went with them, hissing through my teeth. The donkey made as if he was pushing my chin up. He looked me in the eyes. “The other families, I told them this wasn’t personal. It was politics. With your family? With you? It is personal and has been a pleasure.”

One of the ponies let his grip on my ear slacken for the barest moment before jerking back up sharply. His head jerked to the side. I could feel my ear tear, and a warmth began to trickle down into my inner ear. I sagged down only held up by one ear and hoof under my chin.

That...that...ass looked down at me. “I wish I could hold on to you, cousin. I wish I could keep you and teach you your sins exquistely. However, you would kill me one day. I would lower my guard for instant, and you would kill me.”

I wrenched my teeth a part. “I’ll kill you now, you bastard.”

That smile, so damned smug, didn’t twitch. “Were I to give you the time...” He simply shook his head. “However, I’ve learned not to allow you that.” He turned away. I glanced around as much as I could dangling by one ear.

I couldn’t see her. Where was Bonny?

I hadn’t heard her screaming. Momma’s...Momma’s I’d heard. They’d been intent on her. I couldn’t see Momma, but I had heard her. Bonny had been missing since...it had all started.

The donkey turned back, hefting a large revolver. He set it down, leaning against a forehoof. “Any last words? Insults to my heritage and yours?”

“Where. Is. Bonny.” I ground out.

He nodded. “One last good-bye isn’t out of the question. Gentlecolts, drag her outside.” The two creatures behind me each grabbed a leg and dragged me across the wood floor. I was pulled out the front door onto the porch and then bounced down the porch steps, my teeth snapping as I hit each one. They dragged me through the dirt in the yard, stopping to pull me around to face away from our small wooden house. My torturers dropped my legs and stepped around in front of me.

Ponies. Buckin’ ponies.

They moved to join their friends, collected around a small grey molly. The mule wept as she hung down at the extent of the leash and collar they’d fitted on her. The other molly opened her eyes as she heard me come to a rest in the dirt. “I’m sorry. Celestia, I’m so sorry.”

She...she hurt worse than anything I’d felt so far, seeing her like this. I unclenched my jaw again. I needed to talk to her. “Bonny, I’ll come for you. I swear it.”

I felt as much as heard the ass come up behind me. He rounded in front of me. He set his large pistol down again. “No, cousin, She’s headed East. You are headed down.” His smile broadened. It wasn’t smug anymore. He was proud, proud of what he was going to do. “And I’m going to put you there.” He bent his head down and picked up the revolver. He pushed the barrel against my eye. It hurt like hell, but I wasn’t gonna flinch not now, not at the end.

I looked at him with my other eye. “I swore, bastard. I will come for her, and I will come for you. If I gotta pick my bones up out of this yard to do it, then I will see you in hell.” He didn’t say anything. He squeezed the trigger back with his tongue. I closed my eye and readied myself. I’d see Daddy again. I could feel him now. Howdy again, Dadd-

The pistol roared.

It echoed, and all was black.

~ ~ ~

All was not black as I awoke. The flames of a fire danced beyond my eyelid. I groaned as planted my hooves pushed my front half up so I could look around. I noticed my forelegs were bandaged up. I pulled my right hoof up and looked at it. There was a crack that I hadn’t remembered. Someone had filled it with something clear. I looked back over myself. I looked like...a thing..a thing that was wrapped in bandages. Why did the word Mau seem to come to mind?

My back, my flanks, my rump...there was hardly a bit of me that wasn’t covered in whi...well white-ish cloth. I could feel it wrapped up around my neck as I turned. I raised a hoof and felt more up on my head, over my useless eye and the back of my head.

“Welcome back to the land of the living, miss.”

I looked up from myself and across the fire. The small...he was a donkey. I waited for that to mean something, to drive me to my hooves in anger, but I was too wrung out. I looked up at the donkey. He was across the fire, atop his wagon, and tending the fire with a long pole. A rifle lay beside him. He was looking at me out of the corner of a very swollen eye.

He’d had two good eyes just a...

The uncertainty began to knit together as I realized I had more unanswerable questions. It’d been twilight when the donkey had arrived. Now it was firmly night now. The donkey looked like he’d insulted somebody’s mother. I was bandaged. I didn’t remember anything. Again.

I squeezed my eye shut. “What-what happened?” I felt my voice catch. I felt helpless. I didn’t want to feel like this.

He snorted. “You happened, miss.”

I opened my eye and blinked up at him. “Me? What did I-”

The donkey looked at the fire. “Well, I touched your face, and then...then ya tried to smash my face in.”

“I did? Mister, I’m so sor-” He stopped me with a waved his very small hoof.

“I managed to roll away from you quick enough. You cracked your hoof on the pavement trying to squash my noggin. I was able to get the cart between you and me, and then it was just a matter of running fast enough to keep away from you until you fell over.” He shook his head. “I don’t hold it against you, not after what you yelled at me.”

He turned to face me. “I’m not one of those Kansasses.” My look of confusion must have been very clear in the firelight. “I’m not a donkey from Kansass. I’m from way out West; I thought you should know.” He looked down into the fire. “It’s assholes like that make me ashamed to be a jack.” He looked back up at me. I was still so damned confused. He looked at the ground and then me again and slid off the top of the wagon.

He landed and walked over to me. “I don’t think you’re liable come for my skull right now.” He stopped and extended a hoof to me. “Name’s Bob. Hope you’ll be able forgive my kind, your kind too, I suppose.”

I looked at the hoof and stretched out my own and shook his. “What do you mean, my kind and your kind?”

Bob cocked his head to the side. “Don’t remember a thing?”

I squirmed under his gaze. I shook my head. I didn’t want him to know, anyone to know, how helpless I was. He just smiled warmly. “Okay, so you remember a thing, but not many I take it?”

I glared at him. “Why does it matter to ya?”

Bob sat down. “Because I was raised better than those asses around here, your father excluded of course.”

I shrugged. “I don’t know. I think I...” I frowned and narrowed my eye. “How do you know my daddy was a donkey?”

“It’s a guess. You are a female mule, a molly.” He waited for me to nod that I understood that. “Mules are the kids of a pony and a donkey. Judging from your size, your father was a donkey, and your mother was a pony. The bigger the mother, the bigger the mule.” He shrugged.

I’d give him that one seeing as I was looking down at him even half reclined. “Now what do you remember?”

I opened my mouth. “They-”

Again Bob cut me off with a wave his hoof. “You don’t need to go into it, Miss, not if you don’t want to.”

I swallowed and nodded back. He probably already knew. I’d yelled things he said. It was both relieved and mortified. I didn’t know what I yelled. I didn’t want to know. I guess I’d just have to take what small reliefs I could. “There was another mule, Bonny. She’s...I don’t know.” I growled in frustration. “Ponies were taking her.”

Bob straightened up, sounding incredulous. “Ponies AND Kansasses?”

“What do ya mean?” I stared blankly at him.

He stared at me and then slapped himself in the forehead with a hoof. “Sorry, I forgot your amnesia, give me time.” I stared at him some more. He sighed. “Amnesia means you’ve lost memory due to something. In your case knocks to your head.”

I nodded. “The bullet.”

Bob shook his head. “Bullets, two of them. You got hit in the eye and back of the head, neither penetrated your skull.”

My remaining eye widened. “How do you-”

“I’ve treated more than a few injuries in my time.” The donkey ran a hoof over his short black mane. “When I was patching you up, I checked your head injuries...and well, I was as shocked as you. Both shots messed you up superficially but didn’t do anything more..” Bob shrugged. “Anyways, from what I was told about the Far East is that you have the donkeys of Kansass and then you have the ponies of Missurrey. Everyone I talked to made it clear that they do not like the other breathing the same air. So them working together...something isn’t right about this.”

I just gave him a blank stare. Really? Something’s not right about this? “I promised I’d find her. I think I was following her. I lost her trail here at the road.”

He glanced over his shoulder for a moment at the road we were camped beside. “Well, I came from the west, and I didn’t see anyone. They must have gone East along the road...either for speed or to cover their tracks.”

I nodded. “Thank you, mister. I’ll head that way tomorrow.”

He shook his head. “I can’t let you go on alone.”

I furrowed my brow and opened my mouth to speak but stopped. I looked at the donkey again, a bit more carefully. Could I trust him?

He waited patiently, raising an eyebrow. On my left hoof, I knew jack spit nothing about this donkey. On my right hoof, I had tried to kill him, unsuccessfully, and fell unconscious afterwards. He’d have plenty of chances to kill me, tie me up, do horrible things to me, or all of those in any order he’d wished. That I was free, bandaged, and being treated politely did say something for him. I looked down at my right hoof. It was the cracked one, the one I’d tried to murder him with. I seemed to favor it, good enough for me. “Thank you.” I whispered.

I glanced up at him. He was smiling. I tried to return a weak one. “You remember a name?” He asked. I shook my head. He rubbed his chin with a hoof. “Hmm...can’t just call you molly, or even miss, all the time. Do you figure it had to do something with your cutie mark?”

My cutie mark. What in Celestia’s damned flank was a- I sighed and rolled over. My left flank was all bandaged up, so I was laying on my right. My right was relatively untouched. I must have been laying on the side when when they’d...well, I seemed to like laying on my right. I’ll take that as good news.

On my flank was a green...I turned back to Bob. “What the hell is it?”

“It’s a bush, a hedge to be precise. Were you a gardener?”

I shrugged. “How many di fferent ways can I say: I don’t know?”

The donkey chuckled; his dark eyes twinkled in the firelight. “How about I call you Hedge until you remember?”

Hedge. It was good as name as any. It didn’t feel right, but I could make it work, for now. “Yeah, call me Hedge.”

He nodded and got up. “Get some rest, Hedge. We’ll leave in the morning. I promise we’ll find your Bonny, somehow.” He started to walk away when I heard a noise. It was...I can’t explain it. Wind blowing, creaking wood...explosion? I guess he heard it did too because he stopped. He looked down at this leg. It was then I noticed the weird metal cuff on his left foreleg.

“What was that?” I asked.

He was fiddling with the thing for a moment. “It’s my Pipbuck, great little thing. It’s got maps, music, looks after your health, organizes your things, and it even keeps your list of things to do.”

“Sounds hoofy, but what was that noise.”

He grinned. “The last thing. Sometimes when I say I’m going to do something it updates my list. It makes that noise, have no idea what it is, just call it ‘that noise.’ But other than make odd sound effects it does something better.” He moved closer and turned around so I could see the tiny screen. “Something else you shouldn’t ask about...but it knows where to go. Look here.” I craned my head down to look closer. I could see a green picture. There were shapes I didn’t recognize and names over things I didn’t know. Bob pointed with the tip of his hoof at a long line that moved left to right across the screen. “This is the road we’re on, the Long Forty. And this,” he sketched along a dotted line to a flashing arrow, “is where we need to go.”

I squinted at the screen. “Kan-Miss Station.”

Bob nodded, pressing buttons “Yep, let’s see here. Thing also give hints about what you’re supposed to do. Uncanny, give it a fuzzy objective, and it tells you what you need to-” He stopped and looked at the new page after he’d changed it. “That’s a bit morbid.”

On a page marked “Quests” was two phrases at the left. First was “It’s a Dangerous Business, Going Out Your Door...” Second was “You Can’t Go Home Again.” The second seemed to be selected. On the right it offered the direction, “Ask around Kan-Miss Station for a clue to Bonny’s whereabouts.”

“So just ask around?” I looked up at Bob. He was frowning at the PipBuck. “Bob?”

He was frowning at the left hand column. He snorted and set his hoof down. He turned away without a word to me, walking back towards his cart. “Yeah, Hedge, we’ll go there tomorrow. It’s about a day away. Get some sleep.”

I didn’t understand his sudden change. He’d been all smiles and grins before. Another thing to confuse me, well they hadn’t killed me yet. I sighed and laid back down next to the fire. I watched the small donkey clamber back up onto the cart. His small tail wagging furiously as he pulled himself up. He moved back to next to his rifle and sat down. He rooted a hoof around under the edge of the tarp covering the cart and pulled out a pendant on a silver chain that shined in the firelight. He looked at it and sighed. “Just a little longer, I hope.” He kissed the pedant and slipped it over his head. It hung down low on his neck, too big for him. He sat faced away from the fire and looked out into the night.

I lay there and watched him for a bit until I fell a sleep.

The first good sleep I’d ever known.

Footnote:

No new level...

Skills Remembered!

-Speech: 10

No new perk...

Companion Gained, Bob the Donkey!

Companion Perk Gained!

-Hoof in Mouth Disease: You’ve never been good with folk, and EVERYBODY knows it. After failed Speech checks, Bob has a chance to intervene on your behalf with kind words and a hoof to stop yours.

This fanfiction is based on Fallout Equestria by Kkat; a familiarity with the source material may aid your understanding.
You can read Fallout Equestria by Kkat on Equestria Daily.

The Fallout: Equestria logo used above was designed by DotRook, who, according to the original deviantArt page, allows usage in supplementary materials created for and associated with the series. Images really do make a difference, so he has our eternal gratitude and respect.

If you enjoy Fallout Equestria Side Stories, you will want to check the Fallout Equestria Side Stories post on Equestria Daily and the Fallout Equestria Side Stories thread on Ponychan

The Ponychan group is also a hatching ground that you can join if you want to share your experience, writing, or comments with us.

A grateful thanks goes to all the folk at the FOE protodoc hatching ground for their help and review, especially No One and littlekittenmittens. Much of this could not have been possible without all of them. The rest of it is all my doing...mostly the bad.