Fallout: Equestria - Red, White and Blue

I barely felt comfortable in my new jewelery. It was... oddly warm against my skin. I wasn't used to lukewarm sensations. It was bone-chilling or simply scathing. It was never in-between. I felt off. I felt unclean wearing it. In fact, I felt... I felt like crushing the cross into millions of microscopic pieces. It slid off and I could've sworn it didn't look injured or broken. Nothing was wrong with the crucifix.

Was I cursed...? Did I blaspheme?

I jumped in place, barely moving, but shaken.

"Who goes there?! You don't look like one of us, civilfolk...! Come to cathedral if you want to help! Stay outside for business! You kill metal ponies! No kill tribe! Understand!?"

Tribals? There were actually tribals with poor English? I thought english was an easy language. Or, at least proper syntax was easy. I stepped away from the gate and near the speaker system. It told me to push the button with a chalk arrow sign, so I did.

"Yes, I'll help. Tell me who to cleanse and it shall be done."

A lone buzz ended my sentence. So it seemed the tribals were desperate. And so was I. I felt the urge to burn something so I did, aiming my malice toward some vines. So it was that more of the Ark and Dove Cathedral was bathed in flame. It was bathed in luminescence. I couldn't look away, not even close to the entrance. I kicked the doors open and entered, absent-minded.

Supposedly, churches and cathedrals were the undeniable homes of Celestia and her holy trinity. But why did no one keep it clean of vice and conflict. Even the yew benches weren't safe from rambunctious rough-housing. There were bullets and hatchets, to spears and lasers disrupting the peace so wrongly desecrated.

I browsed about, yawning and groggy, spotting the tribals and their synthetic enemies. Their enemies, I could only assume, resembled robots in the likeness of a pony. Same tail design, though most were missing it, and same hair fibers blanketing their heads. Just, most of them were bald from presumed warfare. The synths, I would later know them as, were marblish in skin-tone beneath the artificial layers.

That's how I knew. I knew who to shoot, who to burn. The color of their skin said so.

I worked shortly and burned them. And when any of their polymer flesh caught fire, it was surprisingly effective. The plastic composite flesh would melt away and the metal would warp at the joints. Because that's where I targetted, the joints. They'd go up in flames, check their superficial injury and fall to shotgun and sledgehammer tribals. I was wondering, however, as I lay back and picked them off with gunfire, why my fire was reddish in hue. It was never so ominous before. So why would I, a messenger of Celestia, carry a wicked flame?

There were dozens of synth husks layering the floor. And most tribal corpses, in total estimation, were turned to ash. The purity of the ash before me, on my hooves and in my hair, felt marvellous. It felt familiar. Who else but Celestia could design such fine textures. It was heaven on the hooves and rubbed in like talcum powder. My trance broke hearing the speaker voice right beside me.

"Ah, civilfolk. My name is Mango Summer. Come. You do good. You do magic without horn and burn synth back. You must be Celestia pony. We see Celestia pony two days ago right here, too."

I felt my stomach ache. Twas pulsing and stinging. Twas eating me alive. So I spoke to quell it.

"What... other Celestia ponies. Who? And what did they look like." I inquired, starting notes on my pipbuck.

He spoke slowly. I thought he was lying, but the way his words streamed... I figured it was language trouble. He didn't show any signs of ambush, either. The other ponies were amassed elsewhere, so the Ark and Dove was eerily vast and lifeless.

If it weren't for the many floodlights and lanterns, I'd think twice about staying longer. I found comfort in Summer, though. He was an honest pony with an honest heart. He made eye-contact and never broke it. His hooves were also making gestures. They went forgotten by lying storytellers.

"There were two. One red coat like strawberry and cherry. He eyes white, milk color. And his friend blue fur. She have blue eyes, too. Ice blue. We talk and buy. They give us... what name be again. They give us books and labratori. Blue say we use it make Med-X and Saiko. And then they give us machine make good puncher fruit."

Sons of bitches. Sons of Roam. They were cultivating the locals to line their pockets with caps. I wondered how far they'd get if I paid a visit myself. I dropped the idea when I thought... maybe they were just like me. Maybe the other Celestians were just as hard to throttle. The thought scared me. What could a nation of us do. We could forge Hel, or build Eden. I understood now.

"What if I bought some puncher fruit for now, just to research it, and told you I had a mansion you could grow more in? All the yard. All the basement. Even the rooms. Just two rooms... saved for me and my mare. The rest, for your tribe..."

His mouth was wide open. He could scarcely follow, much less believe. But I told him one, simple thing.

"All you have to do for sunlight... is listen to me. I have a book just for you. And it covers everything about sunlight. All about heat. Does that sound good?"

I sealed the deal with a smile. A Celestian one a Celestian cult leader might wear.

And so, I took him by his hooves and shook his hand. I felt a strange urge to make bets with him. To gamble. But i decided against it, for discipline's sake. We took to bartering not minutes after. And he was a guillable colt. But I never took advantage of him. He'd need all the caps he could steal. Ponies these days were sickly horses on other sickly horses' backs.

'A measure of wheat for a penny, and three measures of barley for a penny; and see thou hurt not the oil and the wine.'

That was today's wasteland economy.

We settled for two of my double barrels, three teddy bears, one pack of cigarettes and forty caps for two puncher fruit. He asked immediately why I didn't just take some, but I told him my neighbor was my neighbor, and I wouldn't take and I wouldn't want. Yes, I took some refined puncher straight from the soil trough, but I never took more. That was unfair. And that was predation, the Roaming way.

I also... happened to scrounge some internal systems parts and hectaterrabyte chips here and there from the synth corpses. I found some heavy duty microprocessors and even a whole head, too. I took a leg back for a souvenir, in-case anypony else from the Commonwealth paid me a visit.

The weapons were not so salvageable. All of their laser pistols and pulse pistols were broken. And, in some cases, they were melted to scrap thanks to some genius and their rampant pyromania. Not three hours after the Ark and Dove conflict did I leave perfectly unscathed. And I was off to find a Mother Puncher, or whatnot. The Mother Puncher was a special, giganticus strain of normal puncher fruit. It was so vast and timeless that it's sole purpose was to spew puncher pollen and drop puncher seeds.

He warned me of a mad stallion stalking it's home, the Sacred Bog. Apparently, the old tribe used to require lobotomy for recruitment. Mango Summers took over once the past leader, Fat Sun, was decapitated by a lone wanderer. I wondered... just how skilled you had to be to decapitate someone mid-combat with a dull splinting weapon. Maybe Tequila could learn to use one. I ignored the twitching in my face, sure it'd pass.

As I opened the doors, I heard it, the sound of breaking stone. I stayed inside.

A stone cross fell from the cathedral's bell tower and fell in front of me.

It landed right where I would've been if I never stopped to think.

I crossed my chest and feared the omen.