Fallout: Equestria - Stargazer

Chapters

Prologue
Chapter 1 - Awoken
Chapter 2 - The Savanna
Chapter 3 - Minefield

Prologue

Based on the fanfiction Fallout: Equestria by KKat
co-written by Mr. ShinyObject and Doctor Felix Whooves
edited by Twilight Sparkle

Stargazer- Prologue

“War. War never changes. It doesn’t matter which side you’re on”

The ground is dry and barren. Nonetheless, a striped foal idly digs at the ground. Her mother told her that this was a way Zebras used to find water a long time ago. The foal wasn’t that thirsty, but she was nervous, and this was something to do while she waited for her mother to get beck.

“Zala!” came a shout from behind the filly. She jumped up and spun around to see her mother trotting towards her at a frantic pace. She was dressed in a simple black cloak with a single saddlebag to the right, filled to the brim with bottles of potions. “Zala, come with your mother, we have to leave the city right now,” she instructed the filly, “Come now, quickly!”

The filly answered with a frown, but followed her mother regardless, struggling to keep up to her pace. She turned her head back to the capital. It was so majestic, and so big. Zala had seen little more than huts most of her life, but the city was filled with mansions and castles. Even the shops were made of stone and metal! But most impressive of all was the Imperial Castle. To the young foal it seemed to stretch up for miles, with its pointed towers poking through the clouds and blocking out the sun itself. She wished it was more colorful, though. The outside had black and white stripes flowing down each of the towers, and the rest of the castle was just slid white or black. She’s never seen it, but she knows that the inside is the most colorful spot in the entire empire, adorned with more gems than she would see in her entire lifetime. The only time she had even seen a gem was the one her father took with him when he went to fight the war.

Zala noticed something just behind the castle. A little glimmer in the daylight that greatly frightened the filly. “Mom, Mom! There’s a star behind the castle! But it’s day, why is there a star there?” she asked her mother. She was not the only foal in the capital who feared this daytime star, and her mother was not the only zebra in the capital to fear the incoming megaspell. The foals’ fear is deeply seated in eons of zebra lore, but the adults’ fears are new to them and not so easily dissipated.

Zala’s mother stopped motionless in her tracks. Tears fell from each eye, passing through lines of black and white until they hit the ground.

She finally turned to answer the filly, “Zala, that is not a star, it is something much worse. It will get brighter and brighter and then it will burn this city in fire.” This was a time for honesty. She would not trick her own daughter. She unlatched her saddlebag and slid her whole cloak off so the bottles all rolled out onto the ground. More than a few of them had blood on them, but the filly simply assumed it was some red potion that spilled. “These are yours now, Zala. They were not easy to get, but I know you need them more than anyone. Even me. Now drink!”

The filly complied, and drank as fast as she could while tears began to form. She had never seen her mother like this. Sad, angry, worried, guilty, loving, all at once. She tried to focus on the potions. None quite tasted right, and they all made her feel funny. Her eyes wandered and saw that mother was right: The star was getting brighter and brighter, bigger and bigger, closer and closer. As she licked her lips from the last bottle, she tried to say something but just started bawling instead.
“It’s okay Zala. I did what I could for you, I only hope that it serves its purpose.” her mother told her as she embraced her child. “If I could protect you with love alone, I would, and nothing could ever break it.”

The two sat there on the outskirts of town, holding onto each other and waiting. The star got brighter and brighter and eventually hit the Imperial Castle at its highest tower, and the castle was no more. The entire city was encompassed with light, then with flames. The filly saw her mother turn to ash before her in an instant. The flames curved and licked around the filly leaving her unharmed, but her tears boiled away as soon as they came out.

A shock wave rushed through the town, toppling entire structures. A newly emptied chariot was flown back and hit the filly with the force of a stampede, crushing her to death instantly.

This was the last day of the Zebra Empire.

Chapter 1 - Awoken

“Can’t hear ya, I’m asleep”

--- --- --- /// /// /// | | | | | | \\ \\ \\ --- --- ---

“So, child, you wish to know of the great war that has destroyed our land?”

“Yes.”

“Are you sure? This may not be easy for you to accept.”

“Well, I’m going to have to, aren’t I? There’s no way I can try and live somewhere so messed up if I don’t know how it got that way.”

“Very well. Tell me young buck, what do you remember about the stars?”

“They’re... bad. They tempt us with their power, but we can’t ever accept it, because they bring evil to everything they touch.”

“Very true. Off in the distance, far from here, there are creatures that had not only accepted the evil into their hearts, but worshipped a being of the stars as a goddess. For a time we thought we could live in harmony with these creatures, but it was not long before they slaughtered our people. The demon took charge. It was here that we, as a people, as the proud Zebra Empire, decided that they could not be left to wreak destruction on us.”

“That’s it? They allied with the stars and so we decided to kill them all?”

“No, little one, be patient. There is much more I have yet to tell.”

--- --- --- \\ \\ \\ | | | | | | /// /// /// --- --- ---

Nothing but silence. Silence for a moment. Silence for an eternity. Nothing is heard, nothing is seen, nothing is felt, nothing is thought. A living being, but just barely, is housed in a personal sanctuary of peace and ignorance.

A blade is thrust into this bubble of stillness, nearly killing its occupant if not for the precision of whomever wields this blade. The blade cuts through the barrier to this sanctuary, a straight line from the top of the device to the base. Strange liquids, swirling colors of all types, flow through this incision in the dark green casing. Finally, along with the liquids flows out the device’s sole inhabitant.

The young zebra begins to open his eyes. He is still physically numb, and his eyes too are having trouble adjusting to having use again. He works up the energy to blink a few times. He tries to stand, but decides instead to just get into a more comfortable sitting position.

“Good,” came a feminine voice from somewhere in front of the buck, “Most try to stand up right away and end up breaking something.” The voice leaned in closer to the buck to give him a chance to look upon a face for the first time in over a hundred years. “I know I did.”

The buck looked around a bit more, but couldn’t see anything more than a few feet in front of him. That was something though. Below him flowed the liquids that just a moment ago he was suspended in. They were spiraling away down a drain not too far away, changing colors with every tile they passed. To his right was the device that he had just come from, or possibly been freed from. A large green blob, emptied of its juices, sat in the middle of a large metal contraption with a glass cover lifted above it by some metal cables. The pod was adorned with an array of lights and more than a few bottles of yet more strange liquids, still half full.

His gaze turned to the zebra mare in front of him. She wore a bit of light leather armor on her back, a strange golden bracelet on her left foreleg, and a long curved zebra officer's sword strapped to her right foreleg. Her eyes were a deep shade of pure blue, and stared directly at him.

He thought he’d attempt speaking, “Where... where am I? And why? Why was I here and.. and why was I in that thing?”

The mare responded with a smile and an answer, albeit an unclear one, “Somewhere safe. You’re here because someone cared about you very deeply. You were in that thing because it was keeping you alive.” She let out a grin, “and more good news! You can still talk, and even remember the zebra language! That means your memory is already at level two.”

The buck was bewildered. “What do you mean? What about my memory?” he asked.

The mare once again answered quickly, “These stasis pods here-” she gave the pod a good smack, “-Aren’t as good as Empire Systems would have made people believe. A bit of radiation leakage and long time storage will do terrible things to a zebra’s mind. A portion of the zebras that come out of here - level 0’s - are nothing but vegetables, a few - level 5’s - come out as if a moment ago they were just going in and still remember it all, but a little under half come out with something in between. Right now we need to figure out where on the chart you are.” She held up her left hoof, showing off her bracelet. “Do you know what this is?”

The buck investigated it closely. It wasn’t just a bracelet, it had a few lights on it and a small screen. What he thought were rings were actually little vials filled with who knows what. So many strange liquids in so little time.

He answered bluntly, “No.”

She let out a sigh, but kept her grin, for his sake, and pulled back her hoof. “No recollection of modern technology, so no level 4. That’s alright, sometimes it comes back. Lets try something a little older, and something you’ve been seeing since kindergarten.” The mare carefully presented to him the sword in her right hoof.

The buck marvelled at it. It had not aged well, that was for sure, and the plunges into baths of chemicals couldn’t have been treating it kindly, but despite its few bits of rust it still glistened in front of him. The sword’s hilt was specially made so that the zebra using it could slip it onto their hoof instead of holding it with their mouth. It left officers with one less leg to stand on, but gave them incredible range and power. Just by looking at it he could tell it retained its sharpness and lethality. Three stars were etched into the side of the blade, but he couldn’t tell if they had been added or they were there since its creation. The stars looked scratched in, but they fit so well where they were it was hard to think they weren’t always there.

After realizing he had been staring at it in silence for an awkwardly long time, he turned up towards the mare and replied, both excited and a bit embarrassed, “Yes. That’s a zebra officer’s sword. Used for centuries by leaders of our armies.”

The mare smiled and pulled back the sword. She assured the buck, “That means you fit squarely in level 3. I just barely made it that far when I got pulled out. You’re lucky.” She pulled out her left hoof again and pressed a few buttons on her bracelet. She then held it up to the buck’s right foreleg. It started making noises, and he could feel things moving about on his skin. Before he could ask what it was doing, the mare butted in with one more question, “Here’s the tough one: do you remember your name?”

The buck forgot all about the thing on his leg. Every brain cell he had was trying to think back to what his name was. He could remember a few things from his nation’s lore, some stuff about proper etiquette, but nothing about himself.

His face expressed this clearly, and the mare didn’t wait for an answer. She comforted him, “It’ll be fine, level 5’s are usually the only ones who remember anything about their personal lives, it’s just that names are usually stored a bit deeper in the subconscious.” The bracelet let out two beeps, and without looking at it the mare moved it from his leg to his shoulder and gave him a reassuring pat. She continued, “Coming up with names is easy though, just think of something you like and that’ll work. I basically got mine just from looking at my glyph mark.”

The buck’s eyes widened. He turned back to look at his own flank, only to see it bare of anything but stripes.

The mare had looked too. As much as the buck was disappointed, she was excited. She told the boy, “A young buck! That’s always good, we could use more children. I wouldn’t have guessed by your age, but some zebras just take longer than others.”

The buck caught something she said, and asked her another question, “Wait, how do you know how old I am?” The buck got a hunch. “It’s that bracelet, isn’t it? What is it? What does it do?”

The mare smiled again, and replied, “You’ve got that right. You’re a smart one aren’t you?” She patted him on the head, his mane still wet from the pod’s juices, then broke eye contact with the colt for the first time since he’s seen her. She admired the device on her wrist, and informed him, “This here is called a Elixir Mixer. Cheesy name, I know, but apparently rhyming became real popular a few years before you got put in that pod. It’s meant to help witch doctors, providing basic medical information and storing recipes for over 500 potions. The ones we find with the pods usually only have about 50 in there, but this one’s our doctor’s personal model and is a bit more than half full. She lends it to whoever’s opening up the stasis pods.” The mare turned back towards the buck and grinned yet again. “And today, that was me, and it was your pod.”

A twinkle came to the mare’s eye as she remembered something. “That reminds me, let’s see if there’s anything in your locker,” she said. The mare trotted over to the stasis pod and pressed a few buttons at the base of the device. Some buttons turned from red to green, and a handle unfolded from the bottom of the pod. The mare turned back to the buck and waved a hoof at it. “I’ll let you slide it open. Wouldn’t dream of touching your stuff before you,” she said.

The buck walked up to it cautiously, put his hoof on the handle, and pulled it. The locker, which seemed to him to work more like a drawer, screeched as the rusty metal rollers slid the container out. Inside were three things: an elixir mixer, a lunchbox, and a cloak. The elixir mixer was in much worse a state than the one the mare had, its vials empty and bronze tubes tarnished. The lunchbox had just a few slices of long spoiled bread, and featured on the front an image of the emperor looking out contemplatively over an army of troops. The cloak was expertly crafted, but just a simple black hooded cloak.

The mare looked over his shoulder at the contents. “Well, that’s not that bad,” she said, “I’m sure we can get a handful of recipes out of that Elixir Mixer, but I wouldn’t suggest strapping it on until we make sure it’s not going to make your feel worse rather than better. Same goes for the bread. Feel free to throw on the cloak though.” The mare let out a chuckle, but soon adopted a more somber tone. She could tell from the despondent look on his face that he was expecting more. She informed the buck, “Some level 5’s have told us that there wasn’t a lot of time to get zebras in these, and they didn’t know for how long. They just kind of grabbed what they had on them and ran. More than a few of these have been empty, most just have the Elixir Mixer. And sometimes it’s better that there’s nothing personal in there. It’s better just to forget what life was like and just go on living.”

The buck stared at the locker and thought. She was right. Whatever he was going to do in this new world, it would have nothing to do with what he was before. This is a new world, after all. The buck thought about this new technology, both the Elixir Mixer and the stasis pod he had been in. Things were different, but he didn’t know how different, and he wasn’t sure he would ever know for sure. He was fine not knowing what exactly got him into that pod, and trusted the mare when she said it was because someone loved him. They were even kind enough to leave him a snack and a change of clothes. He threw on the cloak and put the Elixir Mixer and lunchbox in the hood as in impromptu bag.

His vision felt like it had improved, so he decided to take another look at his surroundings. The lack of windows and the stone walls told him that he was in a cave of some sort, retrofitted for holding the pods. The cave walls were flattened stone, but the majority of the floor and ceiling were metal, except for the occasional patch. He turned back towards his stasis pod. It was not alone, but in fact an entire line of them repeated as far down the cave as he could see before things got blurry, dozens or maybe hundreds. They were spaced about three body’s length apart, and pretty much back up against the wall. The pod to the left of his own had its glass cover broken open, and the green bubble inside it had dried up into a wrinkled ball. The two to the left of that one were like his, only the green casing had shriveled up there as well. To the right of his pod, there was another that was still sealed, tanks full, but with the lights darkened. He could assume that it lost power some time ago, and the occupant is most likely long dead. The nearest one that looked like it was still running was four pods to his right. Its lights were still flashing, the glass cover was unharmed, and it was emitting a very soft glow.

But that was not the only clue that it was still functional. Two Zebras huddled around it, one looking closely at the lights, apparently some sort of systems monitor, while the other had removed a panel to examine the wires behind it. The buck couldn't make out the specific features of the Zebras, but their size told him they were probably stallions. The only thing differentiating the two besides what they were doing was that the second had a saddlebag full of tools.

The mare followed his gaze. She told him, “You are not the first, and you will hopefully not be the last. We’ve been cracking these things open since the tribe first discovered this place a few years ago. Those two working over there are Umene and Ziren. Umene’s the one digging through the wires. He was part of the original tribe and was smart enough to figure out how to hack into the pods without killing the user.” The pods have some sort of fail-safe built in. If you so much as chip the glass, it’d turn the outside layer of that squishy bubble hard as rock and too thick to cut through. Then the whole thing would get like that, and the zebra inside just ends up encased in a crystallized potion.” The mare shuddered at the thought.

Umene thumped the pod with his hoof. The other zebra then violently yanked his head out of the cavity in the pod and spat some loose wires onto the ground. He pulled a measuring instrument out of his saddlebag and stuck his head back in behind the pod’s access panel. The mare continued, “Ziren there is just a level 4 who’s been helping out since he got out last year. Always knows just what to cut, we’re thinking he was an electrician before he got put in. It used to take months to hack into just one of these things, now the two of them working together can get the lid off in just a few weeks.”

The buck had another question, but he wasn’t sure he would like the answer, or even that the mare would give it. Still, he asked, “Why? Didn’t you say these keep zebras alive?”

The mare sighed, then let her grin fade away for once. She gave him the honest truth, “Because no one should have to be in one of those things forever. Umene has given me his word that they aren’t set to ever let anyone out, and you can see that these don’t stay working for long. If we don’t get them out of there, we can’t be sure they ever will get out.” The mare’s expression hardened into a somber frown. “Though it’s not much of a world we’re bringing them into.”

He remained quiet, and the two of them observed the laboring Zebras as they went about their business. His curiosity was burning at him to ask what she meant about this world not being one a zebra would want to live in, but he was too afraid of the answer. Obviously he missed out on a lot, and from the looks of things this was going to be rough. Then again, she was like him once, and she seemed to be adjusting fairly well. She was even freeing zebras herself now. Whatever this new world was, he was sure he could figure it out.

One of the zebras caught the stares being thrown their way. Umene called out, “Hey! Who’s the new guy?”

The mare shook herself to get her head straight, then shouted back to the zebra mechanic, “Level 3. Healthy young buck, no glyph mark and no name.” She turned back to the buck and assured him, “Yet.”

Umene yelled back to her, “Well, come up with something and get him to the rest of the little ones. And get that BrewBuck back to the Madame.”

“Yeah, yeah,” the mare muttered as she slipped off the Elixir Mixer. She slid her officer’s sword into a sheath on her back. She turned back to the buck and told him, “C’mon, follow me. You got some people to meet and some places to see.”

“BrewBuck?” the buck inquired.

“Nickname for the Elixir Mixer,” the mare explained, “Turns out ponies had something similar to these in Equestria called ‘Popbucks’ or something. Some people just really hate calling them Elixir Mixers, and ‘BrewBuck’ just sounds so much nicer. Can’t help but agree with them, I think. Now let’s get out of here.”

He followed the mare as she trotted down the tunnel, passing pods that were all either broken or unsealed. As they walked, the buck finally thought to see the mare’s glyph mark. It was a large, five pointed star with lines running from each of the points and connecting in the center. This reminded him of the stars he had seen on her sword, and he was now certain that they were scratched in. This reminded the buck of something she mentioned earlier about her glyph mark, and so he asked her one last question before they left the cave, “What is your name?”

The mare didn’t even turn around, just replied, “Oh, I never said, did I? It’s Nyota.” As she said it, they passed an open pod with a familiar star etched into it with the tip of a sword, only a few steps away from the entrance to the cave. All this was making the buck a little uneasy. He didn’t consider himself superstitious, but this was starting to worry him.

“You sure do love stars,” the buck said, finally managing to say something that wasn't a question.

As Nyota opened the door, she turned to face him and said, “You have no idea.”

* * * * * * * * *

The buck was surprised to learn that the door did not exit the cave, but simply lead to another. However, unlike the previous one, this chamber was bare and mostly unchanged from the natural state, with the only metal in the room being the door they had just entered through. The walls were mostly unfinished, and the natural stalagmites and stalactites were still present. It was just as huge as the last chamber, so much so that even with his fully recovered eyes the buck could not see the end of it. It was also much wider than the last room, and could probably comfortably fit an entire battalion of zebras.

But this was not a battalion in front of him. It was a town.

The cave was full of buildings, each one of them teeming with Zebras. Torches lined the sides of the cave, keeping the outer edges well lit, but the center was nearly dark. Although the buildings were hastily constructed, they seemed to be holding up quite well. To his left was what looked like basic housing, mostly a few huts, but some blankets and mattresses sat outside as well. A few Zebras were sleeping, but the majority were going about their business in the town itself. To his right, there was a traditional shaman's hut, and nearby was a fenced-in area filled with foals. They were all younger than him, and he worried for a brief moment that, being glyphless, he'd be corralled in with them. He didn't mind being fenced in (after all, he’d been in a much, much smaller pen for much, much longer), but he was not a fan of children.

Nyota gave him a nudge to remind him she was there. She clued him in a bit about the town, “We’ve got the sleeping quarters over there, the kids we let play around in that area over there, and Madame’s hut is the fancy place with all the welcome masks by it. The entrance to the cave is around a little bend at the end back there, but we try not to let anyone go wandering too close to it. Nothing personal, just that we’re trying to keep this place our little secret until the pods are all emptied.

“Now, I need to go get the Elixir Mixer back to the Madame. I’d be fine leaving you, if you wanted to get a feel for the town on your own, or you can come with me and meet the Madame. She likes to meet all the new releases, and it’d be nice if you’d let her check out your Elixir Mixer for anything new, but we’d understand if you’d like to keep it to yourself.”

“No, that’s fine, I’d love to meet her,” he replied, pulling the Elixir Mixer out of his hood and stuffing it in her saddlebag. “And I think I like calling them BrewBucks.”

Nyota smirked. “Well, that makes two of us. Glad I can drop the act now.” She poked at the BrewBuck with her muzzle to make sure it was snug in her saddlebag, then started a slow trot to the hut as the colt followed. “One thing you might want to know before you see the Madame, though,” she warned, “You’re about to meet your first ghoul.”

* * * * * * * * *

Nyota knocked on the hunk of bark that made the door to the Madame’s hut. He was more than a little worried about learning what a ghoul was, but the well-crafted traditional welcoming masks around the hut put him mostly at ease.

A raspy, weary voice came from inside. The buck wasn’t even entirely confident it was a mare’s. “Who is it out there? Did you need something?”

Nyota answered back casually, “No, it’s just Nyota. I’m returning the BrewBuck. I’ve also got the tribe’s newest member out here, with another BrewBuck for you to check out.”

Slow footsteps could be heard coming closer to the door. The buck tensed as the door swung open, not knowing what to expect.

The buck kept his composure as the creature came into view, never showing a hint of terror or pity, but sadly could not retain his shock, and his eyes widened to take up half his face. The buck was disgusted, but relieved at what he saw. The zebra was certainly missing some things, like hair, lips, some skin, and half her tail, but he was glad that there was nothing extra, like fangs or horns. There may have been more to it, though, since he couldn’t see what was under the gold rings on her neck and both forelegs. He thought ghoul was a poor name for such a creature, since the ghouls of legend really didn’t really resemble zebras at all.

The shaman was either oblivious or used to his reaction. First, she addressed the mare, her voice dripping with sarcasm. “Nyota, nice to see you again. I see they let you rip open another life chamber. I’m guessing you didn’t save any of the potion?”

Nyota slapped her forehead with her hoof. "Madame, we've already figured out that those juices are useless for anything we could use out here. And if I'm right, you've still got those bottles from the last one on your cupboard, still unused after a month." She pulled the BrewBucks out of her saddlebag and set them in front of the ghoul.

The ghoul snatched them up from the ground and set them on a table near the door. She turned back to the mare and snidely told her, “I’ve been busy. And they’re called ‘Elixir Mixers’ not... ’BrewBucks.’” She groaned at the name. “Have some patriotism. BrewBuck is something a pony would call it,” she remarked.

“The Great War’s been over for almost 200 years, Madame,” Nyota commented.

“Bah!” she exclaimed, “You didn’t have to live through it!”

The mare couldn’t help but correct her, “Well, actually, I did. So did he. You’re just the only one to still remember it.”

That finally made her cynicism go away, but it was replaced by gloom. “Yes, I am the one who must be burdened with upholding the past, for I took the slower path.” The old witch doctor let out a deep and remorseful sigh.

Her momentary depression vanished as she turned to the buck, who's surprised expression returned as he was now the subject of her attention. However, though she looked at him, she continued to address his temporary companion, "Now, if you'll excuse us Nyota, I'd like to get to know this young colt.

Nyota sat down outside the door and told the old ghoul, “I’ll be waiting for him right here once you’re done with him.”

The Madame shot her a glare, but turned back to the buck and smiled. “Come on in sonny,” she said, motioning him to enter the hut. “You tell me all you know about yourself - and let me take a look at that Elixir Mixer - and I’ll tell you whatever you want to know.”

The buck thought about it, and decided to ask about what seemed to be the biggest thing so far. "What was the Great War?", and something a bit more personal, "And what is a ghoul, exactly?"

Her smile weakened, but remained endearing. “This may take a while...”

* * * * * * * * *

An hour and a half later the buck came out of the hut, his head filled with new information, and new definitions of pain and suffering. He could not imagine what it was like for others in that time. A time when zebras were filled with so much hate.

But they had their reasons, and he understood them. It wasn’t something he liked, but it was something he could wrap his head around. He would have to if he were to continue living in this world that the Great War had left him and everyone else with. He didn’t know what he would do if he ever met a pony, but for their sake he hoped he wouldn’t. He didn't want to become a monster, but he wouldn’t be surprised if that wasn’t up to him. Especially considering it wasn’t up to the Madame and zebras who had the same happen to them. Radiation wasn’t only thing that could turn people into horrible beasts.

True to her word, Nyota was outside waiting for him. She stuffed her copy of Zebra Army: Special Ops Training Manual back into her saddlebag and walked up to the the colt.

“So did she tell you everything you wanted to know?” the mare inquired.

“That and then some,” he answered back. “I can’t believe she was really there.”

“There’s a reason she’s our tribe’s Elder,” she added with a smirk.

“Still, for her it seems like it was so recent. You’d think after all this time she’d have gotten over it. How can someone stay so angry for so long?”

“It was a different time. Everyone was made to think that the war really was all that was important to them. The Madame spent the last decade of her normal life putting everything she had into the war effort. That’s what a total war is. I’m just glad the two of us made it out without that being nailed into our subconscious. The last guy I pulled out couldn’t believe the war was over, and as soon as someone left him unattended he ran out with a pistol and a grudge.”

She brought up the topic, and there was something that he had been meaning to ask her. “How many zebras have you freed from the pods?”

“You’re number 6,” she answered, “Well, eighth, but they were level 0’s and there wasn’t anything we could do for them.” She tapped her chin with her hoof as she recalled her previous releases. “First one was a level 4 a year and a half back. A few level 2’s, a 5, and a little filly that couldn’t even speak. We weren’t sure whether she was a level 1 or just that young. You’re my second level 3.”

“And do you...” he looked for the appropriate word for how Nyota was treating him, but couldn’t find anything, “...Do this with all the zebras you let out?”

She shrugged. “Pretty much. By the time I got to the fourth guy I had the whole procedure worked out. It’s a really tough adjustment, so I figure it’s best to have a kind face guide you through it all. It’s scary, but I try and make the best out of it.” The mare started walking, and the buck followed instinctively. “There’s an old pony expression that explains it well.”

She turned and stared into his eyes. “‘All I want to do is make you smile, smile, smile.’”

Despite what he had learned not a minute earlier, he let a grin come to his face for the first time this century. He felt happy here.

They walked for a bit in comfortable silence. The inquisitive young buck asked where she was headed.

“Going to the mouth of the cave. It’s nearly dusk and I’ve got guard duty tonight,” She told him.

He paused. He had just listened to a first hand account of the Great War itself, and wasn't keen to experience whatever fighting was going on in this world. The Madame had mentioned other tribes, but usually just went back to her personal experiences."

Nyota made it a few more feet before she noticed that the buck wasn't following any more. She realized what she said could have been taken poorly, and was quick to reassure him. "Don't worry, though. I've been here for three years, and we've never been attacked. Good 'ol Starcutter here hasn't ever been pulled in anger." She finished up the thought by patting it lovingly.

Hearing the name of her sword piqued his curiosity once again, so he asked, "Why do you have a Zebra Officer's sword? They don't just leave those lying around, after all."

Nyota chuckled. “You’re right about that. Most of the original tribe says this is the first one they’ve seen.” She unsheathed Starcutter and held it up, looking at her reflection in it. She continued, “It was in my pod’s locker, it and a hoof-full of surprisingly edible zebra cakes that I scarfed down on the spot. Those stars were already etched into it, I assume by me, and I’m pretty sure that little bit of personalization is all that’s stopped it from being stolen right out from under me.”

More about stars. This was going beyond just liking them. She seemed to be nearly obsessed with them! The buck let a little annoyance into his voice as he asked, “What is it with you and all this star stuff? If I remember it right, the stars are something we should be afraid of, not love.”

Not appreciating the accusatory tone, Nyota spun around to glare at him. "First of all, there is nothing that anyone 'should' be afraid of, only things that everyone else is afraid of, and right now that covers just about everything in this messed up world, so don't ever let fear factor into your beliefs. Never run away from something because you’re afraid of it, run away because it’s the best option."

However, she realized that she was letting her temper get the best of her, so she made a conscious effort to simmer down. It wasn't his fault that he believed what everyone told him centuries ago, or maybe even just a few minutes ago. She calmed herself, but maintained her hard gaze. "And the reason the stars are so important to me is because it's all I know about myself. When I got out of the pod, the only thing I could remember about my life was lying in the grass and stargazing. The glyph mark and the etchings on the sword were what sealed the deal. So I embraced it, named myself after the ancient Zebra word for ‘star’ and scratched one onto my pod." She turned away from him, and continued on her way, although at a much faster pace.

He wasn't stupid, he could tell it wasn't an obsession now, but the remnants of her old life. It was all she knew of herself, so it was no wonder that she pursued the idea so strongly. He hurried to match her pace, and apologized. "I'm sorry if that was something you don't like to talk about."

Nyota gave him a huff and told him, “Well, you’re not the first person to bring it up. Not nearly. More than one of the zebras I pulled out of the pods started freaking out as soon as they saw my glyph mark, and you saw that the Madame really doesn’t care for me either. Luckily, most of the tribe just doesn’t care and let me do what I want, but the Madame has a lot of power here. She’s the reason it took two years before they trusted me to guard the place.”

The buck thought a change of topic was in order, and leapt at the opportunity. “Do you like being a guard?”

Without missing a beat, her grin came back to her face, and she answered the question as if she had already forgotten the previous conversation. “Oh, yes,” she said, “It’s great. Like I said, nothing ever happens. Maybe do some reading, fiddle around with my Elixir Mixer, get some practice with Starcutter- not that I need it.” In one swift motion she pulled out her sword, threw it in the air and balanced the tip of it on her hoof, all while walking at the same pace. “Turns out muscle memory is embedded very deep in our brains. Whatever I did before I was in that pod, I was a hell of a good sword fighter.” The sword began to tilt down, and as it fell Nyota positioned herself so it flipped around and just slid back into the sheath.

The buck was mesmerized by the blade, watching it as she twirled it and left his mouth agape in astonishment as she seemed to almost magically fit it back in its sheath.

Even though he was staring right at it, the buck hit Nyota’s back as she came to a sudden stop. She ignored it, and informed the colt that they had reached their destination. “Here it is: the only way into the cave we’ve called home for the last 2 centuries.”

The buck poked his head out from behind Nyota and looked ahead of her. They were a fair distance from the mouth of the cave, but he could vaguely see the outside world. Considering the size of the cavern, the entrance was rather small, barely the width of three or four zebras, and not even as high as two of them.

It was difficult to see through the cave because a trio of trees hid most of the cave from sight. He could see just enough to determine that the cave was on the side of a hill, and that the ground outside was barren of grass. He might have seen more, but it was nighttime, and the stars only illuminated to much. However, he was curious, as always, and so took a cautious step toward the archway of rocks.

Nyota very quickly put a hoof in front of him and pulled him back. “Now now, don’t get hasty,” she warned. “Remember what I said about not letting anyone too close? That still stands. The only reason you got this close is because you were tagging along with me. Hell, even I usually don’t get this close unless I’m on duty.”

The buck scrunched up his face a bit. Surely she didn't mean that. "You really don't leave the cave often? None of you? I thought this was just where you guys lived."

“Well...” She didn’t like what she was going to have to say. She knelt down next to the colt and explained, “It’s not that we don’t let anyone leave, it’s just that we’ve got it really good here, more than anyone who came out of a pod would know, even me. We’ve got a steady supply of healthy zebras, we’ve found some advanced tech, there’s plenty of food in the storage room past the stasis pods, and we’ve even found ways to grow food down here using just potions and some electric lights. If it were just the Madame, I’d say screw it and make a run for it, but everyone who lived on the outside agrees. They’d rather live in a cave than out there, and anyone who leaves the cave is a risk to everyone staying in it.” She stood back up again and wiped some of the dirt off her coat.

And to answer your first question, no I don’t leave the cave often. In fact I’ve only been outside twice.” As she spoke she pulled out another Elixir Mixer, one in worse condition than the Madame’s, but better than the one they found in his locker. It was her own model, if the tiny star etched on the back was any sign. “Once was when I was exactly where you are right now but, with a lot less self control.” She tightened the BrewBuck and flipped a switch to turn it on. “The second time was during my first guard duty where I figured I’d just sneak off for a minute. Of course, I ended up just standing outside for the entire shift.” She gave the buck a grin and added, “I’ll give you one guess why.”

He tilted his head for a moment in thought, before it hit him. "Stargazing?" He ventured.

“Bingo.”

The buck sighed and sat down on the ground. He kept his gaze pointing through the gap in the trees. Nyota had a point. He could see a handful of stars far, far off in the distance. They were still a little frightening to him, his mother (he assumed) had made sure of that. Still, this mare, who had plopped down next to him, changed his opinion a bit. They looked beautiful. Bits of white on a sea of black. You’d think of all the species on this planet zebras would be the ones to embrace them.

“Maybe I should name myself after something star related, too,” the buck suggested.

“Save yourself the trouble,” the mare scoffed. “No point in naming yourself after something no one likes.”

“Isn’t that a little hypocritical?” the buck commented.

“I picked my name because I believe it’s the most important thing in my life, I’m fine with the consequences of being a little less popular. You just want to call yourself that because they look pretty.”

“Fair enough. Maybe the moon then?”

“Don’t think that’s too good of an idea either. That was another popular rant topic for the Madame.”

“How about just space in general? Or the night?”

“That could work. Let’s see, the word for space...”

“Nafasi, I think? Eh, sounds like a girl’s name. Night would be-”

“Usiku. Not a fan, but the choice is up to you.”

“I’ll pass. We got all night, don’t we?”

The mare gave the buck a hearty slap on the back, then moved her hoof up a bit and ran it through his mane. “We have however much time you need.”

A twig snapped outside the cave.

Nyota instantly came to her feet and moved her hoof from the buck’s neck to her sheath to right in front of her, so quickly the buck didn’t even have time to react. The mare held her sword directly in front of her face, one eye on either side of its blade. The buck was taken aback at how quickly her face had turned from care and joy to focus and determination.

“Whoever’s out there better grow a pair and show their ugly face,” the mare growled. Her eyes were darting around the entrance, trying to make things out in the dark and mentally separating the movements of the trees in the wind from anything else that could be lurking out there. The lines created by the tree branches would give zebra attackers a natural camouflage, but anything wanting to get in through the opening would have to block out the speckled backdrop, and if there was one thing Nyota knew it was what a star looked like.

A small black ball flew in from the right side, Nyota caught sight of it after it was halfway to the ground. Her instinct was to hit it with the flat of her sword and fling it back out, but if it was an explosive it might not take too kindly to being hit hard by a piece of hard steel. Instead, she dived to catch it. She stretched her hoof out as she soared through the air, but couldn’t catch it before it hit the ground. The glass ball shattered as it hit the rocky floor, and started to fizz and smoke. Nyota realized that the ball was actually a round vial, and that whoever was out there had some potion that they thought could eliminate her as a threat.

She hit the floor with a thud and hopped back up, covering her muzzle with her left foreleg as her eyes started to water. She turned her leg so that she could see the BrewBuck’s screen. It read, “Potentially lethal potion detected.” Damn. “Proper antidote unavailable.” Shit. “Administering basic toxin repellants.” Much better.

The buck began to cough in the smoke. Nyota gave him a hard shove and he slid back farther into the cave. The smoke would either be blowing out the window or settle at the peak of the cave, either way she would likely be the only one to feel the effects. Still, she couldn’t use her sword when she had one hoof covering her mouth. She took a deep breath and held it in as she switched her footing to allow her sword more freedom.

Still no zebras coming in. Fine, she’d have to take the fight to them. Keeping her sword ready, she cautiously but quickly ran up to the entrance. Looked like she was going outside for a third time.

A large dark object came out of nowhere and swung at Nyota’s head right before she got to the cave’s entrance. The force of the hit combined with her forward momentum knocked her unconscious and she fell to the ground, red dripping from a fresh crack on her head.

* * * * * * * * *

When Nyota awoke, the first thing she saw was the Madame’s rotting face staring back at her. The first thing she heard was a crackling fire. The first thing she smelled was a freshly brewed potion bubbling behind the ghoul. The first thing she tasted was the iron of her own blood. The first thing she felt was the dampness in her coat forming a line from her head all the way down past her muzzle.

The first thing she thought was, “Why the hell am I tied to this chair.”

The Madame was the first to ask a question, though, and yet again sarcasm dripped from her lips. “So Nyota, how was guard duty?”

She decided to play along. “Oh, you know, the usual.” She changed her mind. “Except that I got attacked in the middle of the night. Now what the hell happened while I was out?” She fidgeted in the chair, but she had been tied in such a way that her hooves were held in front of her but the knot was placed behind the chair.

The ghoul spoke coldly, “We’re trying to find out. That’s why you’re here.” She walked over to the cauldron above the fireplace and gave it a stir. She pulled out a mug and poured some of the concoction into it. “You know as well as I do that I’ve had my suspicions about you for a while. A mare pulled out of a pod with a star on her flank can only mean bad news.”

“You can’t really think I would have just let anything waltz in here, would you? I don’t even know anyone from outside!” the mare snapped at the elderly ghoul walking towards her with a mug of an unknown brew.

“Well, you were unaccounted for during your first shift about a year back. Who knows where you were for those 6 hours. Plenty of zebras or ponies could have been met in that amount of time.” When she got to the tied down mare, instead of bringing the mug up to her mouth she instead lowered it down to her secured foreleg. “But in all honesty, this is really more of a precaution than a full out accusation.”

She held the mug right up to Nyota’s BrewBuck and pressed a button that let the device examine the potion, sucking in some of the brew’s aroma. The ghoul then pressed another button that read aloud what its owner could not read from that angle.

“Standard strength truth potion. Possibly healing elements added. Toxicity: negligible.”

The ghoul only now raised the mug up to Nyota’s mouth. “There, your very own Elixir Mixer has verified that I am not trying to kill you, interrogate you, or in any way harm you. I am simply trying to find out whether you are an envoy of the stars, or just another one of their victims.”

Nyota was still suspicious. However long she had been out could have been long enough to hack her BrewBuck, but she had a gut feeling she could trust it. After all, she had her own rule of thumb when it came to potions: the more disgusting it looks, the more likely it won’t kill you if you drink it. This certain mug was rather vile, so she thought she’d try her luck. It wasn’t like there was much else she could do anyway.

She downed the mug as the Madame tilted it into her mouth. All the sudden her tongue felt very tingly, and her head felt like it was swelling. She then realized that if anything the potion may be getting rid of the swelling, and she just only now began to feel it.

The ghoul wasted no time in questioning her. “Did you plan the invasion of this tribe’s cave?”

“No.” The word came out of her mouth as she was preparing to say it.

“Do you know anything about who attacked the members of this tribe?”

“No.”

“Did you put your full effort into protecting this tribe?”

“Yes.” Nyota wasn’t even sure she was listening to the questions any more, the potion answered before she could.

“Did you ever leave your post during last night’s shift?”

“No.”

“Do you know where they took our children?”

“No.” She heard her answer before she really caught the question. She wanted to know what the ghoul meant, but the her questions continued.

“Do you know what they plan to do with the children?”

“No. What do you mean the-”

“Are you aware of anything that happened last night after the initial attack?”

“No- children are missing? Why would-”

“Were you truly and completely unconscious for the last seven hours?”

“Yes- anyone take them?”

The Madame’s questions stopped. She stood up and walked around the chair and started undoing the knot. Nyota tried to put together everything she was just asked. She had been out for the last seven hours, and in that time something came into the camp and kidnapped all the foals. Her nameless friend was probably one of them.

As soon as the rope got loose she scrambled to her hooves and addressed the Madame, “What exactly happened while I was knocked out?”

The Madame showed a face full of despair, and one desperate to be able to shed a tear. She looked at her hooves as she answered. “The foals are gone. The only zebras left are those with glyph marks. Whoever or whatever took you out seemed to slip into the cave without anyone noticing and somehow got the foals out of the cave without gaining attention. If we hadn’t found you bleeding at the mouth of the cave we would have just assumed the foals just got out and ran off on their own.”

This was a lot to take in. Not just the disappearance of the foals, not just the fact that the enemy could just sneak in and take them, not just the fact that they had taken her out so easily, but everything. And all this as her fault. The Madame had suspected that she was behind this, and for all intents and purposes she might as well have been.

The elder zebra filled the silence with more information. “Thirteen foals have disappeared, eight fillies and five colts. All but two of them were originally from stasis pods. One of those was an orphan, the other one’s parents are being comforted as we speak.”

All Nyota could think was why. Why her, but more importantly why them. Obviously the Madame didn’t know either, otherwise she wouldn’t have interrogated her. Still, she wasn’t going to leave anything to chance, so, fighting back tears, she asked, “Do you have any idea why anyone would want them, any idea at all?”"

The ghoul continued to speak coldly despite her sorrowful eyes. “One of the most common side effects of radiation is sterility. It is fairly common practice for tribes to kidnap children to keep their numbers up and increase the gene pool. Part of the reason why we decided to open up the stasis pods was so that we would never have to resort to such extreme measures. It seems another tribe did not share our morals.”

This seemed pretty straightforward to Nyota. She didn’t see why the ghoul asked her what they did with the children when she had a solid theory going.

The ghoul answered her before she asked. “The only thing is that this didn’t seem like tribal warfare,” she said as she walked over to the cauldron and started filling bottles. “There was no gunfire, there was no bloodshed, and there was no screaming. Whatever did this was either the calmest and most quiet tribe ever seen, or it wasn’t a tribe at all, but something much more sinister. All we have to work on is a broken bottle of some potion that’s evaporated away and one of our most combat proficient mares that got knocked down a peg.”

She was deep in thought, so neither the insult nor the compliment meant much to her right now. She was thinking of what the best thing was for her to do, how she could make up for her failure.The correct course of action was obvious, and she was willing to take it.

“Madame,” she said, puffing up her chest and addressing her like a general. “I would like your permission to pursue our attackers and hopefully bring back our tribe’s foals.”

The ghoul’s frown turned into a smirk as she replied, “You have the blessing of your elder to take whatever action to rescue those children.” She finished bottling the remaining truth potion and turned to the mare, her smirk turning to a full grin. “I was planning on banishing you to do the same thing anyway, but everyone thought that was too harsh. Glad to see you don’t agree with them.”

Nyota felt a bit embarrassed, but she was in the right, so she was fine with what was meant to be her elder’s ruling. At least he two of them finally agreed on something. Apparently the Madame was right all these years: Nyota was going to have to leave the tribe.

* * * * * * * * *

Nearly half the tribe was gathered near the mouth of the cave. The sun’s rays were beaming through the trees, illuminating the sea of black and white. It was probably the most sunlight any of them had seen in weeks. They hadn’t gathered to see the sun rise, but to see another star set.

Nyota did one last run over of her equipment. Starcutter was secure on her back, her BrewBuck was still strapped to her left foreleg, and her leather armor was nice and snug against her coat. Her saddlebags were alarmingly bare. She had some healing potions she whipped up with her BrewBuck, a large black cloak for inclement weather or as a makeshift blanket, and a familiar lunchbox she had stuffed with all the food she could get by bartering away her old bed. She had always had luck with getting goods from a trade, but there was little to spare for a banished guard responsible for the theft of children.

That was all she really needed, though. This was not meant to be some daring adventure, this was a rescue mission. More than that, it was a shot at redemption and forgiveness. She owed it to the tribe to get the foals they cared for back. She owed it to the foals to get them back somewhere safe. But she supposed it wasn’t really that safe, now was it?

The Madame trotted beside the zebra about to face exile. “The land is harsh and treacherous. Few of sheltered life would dare trek through it of their own volition, though I suppose you don’t really either.”

“I made this choice just as much as you did,” the mare reminded her.

“True, but you can hardly admit you’d be leaving if it weren’t for the children. I did not force this upon you, they did.”

“The children? No,” she responded, “their captors are the ones who made me do this.”

“Very well,” the ghoul remarked. Nyota felt her saddlebags being opened, and turned back to see what exactly the Madame was doing with her things. She found that the ghoul was not removing anything, but instead putting in a bottle of the truth potion. She explained, “This is to make sure you don’t start pointing hooves at the wrong zebras.”

Nyota smiled knowing that the the Madame was finally on her side.

The Elder said one more thing before turning back to her tribe. “Oh, and before I forget, if anyone asks, you aren’t part of any tribe, and you didn’t come from here.”

She rolled her eyes. “And what am I supposed to tell them?”

The ghoul shrugged. “Anything. Tell them you came up from a hole in the ground for all I care.”

“But I did come from a hole in the ground.”

“Couldn’t let that one go, could you Nyota?”

“Nope.”

“Fine, tell them the hole you crawled out of had a door.”

“Sure. A giant, metal round one.”

For the first time since they met, the two of them laughed with each other instead of at each other. Nyota really was going to miss all the friends she had made, and all the zebras who felt like family to her.

She addressed the crowd. “I’m taking my leave,” she announced, “and if I’m lucky, when I come back I’ll have each of those fillies and colts back here with me safe and sound.”

She took one last slow, deep breath before beginning her walk out of the cave.

“Goodbye, safety,” she muttered to herself as she took her first steps into the outside world while the sun was still up.

“Hello, Savanna.”

Footnote: Level Up.
New Perk: Elixir Mixer Master -- +5 to the potions and medicine skills.

Nyota’s stats
Strength - 7
Perception - 5
Endurance - 4
Charisma - 5
Intelligence - 6
Agility - 7
Luck - 6

Nyota’s traits
Night Person -- +1 to PER and INT during the night; -1 to PER and INT during the day
Race: Zebra -- +5 to sneak, unarmed, and melee; +10% damage from pony enemies

Based on the fanfiction Fallout: Equestria by KKat
co-written by Mr. ShinyObject and Doctor Felix Whooves
edited by Twilight Sparkle

Chapter 2 - The Savanna

“We put a lot of hard work into this land, so we can feed our town, our families, our foals! “

--- --- --- /// /// /// | | | | | | \\ \\ \\ --- --- ---

“Young buck, what do you remember about our great land?”

“Not much. I just remember that it was... great.”

“You are right. Our land was very beautiful, once. We had forests that stretched for miles, fresh water was easy to obtain, and our people were prosperous. We guided our world as it grew around us. We rose above our tribal ways, and emerged as a modern, unified society. We had become an empire.”

“...But then we were attacked.”

“Eventually, yes, but don’t get ahead of yourself, child. I shall tell you of the end. But you must know our beginning before you can know our present. We turned their already accursed land into a wasteland, and in return, they transformed ours from a utopia into the Savanna.”

--- --- --- \\ \\ \\ | | | | | | /// /// /// --- --- ---

So, this was the Savanna. Nyota saw a vast expanse of flat, dry landscape, broken by the occasional mountain and interspersed with little oases of grass and trees. The cave seemed to be in the middle of nowhere, and she was surprised to find that the cave wasn’t part of a mountain, but a hill, little more than the entrance itself. She wasn’t certain of her surroundings, since the dirt and sand blowing through the air obstructed most of it. Fortunately, she had come from a cave that was just as dusty and dry as the outside, so her eyes were quick to adjust to the Savanna’s weather.

The sun was going to be a problem, though. A lifetime spent underground had left her accustomed to darkness; torches and a distant peephole to the outdoors had not prepared her eyes for the wide open sky, the vast whiteness of the plains, and the blinding light of the sun. She could tell already that the stars and moon would be an even more welcome sight than usual. Despite the fact that it was midday, the moon was already floating in the sky, and the wrongness of that wasn’t lost on her despite having lived in a cave for as long as she remembered.

But enough sightseeing. She had a job to get done. The first thing to do was to see if the kidnappers had left anything behind that could lead her to their whereabouts.

The mare cast another glance back to the cave. Before she left, she searched the trees, hoping to find some items or articles of clothing that may have been caught in the branches, but had no such luck. The broken potion vial was, unfortunately, also useless, as other than the concoction that it had contained it was nothing but a common glass bottle. She thought back to the attack from the previous night. She had heard a twig snap, but those were scattered all over the ground, so that led nowhere. She had never actually seen her attackers, so they either aren’t from the area directly in front of the cave (which she had dubbed North, if the position of the sun could be trusted), or they snuck around the entrance to stay out of sight. After considering it, she realized that, when she was struck the attack had come from above, so the attackers were at one point on top of the cave, but but unfortunately that didn’t tell her much. Perhaps the instrument they used to knock her out was a clue? She remembered it had been solid black, she could tell that even in the darkness. She knew nothing about whether or not certain tribes or places used any certain types of weapons, and didn’t think anyone from the cave knew either.

“Well this is off to a fine start,” she remarked to no one but herself. She was getting nowhere fast. She scanned the earth around the opening, hoping to find some hoofprints that hadn’t been erased by the Savanna’s winds. No such luck. Running out of ideas by now, the mare climbed to the top of the hill to get a different angle of the area. Sadly, she still wasn't able to find anything useful. Tracker, she was not.

Well, there was only one thing left to do. She raised her eyes from the ground and surveyed the area. Through squinted eyes and enough sand to fill twenty of the Madame’s cauldrons, she decided what her first destination would be.

A big-ass mountain.

Not the largest one, of course. There are plenty of gigantic mountains around, and unless the ponies had really hated Mt. Kilimanejaro, she doubted that they could have flattened it like they did the cities. The mountain she had set her sights on was to the west, in a former grassland, and had no name that she knew of. For now she’d just call it her next objective, and there wasn’t a star-devil out there that she would let slow her down.

Nyota wasn’t just doing it for kicks, though. Firstly, she reasoned, from that height she would be able to see the majority of the Savanna, and would be able to tell roughly where some camps and old buildings were. Secondly, thirteen foals and their captors weren't going to be noticeable in the open plains, especially when the night came around and the darkness would help conceal them. However, from the top of the mountain she would likely be able to spot a large group like that on the move, and they probably hadn't managed to get very far on hoof yet. And thirdly, of course, it would make for a fantastic view of the night sky.

The mountain wasn’t exactly near though, so she set off at a brisk gallop, hoping to make it there within a few hours. She liked having a goal, even if it was as simple as “climb that mountain.”

When she reached the base of the mountain, the sun was nearing the horizon. It had been even further than she had thought. It turned out that it wasn’t a big mountain a short gallop away, but a gigantic mountain a half day’s gallop away. She had no time to catch her breath, though, and immediately headed up the safest-looking path along the mountain, hoping to avoid treacherously loose soil and sharp rocks.

It was simple at first, just a matter of walking up an incline where she wouldn’t immediately slide back down, but the further she went, the more precarious the terrain became, and she soon found herself struggling for balance. Soon, the path ended entirely, and she had to start actually climbing, groping around for each hoof-hold and jumping from one crag to another to advance.

At one point, when the sun was halfway under the horizon, she groped above her with her left hoof for a handhold and felt something softer than rock or dirt. As she pulled herself up, she found that she had accidentally crushed a budding, ruby-colored flower that had sprouted from the crags of the mountain. She also noticed a blinking green light on her BrewBuck. Needing a bit of a rest anyway, she sat down on the next ledge that could support her and played the alert message.

“Common ingredient type detected. Red mountain flower. Ingredient for: health potion, wolf-spider venom antidote, anticoagulant, resistance to-”

Nyota flicked the button again to shut it off. Ingredient for a health potion; that was good enough for her, she thought, taking the flower. As she continued to climb her BrewBuck alerted her to several more plants along the mountainside, and she decided to play it safe and just grab them all. She’d pick out the good ones the next time she decided to catch her breath. At the moment, though, she was in a bit of a rush, and it would be another century before she grabbed enough flower petals and fancy blades of grass to actually slow her down.

Only a sliver of the sun remained by the time Nyota finally pulled herself up to the peak of the mountain. Though it took some effort, she managed to steady herself on a relatively flat portion of the ground. The sun slipped away behind the horizon as light began to escape from the sky.

Daytime wasn’t her thing, but this she could get used to. Nyota inhaled the night air and let it out slowly as the wind blew through her mane. It tasted bitter and rotten, but it was better than the dusty air of the cave or the sandstorms raging below. The wind had died down considerably, but at this altitude it refused to fade away completely. She enjoyed it though, as it was quite refreshing after the long climb.

She had certainly been correct in her assumption that this would provide a great view of the Savanna. The dust storms that ravaged the ground below had vanished with the winds that drove them, and with the twilight sky still providing a fair amount of light, she could see much better than she had been able to on the ground.

She couldn’t see anything of note to the North. It seemed to be just more of the same, arid grasslands sans any actual grass. Far off in the distance she could make out what was possibly a crater from a megaspell, but considering the lack of rubble surrounding it, she could safely assume that the bomb had missed its intended target.

The East, however, was quite a sight to behold. A couple miles behind the cave was an honest-to-goodness forest. She had been certain that anything living would have been vaporized, and yet there it stood, thousands of trees standing in the distance. She had no idea how far it stretched, as the night had already cast the eastern horizon into shadow, and the strangely dark coloration of the trees caused them to blend in perfectly with the backdrop, making them difficult to see.

The forest curved around the landscape all the way to the mountain’s South. The trees thinned out as her eyes followed the horizon, until eventually the forest was nothing more than patches of green spread thinly throughout the Savanna. Near the edge of the thicker forest, where the trees were far enough apart to clearly see through them, Nyota could make out a small town. It wasn’t built from the ruins of any pre-existing settlement, so far as she could tell. From the top of the mountain she could see the glistening metal of the fence, but no signs of the large, white chunks of marble or concrete that would mean permanent structures. She made a mental note of the town’s location: two days trot from the southernmost base of the mountain. If the residents were peaceful, she might be able to do some trading there.

The West held the most beautiful sight Nyota had seen in three years: The Zebra Capital. The former heart of the Empire, and the home of its Caesar, wasn’t even a mile away from the mountain. It also served as the Caesar’s final home, it would seem, since Nyota couldn’t see any sign of the mighty tower of the Imperial Palace, which the Madame had once said pierced the clouds themselves, easily making it taller than the mountain she stood on.She had very little memory of it, and wished dearly that she could have seen it in person. Where the proud symbol of Zebra power had once stood remained only a pile of distorted metal, resting among a pile of ash that grew smaller every year as the winds of passing generations slowly eroded it away.

The last of the sun’s rays curved around the edge of the horizon and illuminated the city in fading light. She could see the city in its entirety, from the remains of the markets near the forest to the flattened factories on the opposite side. Dividing the two was the residential area, much less damaged than she had expected. Apartments remained standing, missing no more than a floor or two from the top, others missing the walls of one side of the building. Huts and individual houses had been blown away, but more recent constructions had taken their place. Squinting her eyes, she could make out a few apartments that had been somewhat restored with sheets of scrap metal, and fortified with barbed wire. Even after being blown to Tartarus and back, it seemed that the Capital still had one of the larger populations in the Savanna, considering how many of those buildings looked like they were inhabited.

It was the closest thing she had to a lead, so far. From the mountaintop she could see nothing that gave any clues to the foals’ whereabouts; no crowd of zebras traversing the Savanna, no trail of hoofprints anywhere close, no big flag with “we kidnapped them, they’re over here!” written on it. Looked like she’d be doing this the hard way.

And she knew just where to start. At the base of the western side of the mountain, facing the city, Nyota could see a small encampment. It was surrounded by a makeshift wall of warped metal, much like the replacement walls on the restored apartments in the Capital. At the other end of the camp she could make out a gate opening to a path down to the city. Luckily for her, whatever tribe lived there seemed to believe that the steep mountainside would be enough protection, as they left that side of the camp unprotected.

Before she started her nearly vertical descent down the mountain, she tilted her head back and looked straight up.

Cloudy. Damn. Maybe tomorrow night then.

* * * * * * * * *

Nyota was surprised she got so close to the camp unnoticed. She wasn’t exactly the stealthiest zebra around, and trying to safely climb down the mountain that this tribe used as a wall was not an easy feat. The night was on her side, though, and she figured most of the guards were too sleepy to notice her, especially in the dark. She had gotten off the mountain and was now hiding behind a crate she found sitting in the back of the camp. Now would be a good time to come up with a plan.

Just as that thought crossed her mind, she saw a mare walk by with a silenced 10mm pistol hanging around her neck. The guard mare had some slapped together armor, a few pieces of leather connected with rope straps. Her glyph mark was the ancient zebra symbol for “lion.” Could end up being a fierce fighter if things got messy. These tribes are the type to shoot first and ask questions later, but Nyota was willing to take the risk.

Nyota pulled herself out of cover but kept to the shadows. She crept closer to the mare and placed her hoof on Starcutter’s hilt.

She stepped on a particularly noisy twig.

Well, wasn’t that just poetic. Nyota quickly pulled herself back behind the large crate.

The tribal mare caught the noise. She turned to stare at the wall of the mountain in front of her. She spoke through the darkness, trying to seem threatening while still keeping her voice down, “Hey! Is there someone out there? I know how to use this thing!” she put her mouth over the silenced pistol and pointed it ahead of her, struggling to pierce the darkness with her gaze.

Nyota leaned against the crate in utter silence. Keeping her breath steady and low. As long as neither of them moved she’d be fine. Probably. She contemplated the irony of the situation. Just last night she was in this exact situation, but on the other end. She hoped that her attackers were as ill-prepared as she was right now. Then again, those guys wanted to kill her and steal children, Nyota just wanted a little bit of information. If that’s all they wanted, she would have gladly obliged.

This mare, however, may not end up being so cooperative. She fired three silenced shots into the crate and two more at the mountain. She spat out the pistol and talked to the darkness again, “I heard something out there, and I know there ain’t any animals that crawl around back here. I’d hate to wake my elder by grabbing an assault rifle, so why don’t you just pop on out and say hello?”

Nyota did not like the situation she was in. That mare knew she was there, and possibly knew where she was hiding. She could really use one of those black vials filled with smoke right about now. She’d have to try something soon, that’s for sure. And “something” did not include saying hello. At least when Nyota was a guard she’d at least try to find out who her attackers before trying to kill them.

The mare cautiously approached the crate. “Don’t think you can fuck around with the Blue Demons and not answer for it.” The mare grabbed the pistol once more and placed a hoof on the side of the crate, preparing to turn the corner.

Nyota ignored the fact that she had no idea who the Blue Demons were, and didn't really care either, seeing as how she was about to get shot by one. Instead, she started moving. The mare could only get the drop on Nyota if she stayed put.

Nyota whipped around the corner and kicked the pistol out of her mouth with her left hoof while Starcutter swung around to cut the strap keeping the mare’s gun attached to her. With her forelegs’ jobs already done, Nyota’s back legs put all their strength into pushing herself forward. She knocked the guard mare to the ground and put her back knees over the mare’s legs to pin her. The guard mare’s forelegs flailed wildly, but Nyota managed to hold them both down with her left hoof, leaving the muzzle of the pistol just an inch or two out of her reach. One thing this mare did not have going for her was strength, and Nyota took advantage of that.

Nyota held Starcutter against the mare’s neck. One advantage to having a sword designed for hooves is being able to stay armed while talking.

“Keep quiet! We wouldn’t want to wake that elder, remember?” Nyota warned.

The mare opened her mouth as if to scream or yell, but closed it quickly. Instead she turned her energy toward giving her captor a fierce gaze of hatred and fury. Only now did Nyota notice that the mare had blue facepaint just below her eyes and along her cheek, perpendicular to her natural stripes.

“I knew you weren’t an idiot! Now, how about I ask you some questions? You don’t have to answer if you don’t want, but it would be heavily suggested.” As she finished the sentence she slid the sword slowly across her neck, giving her an impromptu shave. Nyota was tempted to pull out the truth serum instead of resorting to interrogation, but though the potion made zebras talk, Starcutter could make them stay quiet. “I’ll start with something easy: who are the Blue Demons?” She didn’t really care, but it could become important, and she wanted to start with a question she knew the mare would answer honestly.

Through gritted teeth the blue-faced mare gave an answer, “Only the deadliest motherfuckers in the Savanna. We’ll kill whatever pisses us off enough, and I’m pretty sure right now you’ve just made the top of the list.”

Nyota sighed. Honest answer, maybe, but biased all the same. “So, just a normal tribe fighting for power then.” The mare didn’t like the disrespect Nyota was showing the tribe, but her expression was about as ferocious as it could have gotten already. Nyota continued, “Alright, have you or anyone in your tribe seen a group of about a dozen foals being led around unwillingly by some zebras anytime last night?”

The mare spat before answering, “How the fuck should I know? We get a few zebras running past the camp every day, no one gives a shit unless they get too close or block the road.”

A possible dead end, but maybe there was someone else in the camp who actually paid attention to what was happening during their shift. She’d be willing to try to come to peace with the Blue Demons if anyone there wasn’t as trigger happy as this mare.

She softened her tone a bit as she asked, “One last question: is there anyone here who maybe kept a better eye on things?”

“Yeah, a stallion by the name of ‘Fuck You!’”

At that, the mare put all her strength into pulling herself out from under her hoof and slammed her own on the pistol to her right. The pistol went off with a deafening gunshot, helpfully alerting her to the fact that the mare had been slowly working the silencer off the gun with the tip of her hoof.

Nyota slid her sword across the mare’s neck, only this time it hit bone as she applied a more lethal amount of force. That gunshot would’ve alerted the entire camp, and Nyota figured she’d have less than a minute before they were all over her. Nyota flicked the blood off her blade and slid it back into its sheath. There was no way she could face them all, and she would need all four legs to outrun them. The need might arise for a ranged weapon, so she grabbed the mare’s pistol and started attaching the silencer again. It started with a full clip, meaning that after unloading into the mountain she had seven shots left. No time to look for spare ammo; hopefully she wouldn’t need to use it at all.

Then she came to a realization.

She just killed someone.

Nyota turned back to look at the dying mare lying with her back on the dirt, blood spurting from the gash on her neck. This was a living, breathing, intelligent, sane zebra that she had just killed. The mare hadn’t done much, just fire off a shot to call for help. Or maybe she was just trying to warn her friends that they were under attack. Either way, she wasn’t really a threat, she had just been a little quick to pull the trigger, and from what Nyota knew of the Savanna so far, that might not even be a bad thing. She could have been making an honest living for all she knew. Maybe she was just the tribe’s mechanic, or the mare who opened the gate. She wasn’t necessarily the one who did any type of killing.

Nyota apparently was, though. She had just killed a zebra and only now even realized it. How could it have been so easy for her? It was as if taking the life was just part of the plan, or, perish the thought, a reflex. She didn’t even stop to consider it; she just continued to think about her own survival. Had she done this before? She knew her sword skills were impressive, but she had always hoped she was just a hobbyist or something, not a trained killer. There was no mistaking it though, she took that life with the cold, calculated precision of a zebra assassin. Was this going to change how she thought about herself? Could she even think about herself in the same way again?

This was not the time to figure that out. There were people trying to kill her now, and she had to make sure that didn’t happen.

* * * * * * * * *

Nyota galloped along the camp’s wall, keeping it to her right side. The mountain was far too steep to go back that way, and climbing the walls would take too long and turn her into a shooting range for the pissed off zebras looking for her. Her plan was to stay low to the ground, keep away from the commotion in the center of the camp, and get as far away as possible from her last known location. The gate was on the opposite side of the camp, and as soon as she got there she’d buck it open and make a mad dash for the city.

She skidded to a stop as she heard hoofbeats in front of her on the other side of a ramshackle bit of housing. She laid herself prone and pressed her body against the side of the building. On the other side she could hear an exasperated stallion speaking.

“Hey, ya dumb buck!” He paused to catch his breath. “Grab a gun and start patrolling! Some asshole just slit the new girl’s throat back by the mountain.”

“Holy shit!” another stallion replied. Nyota could hear him fiddling with a rifle. His next words were muffled by the gun in his mouth, “Don’ wowwy, we’w fife her.”

“Don’t talk with that in your mouth you dumbass, now go and start looking!” the first stallion ordered. Nyota held her breath as the two stallions ran past the shack, fortunately to the opposite side of the camp. She could see that they, too, had blue facepaint and poorly-made armor.

When their steps were no louder than any of the others, she sprang back to her hooves and resumed her gallop along the side of the wall. She was glad to hear that they still thought she was by the mountain, but the camp only had so many places to hide, so that would change soon enough. She felt like luck was on her side, though, since if she had been just a second faster she’d have run right into the stallions she had heard.

Ahead of her, she could see the gate’s giant floodlights aimed towards the road. She was getting close. She slowed to a canter after realizing the gate was probably locked down and under heavy guard by now. She hid herself behind the hut closest to the gate and dared a peak around the corner to see what she was up against.

The gate had a guard mare on each side, each armed with a fully automatic assault rifle in their mouths and actual, quality, leather armor. They had nearly as much blue paint on as they did armor, to the point that you could barely make out their natural stripes. They were scanning the area intensely, and Nyota hid herself again as one of them began to turn her head toward her position.

Nyota considered her options. Sneaking up on them wasn’t really possible, seeing how the gate was flooded with light and the only path to approach them was in their direct line of sight. The silenced pistol was an option, but she had never fired a gun in her life (as far as she knew, anyway) and anything other than a string of lucky shots would just alert everyone to her position. She could try and distract the guards, maybe throw a pebble to the opposite side of the camp or-

“Hey!” screamed a voice from behind her.

Nyota whipped her head around and looked at a blue-faced stallion running towards her, pulling his gun up from the lanyard around his neck. She moved to grab Starcutter and had it out in an instant.

But the stallion wasn’t getting any closer. He fired a three-round burst from his rifle.

One shot tore through Nyota’s mane, another was halted by her armor, and the last one entered her left hind leg. She let out a cry of pain and let her bleeding leg dangle as her other three legs took on her weight. She hobbled quickly around the corner to get cover from the stallion.

The stallion spat out the gun momentarily to shout a warning, “Blue Demons, over here! I put one in her leg, but she’s still moving!” He picked up the gun again and fired two more bursts, but none managed to penetrate the wall of the hut she was hiding behind.

The gate guards heard the warning and turned to see Nyota who was now limping around the side of the building toward them. They didn’t hesitate to open fire with their considerably more dangerous assault rifles.

Nyota ignored the burning pain and flying bullets to search for cover. The first thing she noticed was that she was lucky enough to be near the door of the hut she was hiding behind. She shoved it open and leapt inside as bullets grazed her flank, and a lighter-caliber one hit her remaining hind leg. She prepared to buck the door closed, but another intense pang from her hind legs convinced her otherwise, so she slammed it closed with her side instead

She was out of the line of fire, but only until they reached the door, so she had to think fast. First, she turned a locker over in front of the door, which would hopefully prevent it from opening. Then she looked around for any windows or other points of entry, but found the hut to be secure. Gunshots could be heard from all around her, but the hut’s walls seemed to be thick enough to stop any bullets from coming through.

After carefully assessing the situation, Nyota determined that she was utterly screwed. She was trapped in a tiny hut that was currently being surrounded by more enemies than she had stripes. Most of them had fully automatic weapons, she had a half-empty pistol and a sword. She was bleeding profusely from her rear legs, her left one quickly going numb, and the pain of her injuries combined with the sound of gunfire was making it hard to concentrate.

She noticed then that her BrewBuck was flashing red. Well, it wasn’t any worse than the sound of gunfire, so she flicked the audio button and listened as limped around the hut searching for anything useful.

The tinny voice announced the first medical problem, “Warning: minor lacerations detected on user in multiple locations. Standard health potion suggested. Number carried: 0.” Oh good, that helped a lot. As did the contents of the hut. The locker she tipped over was mostly empty and the shelf across from the door only had a few metal boxes wrapped in chain and padlocks. Nyota could hear banging on the door as they attempting to break in, but the locker was doing its job so far.

“Warning: moderate damage to right hind leg of user. Standard health potion and sterile bandages suggested. Number of potions carried: 0. Number of bandages carried: 0.” More than she already knew. Maybe she could whip something up from the plants she picked up on the mountain. There was no way she had time to make a full strength potion, but maybe just eating the plant alone would be enough to keep her alive, not that it mattered much at this point.

“Warning: major damage to left hind leg of user. Extra-strength health potion suggested. Number carried: 0.” Nyota took one more look around the hut. In the corner, by a dirty mattress and some half-burnt papers, she saw a small blue flower growing out of the dirt floor. It reminded her of the blue mountain flower she picked climbing the mountain. Maybe it would be just what she needed. She crawled over to it, leaving a trail of blood. The gunfire died down, but the banging on the door did not.

“Warning: major damage to primary muscles in left hind leg of user. Extra-strength health potion and cauterization suggested. This device is not certified to cauterize wounds. Number of Extra-strength health potions carried: 0.” Nyota pulled herself onto the mattress, panting and starting to get dizzy. She rolled to her side and faced the flower. She knew there wasn’t anything it could do now, but she still reached out her right hoof to pick it.

“Warning: poison joke pollen detected. Green vine with light blue flower. Avoid at all costs. Extremely dangerous.”

Wait, what was that?

As soon as she touched the flower, vines sprang out of the ground and wrapped themselves around Nyota’s hoof. They held her down as more vines grew out and formed an enormous leafy mass in front of her.

Nyota looked on in horror as the giant, writhing ball of vines before her began to take shape. Two thick vines sprung out the front, two more out the back, then more swirled around them, and more, until each of the four original vines was now several layers thick, and as long as Nyota’s leg. The plant ball now took a more elongated shape, and a single vine slid out behind it.

Four appendages and another in the back. If she weren’t slowly losing consciousness, Nyota would have figured it out sooner. The poison joke was forming a body. A zebra body. It wasn’t until the plant grew a neck and a head that she finally put it together.

The plant shook its legs and moved its neck as if to crack it. It got down on its knees and, without eyes, peered directly at the face of the zebra who had touched it and whose hoof was still trapped in the vines. The vines in the creature’s head rearranged themselves, forming a mouth. It began to speak to her.

“Why hello there! How are you?” it greeted pleasantly, giving the mare a toothless smile.

The shock and horror that Nyota felt was now replaced with bewilderment. She was stunned at how closely the plant’s voice was to that of a normal zebra mare, so much so that if she were going by voice alone she would probably it was just a normal zebra. She had not expected this creature to let her live, much less strike up conversation. Worse yet, it started a conversation that had a painfully (in multiple senses of the word) obvious answer.

Getting a bit snappy in her worsening delirium, Nyota answered, “I’ve been better. How about you?”

The plant grew a smile larger than any real zebra physically could, and tried to clap, but the only noise it made was the rustling of leaves. It then turned and walked over to the shelf of locked metal chests.

“Finally, I found someone with a sense of humor! You would not believe how many zebras answer with ‘I’m dying, help me!’ or ‘What do you mean how are you?’ or ‘HOLY SHIT WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU!’” It paused for a moment to look at the mare. “That last one is probably the most common.”

The plant creature held its “hoof” up to the padlock on one of the metal boxes. Tiny vines extended from it and went into the keyhole. It fiddled around with the tumblers inside until an audible click alerted the plant that it was unlocked. It then pulled off the padlock and unwrapped the chain from the box.

“Think I saw the lady put something in here you could use.” It flipped open the lid, reached in, and pulled out a murky red potion. “Ah, this should be just what the robo-doctor ordered. Red means health potion, right? You’d think I’d know, I probably have a friend in here.”

Nyota looked at the plant flabbergasted. Was this thing really cracking jokes while she was bleeding out? What was it, even? Could she trust it? It had her tied to the ground, but it was also offering her what seemed to be a health potion. But even if she had had the strength to move her free arm, she wouldn’t have bothered to scan the potion before drinking it. At this point, poison was the least of her concerns.

It had a sense of humor, so she figured it might be in her best interest to keep the mood light. “Well, how about you bring your friend on over here?” she requested. “I’ll tell you whether he was worth juicing.”

The plant giggled as it trotted at a painfully slow pace to Nyota. “Well, most of my friends are pretty lazy, so if he is in here I can’t guarantee he’ll do any real work fixing you up,” it commented. Another vine emerged and popped the cork stopper off the potion. It then poured the potion into the zebra’s mouth from much too high up, spilling some of it over her nose and chin.

Nyota’s pain subsided a little. She felt the magical energy flow through her, but it faded away quickly. This was definitely not an extra-strength health potion, and maybe not even standard-strength. It was enough to stop the bleeding so far as she could tell, but she was still missing quite a lot of blood, and she couldn’t move three out of four legs thanks to either injuries or restraints.

She lifted her left foreleg and looked at the screen on her BrewBuck. It was flashing red to warn her that she had come in contact with poison joke, but she just ignored it and pressed the button to show medical readouts. Pretty much what she expected. All the same body parts are still in horrible condition, but at least they weren’t getting any worse, and her BrewBuck wasn’t reporting any infections, so if nothing else she wasn’t going to die from that then and there. She had yet to figure out whether the same could be said for the poison joke warning.

“So, Ms. plant thingy, are you going to kill me?” Nyota asked directly.

“Nah,” the plant answered casually. “It’s the rest of my family that are the unforgiving, emotionless killers. I find that a bit boring myself; there are better ways to spend your time.”

Nyota ignored the personal comment, and perked up at the mention of danger. “Wait a minute, you’ve got family who’ll kill me without even caring? Are they nearby? Could they get to me?” she asked worriedly. She had enough problems at this point

“They won’t come in so long as I’m here. I don’t think they like hanging out with me all that much,” it replied. “They’re right outside, though, if you want to say hi. Didn’t you notice?”

For the first time since touching the flower Nyota returned her attention to the noises outside. The banging at the door had disappeared, but the gunfire persisted. It was more distant, no longer ricocheting off the side of the hut. Rifle shots were constant, fully automatic barrages rather than the disciplined three-shot burst. They weren’t shooting at her, they were shooting everywhere.

Just then, from outside, came a scream so loud that Nyota had to cover one ear with her free hoof.

“That was probably Roger’s doing,” the plant commented. “He’s always going on about how loud he can make them scream. Someone who won’t shut up about making other people scream: how ironic is that?”

The zebra mare just stared at the odd plant in front of her.

The plant took the silence as a good time for introductions. “Oh, I never said my own name, did I?” it noted. “It’s April.”

The plant lowered its head and grinned at the mare. “Get it?”

Nyota thought about it for a moment. “April. As in April Foals Day. When everyone plays pranks on one another.”

The plant performed another leafy clap. “Hey, you are a clever one!”

The mare still wasn’t sure if she could trust this thing, but she supposed she might as well return the greeting. A name no one in the Savanna knew wasn’t really that much to give away. “My name is Nyota,” she said, “Get it?”

The plant finally put on a frown. “Sorry, no. I don’t know ancient Zebra. Sounds nice though! What’s it mean?”

The mare was the one smiling now. “Maybe I’ll tell you later,” she teased, “Like when you take these vines off my leg.”

The plant was taken aback at the sudden change of topic. “Well, about that...” it mumbled.

Nyota sighed. “Let me guess, this isn’t coming off for free, right?”

The plant let out an awkward chuckle and answered, “I had been hoping to strike a deal, yes.”

The mare slapped her forehead with her only free hoof. She was already on a mission, she couldn’t afford to do any favors, much less give in to threats. This was a poison joke plant, though, and her BrewBuck had made express interest in telling her they are not to be messed with. She wasn’t even entirely sure it could be killed. It had gone silent outside, so she assumed none of the Blue Demons had figured out how, and since the tribe was much more well equipped for this than her, she could only assume that her own attempts would fail just the same. Maybe if she was lucky this could help her out in the long run.

Nyota asked it straightforwardly, “Okay, April the talking plant monster, what do you want from me?”

April donned another impossibly wide smile. “Simple!” it replied, “Wherever you are going, take me with you.”

Nyota waited to hear more, but that was the end of its request. All it wanted to do was go along for the ride, without even knowing what that entailed. This was a very odd request, and she failed to see why it needed to resort to holding her captive. There had to be more.

“And why, exactly, do you want to go where I’m going if you have no idea where that is or why I’m even going there?” she inquired.

“Because I just want to go somewhere!” the plant replied enthusiastically. “In case you aren’t an expert botanist, I should tell you that plants have roots. As you were so quick to point out, I am indeed a plant. While the fun part of me is free from the ground to do whatever I want-” it demonstrated this by doing a small, solo can-can routine, “-My roots have to stay pretty much where they are, and my body has to stay pretty close to them. Roots aren’t like vines, they can’t just shoot around, they stay the same size and move very, very slowly. It took my family about a week just to get here from the North face of the mountain.”

Nyota looked back at her hoof covered in vines. Sure enough, they were all connected to the original flower’s roots.

“So...” it was hard to put it all together when she was still so light-headed. “You want me to become your walking flower pot, and in return you let me live?”

“More than that!” the plant remarked, “I’ll be your best buddy! We can hang out, take long walks, hunt down raiders, ride tandem bikes, you know, best friend stuff! I’ll even make you dinner! It’s the least I can do for literally treating you like dirt.”

“And what if one day I just decide you’re getting annoying and scrape your roots off my leg?”

“Well, then I should tell you that poison joke only takes effect the night after exposure, so as long as you keep that little bit on you you’ll be fine. But if you leave me in the middle of the desert, you better have a mirror ready for when you wake up next morning.” The plant quickly changed to a serious tone and continued, “If you wake up next morning.”

Nyota considered the offer. An ally would be nice, especially since she was still getting used to the Savanna. But this thing wasn’t really an ally, just something that considered her useful for its own needs. It could stab her in the back any time it felt like it. The potion and apparent protection from the Blue Demons and its family was nice, but it didn’t exactly ensure loyalty. Still, this creature had already shown that it could pick a lock, and she guessed that it could probably take her in a fight, so having it on her side would be useful.

No matter how she thought about it, it all came down to one thing. “Well, I’m not really getting out of here unless I say yes.” She took a deep breath before finally answering, “April, you’ve got yourself a deal.”

“Whoopee!” The plant screamed as it shot up into the air and hit its head on the motionless ceiling before falling back down. “Ow. But yes! Very happy! I can finally get away from this boring ol’ bunch of chlorophyll I call family.”

The vines on Nyota’s arm recessed back into the root of the plant which was now wrapped firmly around her foreleg. She pulled her hoof off the ground and looked at her newly forced accessory. It was clinging so tight it almost wasn’t visible under her striped coat. It wasn’t really tight enough to cause any problems, though, but it was definitely tighter than the BrewBuck on her other leg. A single flower bud sat just above the wrist.

The mare pulled herself up, but after feeling the pain decided to just rest on her forelegs. “So what now?” she asked.

“As much as I want to start our amazing journey, full of danger, intrigue, action, romance, mystery, et cetera, I think it’d be better if we took both took a little nap till morning,” it suggested.

“I prefer the night,” she remarked.

“And I prefer partial shade; we can’t all get what we want.” the plant snapped. “You need the sleep, and I need... well, nothing really, but I still think we should wait it out until tomorrow when my family’s all busy basking in the sunlight.”

Nyota was fully aware that she needed to sleep, she just didn’t want to. She was wasting a perfectly good night just because her legs were a little more shot at than usual. Maybe she could make a potion, or just take a quick look outside. Something other than just lying on the mattress because she was tired and dizzy. Then again, it was a rather comfortable mattress, and really just an hour would be enough. Yeah, she’d just take a quick nap for an hour maybe.

April trotted over to Nyota and placed its hoof up to hers. In a trick that had to disobey several laws of physics, the entirety of the plant’s zebra-sized body unraveled itself and slid into the few feet of roots wrapped on her leg.

Nyota spoke to the plant on her leg. “You’re not a normal poison joke, are you, April?”

The flower on her wrist turned toward Nyota and spoke to her in April’s voice, moving its petals like lips, “Nope. I’ll tell you tomorrow. Good night, Nyota, my new travelling buddy.”

Nyota laid on her back and chuckled at the ridiculous situation she’d gotten herself into just one day out of the cave. This was going to get interesting.

“Good night to you too, April.”

Footnote: Level Up.
New Perk: Last Laugh -That poison joke on your hoof isn’t just for show. When fighting unarmed, you have a 10% chance of infecting enemies with poison joke.

Co-written by Mr. ShinyObject and Doctor Felix Whooves
Edited by Twilight Sparkle

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 onEquestria Daily

The Fallout: Equestria logo used above was designed byDotRook, who, according tothe 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 theFallout Equestria Side Stories post on Equestria Daily and theFallout Equestria Side Stories thread on Ponychan

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

Chapter 3 - Minefield

“Apparently they're too rare and too scary to try to talk to or study.”

--- --- --- /// /// /// | | | | | | \\ \\ \\ --- --- ---

“That can’t be it. Blowing up the country isn’t the same as killing off a people.”

“You are wise, young buck. There is more to being a member of the Zebra nation than the land you live on and the stripes on your coat. The ponies believed that all power rested in the gift of friendship, but we knew better. The bonds of our people are beyond that. We are not a nation of friends, we are a nation of families.

“But everyone has a family, it’s not thatspecial.”

“It is not rare, but it is important nonetheless.The shattering of familial ties are what plunged this world into war. The slaughtering of our people in that pony valley was not simply an attack on those zebras, it was an attack on their families. When I heard that one of us had destroyed that wretched place, I knew in my heart that it was a son or daughter of those massacred. There is no greater driving force than that between a parent and child.”

--- --- --- \\ \\ \\ | | | | | | /// /// /// --- --- ---

Nyota awoke from a dreamless sleep to find herself still lying on the mattress she had bloodied the night before. She grimaced at the sight of sunbeams shining through the gaps in the wall and rubbed at her eyes, waiting for them to adjust.

Once they did, she turned her attention to the room, able to get a good look now that it was better lit than the night before. At some point while she was sleeping, someone had set the shelf back upright next to the door, and all the previously locked boxes had been opened, their padlocks laying undone beside them. To Nyota’s left sat the empty vial, formerly a health potion, that had been poured on her face (and partially drunk) the night before. Three full ones had been placed next to it.

For a moment she wondered who had done all this, but as she got back on all fours, she noticed her new right-foreleg accessory and recalled her alliance from the night before.

She wondered whether her new ally was in the roots or up and walking. “April?” Nyota whispered to the flower, “You there?”

“WHAT?” came a shout from just outside the door. “I’m out here!”

A few moments later the door slammed open and the coiled mass of blue-green vines trotted through with two canteens hung around its neck, one large and circular, the other small and boxy.

It greeted the groggy zebra, “Top o’ the mornin’ to ya, sleepyhead! Boy, you look like you could use a few cups of coffee.” The plant swung the canteens off its neck and towards Nyota. “Here, I grabbed these off some of the dead guys. Small one for you, big one for me, filled ‘em both up at a pump near the center. Don’t know how you’ve survived this long without one, honestly.”

Nyota chose to not bring up that “this long” was approximately 24 hours. Instead, she yawned and asked about the potions beside her. “Are those for me?”

“Yup,” it answered, “Found them in those locked boxes over there with some bullet casings, glass jars, and bottlecaps of all things. Figured you could use those if things get hairy again.” The plant beamed a toothless grin at the zebra mare. “Wouldn’t want my ride to drop dead, now would I?”

Nyota rolled her eyes and stuffed the potions into her bag with the truth serum, finally starting to wake up. “Now now, I thought we had agreed on the term ‘friend.’” Although she wasn’t sure that was the right word either. “And speaking of being friendly,” she added, “Why aren’t you just keeping them for yourself?”

“I don’t really have pockets, on account of not having clothes,” it answered sarcastically. “But really, health potions aren’t that much better than a good drink of water for a Living Joke.”

The mention of Living Joke piqued Nyota’s curiosity once again. She walked up to April and studied the creature’s face, then took a look down at the flower on her arm, then looked back up again.

“So... what exactly is a Living Joke?” the mare inquired.

April facehoofed. “Oh fiddlesticks, that’s right! Yesterday I told you I’d tell you tomorrow! And today is tomorrow, so I should tell you today.” The plant set its hoof back down and cleared its throat. It pushed Nyota back to make room, and she pretended not to be disgusted by the wriggling vines it had pressed against her chest.

“Allow me to sing you the song of my people!

“There once was a great necromancer,

and through our fields, he was a prancer.

He got hit with some joke,

so incantations he spoke,

for he thought soul jars were the answer

“But he must have never heard the rumor

that poison jokes have a sense of humor,

and though it’s not a soul,

it still fills the hole,

so like us, he became a bloomer.”

For a minute Nyota just stared speechless at the creature in front of her, strange in both form and personality. With every action it took, it seemed less and less like the killing machine that it wanted its species to be seen as. Then again, Nyota would be dead now if something hadn’t killed the Blue Demons. And Nyota wasn’t entirely opposed to the idea of having an ally who was entertaining.

“First of all, that wasn’t really a song, just two limericks,” she commented, “And second, I didn’t really understand a word of that.”

The plant let out an annoyed grunt. “Well, you can sing limericks, too, you know. All poetry can be sung!” It snapped back. Its vines started wriggling even more than usual as it was angered, a few coming loose from the body, but they soon settled back into place. It sighed, then continued, “But I suppose if you want to hear it the boring way, I’ll tell you.”

“About a hundred years ago there was a zebra who specialized in dark magic. One day he ended up walking right into a poison joke patch, but didn’t realize it until it was too late, and he had until morning to come up with something. Now, he knew nothing about potions, so he figured he’d do the necromancer catch-all: soul jars! Turn them into little vessels to hold a soul, then cut out a little of his own and throw it in. He thought that if he took a chunk of his soul and stuck them to the plants, he could control them, or at a minimum stop them from doing anything bad to him.

“But the thing is, we already have souls. Kind of. We have a sense of humor. We have what we think is funny. We have personality. So when he prepared us to take in a piece of a zebra soul, instead we just filled the jar with ourselves. Since we were meant to contain part of a zebra, we took on the shape and voice of a zebra.

“So now, instead of an army of deadly zebra-plant hybrids at his control, he had an army of deadly plant-zebra hybrids about to royally screw him over. And we did. Ol’ grandpa PJ said, ‘Hey, this guy made plants look like zebras, it’d be funny if we made him look like a plant.’ So they turned him into some other plant and rooted him in the heart of Enigma forest just South of here.”

Nyota considered the story. She wasn’t really familiar with necromancy, only megaspells and potions. She recalled some legends of evil shamans who would cast spells on the heroes of the story. It always seemed so ridiculous, like no one could really want to do such cruel and destructive things. Then again, that was the world she was living in now. And the thing in front of her was proof that it was being done.

The story didn’t answer all of her questions though. “So what about that thing you do with the vines?” she asked, “Where you somehow put your entire body onto the roots on my leg.”

“That’s just from radiation,” it answered, “Any poison joke can do that, it’s just that for them it’s just like a bunch of really long tentacles, whereas we make a body with ours.”

“That was another thing that confused me,” she added, “how exactly can you have a body completely unconnected to your roots and flower? Don’t you kind of need to stay connected to them?”

The plant threw a foreleg up and shrugged. “Zebra magic is weird. So long as I stay in pretty much the same area, like 30 or 40 feet, I’ll be able to keep up the body. The water pump in the center of camp was stretching it. The farther I go the less I think clearly, and if I keep going the vines just kind of wither away and my mind jumps back to the flower.”

“So if I jump on some chariot and leave you in the dust you’ll just start annoying me from my wrist,” she surmised.

“Yup. You can’t get rid of me that easily,” it replied. “And now that we’re done talking about how cool I am, how about we go outside and get some nice, warm, bright sunlight?”

Nyota groaned. “Do we have to?” she asked.

“Yes, actually,” it answered, then corrected itself, “Well, I do.” It pointed a hoof at Nyota accusingly. “And that means you have to, too.”

Nyota snickered. “You said tu-tu.”

The plant giggled. “Hey, I did, didn’t I! Nice catch, zebra.” It swung the door open, then motioned for Nyota to follow.

As soon as she stepped out her eyes were floodedwith blue as she looked down at the ground, which was covered with poison joke (or rather, Living Joke) plants.

April trotted through the plants thoughtlessly and only turned when it didn’t hear hoofbeats. “Hey, ya coming? Why you waiting at the door?” she asked, then immediately made the realisation. “Oh. That’s right. You probably don’t want to step on those guys.”

“If it would result in me getting brutally murdered, no, I wouldn’t,” she snapped back.

April sat down and thought. “Hmm... maybe if you just, like, um, or kind of... I don’t know, just not step on anything? Or anyone?” April suggested. “Hey, there’s a lot less on this side. See if you can get over here,” the plant said as it casually walked over the flowers to the barren ground by the corner of the hut in the shade.

“Easier said than done ya’ pile of leaves,” Nyota commented as she judged the distance to the plantless corner of the shed, which seemed so much closer when she was hiding behind it last night. She scanned the ground for the tiny spots free of the flowers and roots. Slowly and carefully she moved each hoof to a free spot. Every so often she would see a vine wriggle around, but otherwise the plants stayed motionless.

“Almost there, just gotta put one hoof in front of the other!” April informed her.

“Not so loud!” Nyota replied, never taking her eyes off the treacherous ground. “You don’t want to wake them. If you can wake them.” Nyota paused, then looked up and asked “They are sleeping, right?”

April scratched at its head of vines. “Well, sort of,” it answered. “We just really like the sun, so sometimes we just sit there and soak it in, filter out the rest of the world. Noise wouldn’t really wake us, but bruising a vine or losing a petal would sure piss someone off. So don’t worry, us talking won’t be a problem, but yes, your little dance over here is preventing them all from eviscerating you.”

“Oh good,” Nyota said sarcastically. She had gotten past the worst of it, and by now it was really just about walking carefully rather than contorting to fit her hooves in the right places.

And with one last step she was in the clear. The bulk of the plants were behind her. On this side of the hut the poison joke plants were few and far between. Looking down the path she took last night, she could see it was entirely clear of the plants. They had all gathered back on the other side of the hut.

The side by the gate. The Living Joke had gathered in front of the gate out of the camp.

Nyota bowed her head and quietly started letting out swears under her breath upon the realisation that her way out was covered in things that would kill her.

“Hey, what are you mumbling about?” April asked. “Are those swears? They sound like swears. You’re swearing.”

Nyota whipped her head back up and stared directly into what could be considered April’s eyes. She gave her the look of a mare who was really not in the mood to deal with smart-ass walking plants.

But instead of snapping at it she just let out a sigh. She figured she might as well ask, “Why is your family sitting right by the gate out?”

Ignoring her apparent frustration, the plant responded, “Well, duh, ‘cause that’s where the sun is! That big ol’ mountain is leaving a big ol’ shadow over the whole camp, except right there at the front. It’s the farthest from the mountain.”

Nyota turned to look at the mountain, and after getting immediately but temporarily blinded, she saw that the sun was indeed just peeking out over the mountain, and sure enough the whole camp was in the shade save for the area right by the gate. She also now knew that it was much later than she thought, closer to noon than to dawn. She had lost more time than she thought.

Nyota let out another short sigh then turned back to the plant. “Okay, we’ll take another look around the camp for supplies and another way out, then maybe by the time we get back they’ll have moved, or I’ll have come up with something better.”

April performed an excited hop as she agreed to the plan, “Okie Dokie Lokie!”

* * * * * * * * *

In front of Nyota lied the drying and decaying corpse of a Blue Demon stallion, the blue paint over his face doing nothing to hide his twisted expression, most of it having mixed with blood and dripped off.

Nyota had seen some nasty corpses fall out of the pods back in the cave, and she had made a corpse of her own last night, but something about this stallion got to her. She looked at the cuts and bruises across his body, the malnourished limbs of skin and bones, the blood staining his coat, the back leg attached by nothing but a tendon, the old scars that never healed over, the mouth letting out a silent scream. This stallion was a tortured soul, and his body was tortured as well. His death was not quick, and his life hadn’t been any better.

As Nyota stood and stared, April, completely ignorant of what she was going through, broke the silence.

“So does he have anything good on him?” she asked.

The sudden noise jolted Nyota. “Um, I’m working on it. It’s just that he... he...”

April stopped poking at another corpse to walk over to Nyota. “What, you never seen a dead body before?” the plant jeered.

“No no, I have,” she assured, “It’s just that this one... It’s really getting to me.” She peered into the corpse’s eyes. “I mean, just look at him! He’s got scars all over, his ribs are showing from malnutrition, and that face just-”

She was interrupted by April extending a hoof and raising Nyota’s head to make eye contact. “Hey now, Nyota, you’re going to have to get over this. There are people like him suffering all over the Savanna, and there isn’t a thing you or I can really do about it. He’s dead now, so whatever pain’s been dealt his way is over with now.” It turned to look at the stallion’s dying expression as her voice softened. “If I could have done away with it with a smile, I would’ve, but my family’s solution is sometimes the only one that can really offer a permanent remedy.”

A moment of silence passed for the poor departed soul as the mare and the monster gave their silent respects.

“So did he have any good loot on him?” April inquired.

If it were any other single creature in the Savanna, Nyota would have given them a disgusted look and walked away, but April’s mind was an odd place, and this sudden change in topics and mood was something she’d have to get used to.

“Um, no, not really,” she answered after readjusting to the situation. “A few more rounds for the 10mm, but his gun’s no good. Seems everyone here just kept firing until their weapons fell apart.”

“Pretty much the same for all the bodies I searched while you were being all mopey,” April added.

Nyota figured she’s let that one go. “Okay then, so we’re ready to head out” she said. “Has the sun moved?”

The two look up and see the sun has just barely gone over the peak of the mountain, however a shadow is still spread across the bulk of the camp.

“Looks like that would be a negative, Captain!” April reported.

“Great. So the Living Joke are still at the front gate, I haven’t seen a single other exit since I’ve gotten here, and climbing the wall would probably put enough strain on my mostly-crippled legs to make me pass out,” Nyota concluded.

“That’s about the gist of it.”

“Well, I guess that only leaves us one option,” Nyota announced, “It’s time to meet the folks.”

* * * * * * * * *

Nyota and April stood at the edge of the shadow cast by the mountain. In front of them was a field of mutated and cursed poison joke plants basking in the sunlight, and on the other end of that the gate out of the camp.

“Let me give them a little wake up call,” April suggested. It took its hoof and placed it right next to the nearest blue flower. A little vine extended out the center of her hoof and gave the flower a tiny little flick.

The ground began to rumble for a moment, then vines erupted from the ground, all along the field of plants. They extended high into the air, writhing and flailing around until they collapsed to the ground and started wrapping around themselves. Nyota began to see the bodies take shape, at least 20 separate bodies, each nearly identical to April, but each of them had 5 or 6 flowers placed around their body, and their vines were much looser. The crowd of zebra-plants stood around, some looking at April, some looking at each other, but they all ignored Nyota.

“Hey there, guys!” April yelled. For the first time since they met, Nyota felt that her smile was forced. “How ya doin’ Tony, Seymour, Audrey, Lisa, Bruce, Natalie, Dinah, Bob, um... Audrey two-”

“Stop calling us by those stupid names!” came a voice from somewhere in the crowd. Like their appearance, their voices were rougher and less refined than April’s. Nyota couldn’t even tell if it was a mare or stallion. “They aren’t names for plants and they aren’t even Zebra names.”

“Yeah, well, they also don’t sound like names for SHUT UP!” April retorted ever so intelligently.

The Living Joke at the front of the group split apart to let through a group from the back. The group of 5 walking up were not like the rest. Instead of blue-green, the vines that coiled around them were nearly black and white, with only a tinge of green. The way the vines wrapped around them, alternating between black vines and white vines, made them appear striped like zebras. They were also taller than the others, and their bodies were more defined, enough that Nyota could make out their gender without hearing their voice.

April begrudgingly greeted them, “Hey uncle Steve, aunt Pam, aunt Rita, uncle Roger...”-there was a pregnant pause- “Dad...”

The plant addressed as “Dad” took a few steps forward, out of the crowd and into April’s face. “April,” he said sternly with the authoritative voice like that of the Caesar himself, “Why are you not basking in the sunlight with the rest of us, why do you keep calling us those names, and why is that zebra from last night still alive?” He pointed a monochrome hoof at Nyota without looking at her. She wasn’t even aware that he had seen her there, though she figured that someone would bring her up soon. “We agreed against keeping them as pets,” he added, sending a little chill down Nyota’s spine.

“To answer the first two, I’m just kind of an independent spirit that way,” she answered, sounding like a child making excuses, “and about the zebra, well...” a lump formed in her throat, “Remember that idea I had a while ago...?”

The plant slapped his face and rolled his nonexistent eyes. “Oh stars and moon, don’t tell me you’ve finally got a hostage!” he groaned.

“Actually, no,” April responded matter-of-factly, “She volunteered.”

Nyota would have corrected her on the young creature’s use of the word “volunteer” if it weren’t for the striped plant whose vines had just jutted out of its body and started whipping around in a wild frenzy.

“Volunteer! Volunteer!” he screamed, throwing his forelegs in the air. He had lost the stern, stoic tone from earlier. “You’re telling me you just sprouted up to her and started talking to her? Having a conversation? Tell her your little idea and have a nice cup of tea? Going against the very nature of who and what you are to talk with some meatsack?” April’s father was going bezerk. Nyota was getting hit with spittle five feet away, and she wasn’t even sure they had spittle. This argument had been a long time coming. “You’re a Living Joke, April, we don’t talk to zebras, we kill them. We don’t take hostages, slaves, pets, and certainly not volunteers. Kill, murder, eviscerate, maybe torture a bit, but that’s it! That’s what works for us, and that’s what works best.”

He stopped. His vines pulled back in, and he tried to regain his composure. He sighed, then added, “But that was never what worked for you, was it?”

“No,” April replied confidently, “Which is exactly why I need to split from the group.”

He turned away from his daughter and just looked into the dirt and sand, trying to find an answer. Silence fell on the camp.

One of the other striped Living Joke spoke up, “Speaking of splitting the group, I think I’d like a word with the zebra.” Nyota’s ears perked up at the mention of her species.

Without looking up the father responded, “Yeah, sure, just don’t do anything to her yet Roger-” his head jerked up, then he facehoofed- “dang it kid, now you got me doing it!”

Roger chuckled as he walked over to Nyota. “I don’t mind the name, really.”

He huffed back at him. “That’s not the point.”

* * * * * * * * *

Roger and Nyota stood at the side of the hut that she had become so familiar with as of late. Roger leaned against the wall of the camp, Nyota stood nervously by the door. The only thing going through her head right now was April’s mention of a family member named Roger who was fond of making zebras scream. The atmosphere was tense.

Roger broke the silence. “So...” he began casually, “April finally found someone who would laugh at her jokes?”

Nyota just blinked at first. She was expecting a threat or warning. After a moment though she answered, “Yes, she did.” Though that would have been a sufficient answer, she figured she might as well give the full truth. “Though I was delirious from blood loss at the moment and about to die.”

The plant gave a quiet laugh. “Yeah, that would explain it,” he commented, “I told her that if she wanted to find a zebra with a sense of humor she’d have to work on her material, but I suppose delusional hostages work too.”

He kicked a shell casing on the ground, sending it spinning away under the wall to the outside. “She’s always been the comedian of the group. Acted a lot more like our ancestors from way back before the war.” Nyota’s nervousness faded as she felt he was confiding in her. He obviously wanted to talk with someone about this outside the family. “Killing for her always looked like a chore, you know? She’d never really get anything out of it.”

Nyota thought she’d go out on a limb. “Do any of you enjoy it, really?” she inquired, “I mean, April is proof that you don’t need to kill, and you seem like you could get along with zebras if you just tried. Maybe you’re only killing them because they fear you.”

At that Roger’s head shot up and he pulled himself off the wall and turned to Nyota. “Oh no no no, my dear blood bag, I LOVE murdering!” he said with a grin, “We all do! It’s amazing! Zebras, griffons, even ponies on the rare occasion that we see one. I’ll kill ‘em all! Hell, even feels good to kill Phantinis and Beests, but animals only squeal, they don’t scream. Man, when you’ve chopped off a leg or two and just start jabbing at them, and their mouth kinda opens and closes, and they get all gaspy, but their mouth is still making noise the entire time, but it’s all weird and stuff, oh man it makes me smile just thinking about it!” Roger let out a long sigh and put on a big smile as Nyota turned pale under her coat. April did mention how he just loved talking about making zebras scream.

After a short silence Roger’s toothless smile dimmed into a frown, and he trudged back to the wall and flopped his body against it and started kicking at the dirt again. “And even though everyone else was fine with that- not a single complaint from anyone! April could never get caught up in all of it. We made sure she got her fair share, and she got the job done, but it didn’t lighten her up like it did with the others.” He wrapped his vines around another shell casing and brought it up to his face.

“She needed more,” he added, then turned to look at Nyota. “She needed you.” He flicked the casing at her. It bounced off her unflinching forehead and landed at her hooves. “So don’t screw up.”

Nyota shook her head to get the murderous speech out of her head and think about what the plant just told her. She was accepting a mission was all, and this was a higher up making sure she succeeded. She responded accordingly, putting on a determined face and saluting the plant before telling him, “Don’t worry sir, I will not let anything happen to your niece.”

He waved his hoof dismissively. “Oh please, she’s much more likely to get you killed than the other way around,” he clarified. “Thing is, that’s what I’m afraid of,” he added.

After giving her a second to look bewildered, Roger elaborated on his fear, his tone growing harsh. “If you drop dead in the middle of the desert, she’ll live off the fluids in your corpse for maybe a week, then get her roots about 20 feet farther from the middle of nowhere, then shrivel up and die. As different as she is, she’s still family, and we don’t want her crumbling to dust because of some dumb zebra when she could have just stayed grumpy but alive back with us.”

Nyota was finally realizing the weight of the decision she made so quickly last night. “So basically,” she surmised, “If I die, you’ll kill me.”

Roger chuckled. “There you go, zebra, you finally got it,” he said, then gave her a leafy jab to the shoulder.

“So was that all you wanted to tell me?” Nyota asked, sensing that the conversation had come to a decent conclusion.

“Pretty much. Let’s get back to-Oh wait!” Roger answered, holding a black and white vine out to stop her. “When you’re talking with april, don’t bring up that she’s only got the one flowerbud.” Nyota recalled noticing that all the other Living Joke had flowers all around them but April only had the one on her root. When she looked up at Roger, baffled, he added “It’s a plant thing. I figured you probably wouldn’t have guessed that on your own.”

Roger pulled back his vine and the two started walking back to the others.

* * * * * * * * *

As they walked back to the main group by the gate, now wide open, Nyota overheard the tail end of April’s father ending a conversation.

“-But don’t ever think that this means we don’t want you here.” he assured.

“No, I understand,” April responded, “This is just because I-” She turned towards the two creatures coming around the bend. “Oh hey! You’re done talking or whatever! And Roger didn’t kill you! Awesome!”

“I’m inclined to agree,”Nyota snarked back as Roger blended back into the herd/field. “Are you done talking with your father?” she inquired.

“Yeah, I think so. I think we get each other now,” April said. “Though I wouldn’t suggest talking with him yourself, I think he has a thing against zebras.” she warned.

“I’m standing right here, you know,” April’s father huffed, “But, yes, I do.”

“Well then we better get on our way!” Nyota declared, disguising concern as eagerness. “We got the whole capital between us and the things before we do the stuff.” she continued, partially joking, partially not wanting to reveal much, partially clueless on what her actual plans were.

“Then stuff we shall do and to things we shall go!” April echoed enthusiastically. She trotted joyfully away from her family and over to Nyota. The two bro-hoofed, and Nyota realised she was already building up a resistance to the icky feeling of April’s vines on her coat.

“Well then... I guess we’ll get out of your way,” muttered April’s father, turning back to the plants. “Living Joke!” he roared, “Part!”.

The ground began to rumble as various roots and vines tore out of the ground and moved off the gate’s pathway. The zebra cautiously began walking toward the long sought after gate, careful not to step in any of the holes in the ground left by the Living Joke. April followed happily and hoppily behind. Nyota could almost hear the spring in her step, but could quite clearly hear the plant’s vine of a tail shiping around and smacking the ground after landing each hop. For a second she wondered if that hurt, then quickly came to the realisation that April probably didn’t really care. She was happy, probably more happy than she had been in her whole life. She was finally leaving a family that was by no means bad, only stifling. In a sense, it was really just a matter of ideology. April cared too much about laughing and not enough about screaming.

Next thing she knew, Nyota was on the other side of the gate, back into the Savanna. She could see nothing but sand in all directions, even up, as she could see the beginnings of a small sand storm.

She stopped and turned to look at the camp she had been in for the last day. This was her first time seeing it from the proper direction and elevation. The walls were much smoother on the outside, but tagged with more graffiti (“Blue Demons, Fuck off!”, “Badasses only”, etc.).

Uncle Roger poked his head out around the gate to see the two. “Hey April!” he screamed, trying to speak through the strong wind. “Come back any time if you need anything!” he offered.

“You betcha’ Roger!” April hollered back, giving a wave and a wink.

And with that, the plant and the mare walked off into the horizon.

“Any idea where we’re going?” April pondered.

“Um... forward?” Nyota answered.

“Good enough for me!”

* * * * * * * * *

“I’m booooored” April moaned as she and Nyota continued through the Savanna. “We’ve been out here for days!”

“It’s barely been an hour,” Nyota corrected.

“But it feels like days. Days and days and days. All that’s in front of us is dirt and sand, all that’s behind is is dirt and sand, all that’s in the air is dirt and sand,” she whined.

Nyota chuckled at the plant’s expense. “Remember when we saw that dead tree half an hour ago?” said Nyota, “That was exciting, wasn’t it?”

April grunted than feigned a laugh. “Hardy har har, zebra, but I’m the one who’s supposed to making lousy jokes here.”

“Well if you’re getting tired we can take a break from walking if you want,” Nyota offered, “We won’t be making it to the city by tonight anyway.”

“Bah, you blood and guts zebras may be weak out in the middle of a desert, but Living Joke love it. I’m eating up so much wonderful, delicious sunlight right now I think I may be gaining weight.” She drove the point home by extending her vines out so she looked like she had a bloated stomach.

“Well, then quit whining, you’re having the best meal of your life.”

“But it’s such a boring meal! I was hoping for more dinner and a show, not dinner and a slowly drudging in what we think is the right direction.”

The accusation of being led in the wrong direction irked Nyota more than she was willing to let on, but some annoyance still seeped into her voice. “It’s about 10 AM right now, that means the sun is still in the East, so as long as we keep it at our backs we’ll be going West, a.k.a. towards the Capital.” After saying it out loud, Nyota came to a realization, and amended, “But we’ll have to take a break around noon when the sun’s overhead. Then an hour later we’ll start heading towards the sun.” She turned her head back to the plant as she kept walking. “Believe it or not, I do know what I’m doing.” Mostly. She still didn’t really know what to do when she got to the city, short of a miles long search by a single zebra and a plant that can’t split up.

“Well then how about we take that break over there? I think I see shade.” April pointed a vine ahead of them. “I mean, I like the sun and all, but I’ve had about enough photosynthesis for the day.”

“Huh?” Nyota turned her head back forward and looked where April indicated. The dust in the air combined with the blazing sun made it nearly impossible to make out, but sure enough, there was some sort of big black blob far in the distance. She figured it was worth a look at least. “Okay, sure. It’s a little earlier than I hoped, but we need to take a break eventually.”

April stopped. “Woah!” she gasped. “I’m actually traveling with someone who will take into consideration where I want to go!” She stood silent in shock, then continued trotting with a bit happier of a demeanor. “This is so weird, but so very much better.”

After ten minutes of walking Nyota still couldn’t tell what the big black mass was. Another ten minutes later and she could tell that it was much larger than she thought, taller than a hut, smaller than a house. Another ten and they were standing in front of it.

It was huge, about 40 feet long and 10 feet tall. To Nyota it looked like a giant black metal box, with a curved roof on top and a giant plow on what she presumed was the front. Despite looking like it weighed more than the entire residence of the cave and half the cave itself, she could make out giant iron wheels on the bottom, each dug into the dirt two or three inches deep. The upper half of the wheels, along with almost the entire rest of the vehicle, were plated with solid steel, its black paint slowly but surely getting scraped off by the sandstorm to reveal the metallic center. The only places free of armor were the viewport in the front and the windows on either side of the back, all of which were heavily tinted black, so much so that Nyota didn’t even know they were glass until she went up and touched it. She dragged her hoof around the entire thing, feeling the texture of the metal. She felt all the dents from bullets bouncing off, the rough of paint being worn off by the sandstorm, bumps from pieces of metal being welded together. She could tell that it had been through a lot since the end of the war, but whoever owned it had put love and care into keeping it up and running, possibly out of survival, possibly out of wanting to keep the past alive. She was hoping to meet this zebra, and dangerously curious about what this thing was.

April, however, was not. “Oh, another one of these things.”

Nyota’s head snapped back from peering into the dark window. “What? You know what this is?” she blurted, eager to solve the mystery.

“Not really, I’ve just seen one before. One of the camps we murderified had one of these rusting away in the back, it wasn’t all black but it was the same machine.The logo on the side was from some company called ‘Skyline Steamer Locomotives.’ It’s kind of like a carriage, but a lot bigger and stronger, and it doesn’t need to be pulled, only steered. I poked around inside to see if it had some horn or something that I could freak everyone out with, but the whole thing was out of power. I could never get it running, but I did get it moving.”

Nyota had turned her attention back to the side of the steam engine. “Well, I don’t think it matters anyway,” Nyota sighed. “I can’t find a door anywhere on it, just big metal plates.” While she could probably break through the window with enough time, she had no intention of breaking such a magnificent machine.

“No problem, just pull that little doohickey right there,” April mentioned.

“What?” Nyota trotted back over to the back. There was another black metal plate covering the back, but it was small enough that she could make out some of the undercarriage and a few connecting axles. On the corner jutted out a large lever with a stiff rubber handle. “So what, this’ll open a door or something?”

“I said I got the last one moving, I can get this one moving, too,” April replied.

“Well alrighty then.” Nyota clutched the handle with her right hoof and pulled, but to no avail. She put both hooves on it and pulled it down with all her weight. It slowly started moving downward, and Nyota could hear some gears moving into place further in the machine. Then all at once the lever slammed to the ground.

“Uh oh.” Nyota gulped.

The whole thing started creaking, and Nyota noticed that the wheels had started turning ever so slowly. It was lurching forward, wheels digging into the dirt as it moved.

“April, what did you do!” Nyota demanded.

“What? I said I could get it moving!” she tried to say while holding back a giggle. “I just didn’t say that we would be outside when I did it.” She snorted and then broke out into a full on laughing fit.

“April, this is serious!” Nyota scolded. She was walking right behind the train, trying to put the poorly-labelled parking brake back the way it was, but it was just as stubborn going up as down, and there was no way to get enough leverage to move it again while the machine was inching downhill. “We could have used this thing! You know how much faster we could have gotten to the city if we could ride in one of these?”

April pulled herself up after rolling on the floor and trotted over to Nyota, now beside the steamer looking through the windshield. Only then did her laughing die down to just a chuckle as she wiped away imaginary tears in her non-existent eyes. “Oh, come on, it’s still ours! I mean, it’s not going anywhe-” she snorted at her own poor choice of words “Well, it is going somewhere, but we can still use it. It’s heading the wrong direction, yeah, but we can have some fun riding on top of it anyway until it gets to the bottom of a hill and we try opening it up all over again.”

Nyota scoffed at April and went from a trot to a canter as the steamer started picking up speed. She turned to her and asked, “Yeah, but what if it runs into something? Or what if-” she cut her sentence short. The machine stopped screeching long enough for her to hear something out in the storm. “Hey, do you hear that?” she whispered.

“Huh?” April finally stopped chortling and listened to the wind. “Hey, yeah... It kind of sounds like...” she shaped her vines into a comically large set of ears. “Yeah, like a voice. Ooh, and he sounds like a very, very angry voice.”

“What?” Nyota listened harder, drowning out the sound of the steamer, and she could tell it was a voice, but not any of April’s details. However, she could hear where it was coming from: the other side of the Steamer.

Nyota ran up in front of the Steamer and poked her head around the corner. Barrelling at them and the steamer was a blurred figure of black and white. And it was swearing.

“Shit motherfucker ass tits cunt cock motherfucker shit ass tits motherfucker shit fuckity fuck fuckity fuck fuckity fuck fuck fuck FUCK FUCK FUCK!” the stallion shouted.

“Such a colorful vocabulary for such a monochromatic creature,” April muttered, keeping quiet to try and go unnoticed.

As he got closer, Nyota noticed that April wasn’t just making a joke about him being a zebra. Once the sand stopped obscuring him, she noticed that he wasn’t black and white; he was black and silver. Specifically, his entire body and armor was solid black as well, but with metallic elements showing around his joints. He also had a pair of metal welding goggles with a black visor, and a giant iron and brass machine on his back. Nyota had never seen neither the giant device on his back, nor a zebra whose coat was entirely black and free of stripes. Was this what a pony looked like?

He got about ten feet away from the steamer before planting his hooves on the ground and gritting his teeth“Okay, WHERE are the FUCKTARDS that DID THIS?” he hollered.

“Right over here!” April had jumped up from behind the front of the machine and waved a hoof at the foul-mouthed black stallion. Nyota was so busy watching him that she did a double take when April jumped out. She reached out a hoof to pull her back, but by then the stallion had already started revving up the machine on his back.

A flurry of metal flew past the windshield of the steamer and ripped apart April’s waving hoof as Nyota pulled the rest of her back behind the steamer, now moving at nearly a gallop.

“What the hell April!” Nyota screamed. “You don’t just pop up and wave to a guy who just called you a ‘fucktard’ and has a giant killing machine on his back!” She groaned at her ignorance, then took a look at her foreleg. “Are you okay?”

“Yeah, all good,” the plant responded as if she had not just lost a limb. “Got more than enough vines in me to replace a limb every once in awhile.” She showed off her newly reassembled hoof and gave a toothless grin. “So, are we gonna kill him now or what?” she inquired.

“What? No!” Nyota answered. She carefully galloped up in front of the steamer and peaked around it. The stallion was having trouble keeping up with the steamer while carrying the weapon on his back, which Nyota figured had to be stationary to fire, otherwise he wouldn’t have planted himself so firmly before. That would be something they could exploit in a fight, but this time Nyota was not going to kill someone so thoughtlessly. “April, this guy just wants his... train-thingy back. For all he knows we’re trying to steal it, which we pretty much were, so he has every right to shoot at us. Not that I’m going to let him.” Nyota felt a pit in her stomach realizing that she actually sided with the person shooting at her friend. “And I thought you hated killing,” she recalled.

“Yeah, but he shot me, remember?” the plant reminded her. “And he probably has the keys on him, you know. All we have to do is loot the corpse and we’ll have our own free ride.” She put her leafy hoof around and lifted her other to the sky, somehow galloping on two legs. “Think about it! We could have out own traveling circus! Or sell ice cream out the window,” she suggested. She ran in front of her to look her in the eyes as she grabbed her head with both forelegs, now walking on two legs backwards. “Think about it Nyota,” she whispered, “Ice cream...”

“No April, no ice cream!” she hissed back. “We haven’t really done anything bad yet, just released a parking brake. Once this thing rolls to a stop, we’ll just-”

SLAM!

The steamer stopped so suddenly that both April and Nyota were five feet past it when they finally turned. The steamer had run into the only tree visible, which also happened to be the thickest tree Nyota had seen this century. And yet, the steamer easily cracked its base, and the tree now lie on the Savanna floor. The wheels are still spinning, but the front of the steamer is elevated off the ground and sitting on the tree’s stump.

April was shaking her head. “Second tree we’ve seen in two hours, and we run into it.” She turned to Nyota and sighed. “Typical.”

April speaking pulled the shock out of Nyota, who then looked from the tree to the stallion on the other side of the steamer, who could not pull his eyes off the minor wreck in front of him, his mouth agape. Then it closed, then he just looked up into the sky and started spitting out curses.

“GOD DAMNED FUCK SHIT ASS TITS!”

He swung his head back down and looked at Nyota and April, now in the open. “You god damned whores will ass shit ass fuck until you tits ass fuck shit ass.” He was so angry he couldn’t even form real sentences, but Nyota got the full idea of what he was saying.

“What a great command of the language,” April said before joining Nyota in leaping behind the steamer. After a short bit of whirring noises, the former location of the two was peppered with lead.

The barrage stopped momentarily, just so that the stallion could add, “AND THAT DAMN TREE TOO!” The tree was then brutally assaulted, so much so that the tree was starting to roll backwards from the force of the projectiles. Nyota was surprised to see that the tree had no bullet holes in it, but was speckled with shrapnel and scrap metal. Looks like that giant weapon on his back isn’t a gun. At least, not a normal one.

“AAAAAHHHHHH- wait.” The ebony stallion stopped wailing and revved down his gun. “Shit. No, this isn’t going to- damn it!”

Nyota was still hiding behind the steamer trying to keep her heart from beating too fast, but she couldn’t help but be curious why he had stopped shooting. She had hoped to do this peacefully, and she still might. “Excuse me sir!” she shouted over the steamer, trying to sound pleasant and not as scared as she was, “Is there something wrong?”

“No shit there is, my steamer’s front axle has a tree growing under it.” A surprisingly straightforward answer. Perhaps he’s not just a raider.

“We’re sorry about that. Is there something we can do to help?” Nyota offered, trying to extend an olive branch while waving the white flag.

“Okay, there are five reasons I’m not going to kill you right now.” One would be enough, but Nyota wanted to hear them.

“One: you’re hiding behind cover that I’m not willing to blow up and too slow to get around.” Not what she was hoping for, but he’s right.

“Two: you’re more afraid of me than I am of you.” Once again, not what she was hoping for, but entirely true.

“Three: My tribe doesn’t really kill unless it’s a necessity, and you guys have already done your damage.” Now that was a lot more interesting, and was a good sign. Perhaps his entire tribe could be reasoned with.

“Four: I’ve never met a pony before.” What.

“Five: I’m sure as shit not going to be pulling this thing myself.” Now that was what she was expecting. She isn’t going to be getting off scott free for this little incident. It also meant that he didn’t just not want to kill her, he needed her alive. Seems everybody does now

Nyota started slowly inching towards the edge of the steamer. “Okay then,” she shouted. She took a deep, then told him, “I’m coming out, I’ve got nothing in my mouth.” She decided to leave out the fact that she had a weapon operated with hooves.

She crawled around the corner, fully aware that the stallion had his gun aimed at her. As soon as she was clear of the steamer, she laid prone on the ground to show that she had no intention of starting anything.

Now only a few feet from him, she got her first good look at her attacker. His big back-mounted weapon looked nothing like a gun, and more closely resembled a piece of industrial machinery or a bulky household appliance, no moving parts visible from the outside. She could also now see that he wasn’t a pony, just a zebra who’s white stripes were nearly gone. It wasn’t paint, though, it wasn’t wet looking, and it went all the way down to the roots. Even under his hair she could see his skin was dark. Either it was a birth defect, or whatever dye he used was stronger than anything she’d ever seen.

The black stallion started evaluating Nyota. “Leather armor, big sword, elixir mixer, two canteens, and...a...” he paused to lean in and get a closer look out of disbelief “... a flower.” She could feel his disconcerting glare from behind the welding goggles. “Now, bring out the pony.” He nodded towards the steamer.

“Um, okay,” Nyota murmured. She might as well play along. “Uh, April? you can come out now. And don’t try and kill him.”

April joyfully hopped out and stood merrily at Nyota’s side, the former still lying flat on her belly.

“Oh wow,” he gasped. “Solid green pony! Or is it blue? Whatever, it’s cool to finally see one.” He eyed her up and down. “And completely naked of armor, weapons, or equipment. No hair even! My my, you are an interesting one.”

April giggled, her voice now suspiciously more high-pitched than previously, “Tee hee, you know just what to say.”

This zebra’s vision must be as muddled as his coat, and the dark as night welding goggles probably didn’t help. Whatever his vision capabilities, Nyota was not entirely comfortable letting a stallion think he was hitting on something that had a pulse, and even though she was all for letting April have her fun, she was not going to let this zebra realize it on his own and blow her away. “You know that’s not a pony, right?” she informed him.

“What?” He moved up to April and looked at her up close, inspecting the vines. “Wait, are those stripes? But you’re green! Are you- wait, wait.” He flipped up his goggles’ visor and immediately flipped it back down again. “Aw assfucks, it’s just a damn plant. A freakish, pony-colored plant with a zebra body. Though a rather sexy plant body if I do say so myself.” He winked at her with his entire body and whistled a pitch-perfect cat call.

April giggled like a little filly.

Nyota gagged a little. “Okay, how about we stop with the creepy inter-species flirting and get to work fixing that steamer, eh?” she suggested.

April cleared her throat. “Ahem, yes, let’s get to the slave labor!”

All of a sudden, the magic was lost, and the stallion turned to his steamer and started digging around under it. “It’s not slave labor, it will never be slave labor, I hate slave labor, and slave drivers can go get fucked by Ares, Taurus, and both the Ursas,” he grunted from beneath the chassis of the steamer.

April and Nyota withstood the awkward silence as the stallion poked away at the machine. Nyota was constantly being surprised by this stallion. He had values, he had principles, he didn’t attack those who didn’t wrong him, and he was very practical. She could get past the religious differences if need be. Besides, he probably only did it to extend his rather exceedingly used and constantly expanding vocabulary of swearing.

He popped back up and trotted over to the side of the steamer. From a compartment in the machine on his back he pulled out what looked like an iron, but with a multitude of wires and worn away bits of metal. When he placed it near the steamer, it jerked forward and latched itself onto the metal plating. Some moving pieces could be heard from the inside of the cabin, then he just pulled it like a handle and the door swung open. Before stepping inside, he turned to the two mares.

“I’ve got some back up harnesses in here. If I keep the back wheels powered, you two should be able to pull the rest of the weight. Then when we get back to base you guys can go on doing whatever the fuck it was you were doing.” He jumped in the steamer and rummaged around a bit. Nyota could hear him humming to himself, rather happily considering the situation, then watched as he jumped back out and threw the harnesses in front of her. “Hook ‘em up and get moving, I want to get there by tomorrow morning.”

Nyota was not the submissive type, but she was eager to fix a mistake she and her ally made, so she grabbed the harness and started looking for where it attached to the steamer. She also felt that it would be a good idea to get on the positive side of a tribe that is apparently against slavery and murder. The fact that they had seemingly powerful ancient equipment was just icing on the cupcake. Her real hope, though, was that they were large enough and observant enough to have seen the children. Then again, if they were all as blind as this one, she’d be surprised if they could see the sand in the air.

April was putting her harness on, seemingly okay with this manual labor. Nyota suspected it had something to do with the recent flirting. “So where are we going anyway?” April asked. Nyota had a guess, but was interested to know as well.

“Home,” He replied “The Coal Mine.”

Footnote: Level Up.
New Perk: Swift Learner - Take it all in, the good and the bad. +10% experience any time experience is gained.

Co-written by Mr. ShinyObject and Doctor Felix Whooves
Edited by Twilight Sparkle

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 onEquestria Daily

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

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