Fallout: Lavender Wastelander

Daniel stared at his front hooves.

His front hooves.

He continued to stare at his hooves until his brain caught up with the fact he was, indeed, without a doubt… a pony.

Spots still speckled his eyes from the flash of light that had opened up inside the tunnel. Despite his slightly blurred vision and rapidly beating heart, Daniel’s found the strength to look at something other than his hooves.

He was in a narrow alley paved with concrete, squished between two brick-and-mortar buildings. A brick wall lay behind him, and ahead, past the tidy trash cans and odd baubles was a cobblestone road. Ponies walked along the sidewalks, thankfully too busy with their noses in the air to look his way.

He was in Equestria!

Daniel attempted to recall everything he could about Equestria from the half-drunken info dump Twilight had given him on their date. It wasn’t much. Just a few place names and that Celestia and Luna were the other Princesses of Equestria.

Thinking quickly, he began forming a plan. He needed to find the Princesses and tell them about Twilight. And if he was here, the same portal that had grabbed him could have grabbed Fluttershy and the raiders.

A chill ran down his spine. If the raiders had been separated from Fluttershy, there was no telling what they would do. A newfound sense of urgency spurred him to redouble taking stock of his situation.

He looked into a nearby window, the curtains drawn, allowing him to stare at his own reflection. His new fur was soft brown, a lighter shade than his neary black tail and goatee, which looked odd on his equine face. He still wore his combat armor and helmet, which had made room for his horn. So he was a unicorn. He still had his Pip-Boy on his left foreleg, while his backpack had turned into saddlebags. He also had all his weapons. His carbine was strapped to his side by some sort of harness, the barrel poking out in front of him like a lance. On his right foreleg was his pistol holster.

“What the hell am I supposed to do with that?” Daniel asked himself as he looked at the strange grip of the pistol. It was sticking out sideways on the weapon. “Bite it and pull the trigger with my tongue?”

He shook his head, casting aside the thought about what other eccentric designs would come about from human-to-pony ergonomic conversions to focus back on the plan. He needed to get moving, but he also needed to stay hidden, or blend in if he could.

But first, he needed to figure out where in Equestria he was. He regarded his Pip-Boy and pawed at the device with his hooves. It was a long shot, but maybe the magic that sent him here had updated his Pip-Boy.

As he flipped through tabs, he didn’t question how he was able to grasp things just in front of his hoof. He was in magical pony land, there were a lot of things he wasn’t questioning.

To his shock, the wide area map showed his location tag as ‘Canterlot Market’.

He was already in Canterlot, the capital of Equestria. That was good. Now it was just a matter of getting to the Princesses without causing a mass panic. He didn’t want to get the boot back to the Wasteland before he could explain everything. He knew where Twilight and Rarity were.

With his location known, Daniel rose to his hooves and made to leave the alley, but stopped as a thought crossed his mind. Equestria was far more civilized than the Wasteland. Ponies didn’t have firearms, and he was about to walk out of a random alley in broad daylight dressed in combat armor and armed to the teeth.

Going over his options, the only one he could think of was ditching his outfit, since he couldn’t fit everything into his bags. It wasn’t the most ideal option, but it was the only one that he considered that would help him blend in. Twilight had said ponies normally walked around naked. Carrying around what he could keep in his saddlebags would have to do.

“Thou art different than most Wastelanders I have seen,” an elegant, almost picturesquely-regal female voice said evenly from behind him. He heard the clop of hooves landing behind him and the swoosh of wing flaps. The tip of a blade pressed into the back of his neck, below the bottom lip of the helmet and above the protection offered by the back of his combat armor. Whoever was behind him had him dead to rights. “What is thine name and occupation? Thou lack the cruel adornments worn by most of thy ilk assaulting the land as of late.”

“M-my name is Daniel Neeson, I was a physician in training until two-and-a-half weeks ago,” Daniel said, his voice hitched slightly. “If you can take me to Princess Celestia or Luna, I can tell them everything I know about Princess Twilight Sparkle.”

He heard a gasp as the blade was withdrawn.

“Thou speakest with Princess Luna,” the female speaker said. Her odd regal accent evened out to a more modern sounding one as she spoke. “I detected a magical burst in this area. Turn around slowly and tell me everything you know.”

Daniel complied, easing around. He was stunned into silence as he laid eyes on the dark blue, nearly black alicorn with a flowing ethereal mane made out of a starry night sky. It was unlike anything he had ever seen. Like blue plasma, it spilled from her dark black metal helmet, trimmed with silver.

He realized she was armored. Her helmet matched the onyx metal armor trimmed with silver moon filigree. The realization of her armor sent his eyes focusing onto the pair of swords levitating at her side. The hilts were painted olive drab like the pre-war military. Both were about the length of a machete which tapered to a sharp point. They each had a single straight blade on the cutting side, while the opposite side of the blade had large serrations running up two-thirds of its length.

To Daniel, the swords felt oddly out of place with all the black and silver she wore.

Princess Luna sheathed both of the blades in large cloth scabbards flanking either side of her as she stared at him with her one good eye. Her other eye was covered in a dark black eyepatch and half of her face was missing fur and deformed with burn scars.

“Y-yes.” Daniel snapped out of his stupor, his voice hitching again as he finally realized her face was heavily scarred. “She’s safe in a place called Rivet City with her friend Rarity. Twilight and I were traveling together while searching for my father and her missing friends. We’ve found Fluttershy as well, and if the portal that grabbed me also grabbed her, she should be here as well.”

“I see,” Princess Luna said with a nod, her horn glowing brightly. “Remain still and allow me to take your weapons. Afterwards, we shall meet my sister at the castle or wait for her there. She was responding to another magical disturbance within the city, and I do not know if we will outpace her return.”

“How often have the lights been bringing people here?” Daniel asked as Princess Luna telekinetically removed his weapons. The lack of weight had him shiver. “Fluttershy and I ran into a human named Ethan who had been turned into a bat-winged pegasus. Discord found him near Ponyville and sent him back.”

“Your knowledge of the names of several missing Equestrians and recent events leads me to believe your story that you know Twilight Sparkle, so I will grant you insight,” Luna replied. She levitated his weapons close together and they all disappeared in a flash of magic. “The arrival of outsiders has been occurring since two-and-a-half weeks ago. It started when a significant portion of the Everfree Forest became more anomalous than usual in a large explosion of magic.”

Princess Luna headed for the street. Daniel followed at her side, ears perked.

“Princess Celestia, my sister, departed to respond to the sudden burst of magic. I remained at the castle to take over the royal duties. I remained there for a few hours until I was nearly assassinated.”

“What happened?” Daniel asked quickly as they turned the corner and into the open. Ponies across the street stopped to stare at them, a few on the same side of the street gasped and ran the opposite direction.

“An invisible machine with the body shape of a pegasus mare attacked me,” Luna said in a near deadpan. “Instead of wings, she had sword arms on her back that plunged into me before I could react. I teleported away after two stabs and raised my shield, but the machine mare struck through with a blast of crimson energy just powerful enough to break my guard, which claimed half of my face. I retaliated by ripping off the swords it had and decapitating the machine with its own weapons.”

“I’ve never seen a robot like that,” Daniel said. “Looks like you made a quick recovery.”

“I have not recovered fully,” Luna said, scowling. Her burned face meant the scowl pulled back far enough to not only show teeth but gums as well. “The portals have grown more erratic and powerful lately, and thus I am needed in my weakened state.”

“So, can you teleport us like you did with my weapons?” Daniel asked.

“No,” Luna said, shaking her head slowly. “Teleporting more than a few small objects is taxing on me. Let us discuss something other than my injuries. The wounds both physical and mental still ache me thusly. Tell me, how are Twilight Sparkle and her friends?”

“Let’s hope the walk is long enough for me to tell you everything,” Daniel said with a dry chuckle. “There is a lot to catch you up on.”

They rounded onto a different street, and Daniel balked. It was like stepping back in time for him. The main thoroughfare lacked any of the destruction and grime he had grown accustomed to back home. Not a burned-out building in sight.

Two long, straight two-laned roads were separated by an extra-wide median filled with grass, park benches, and trees. Flanking the roads were sidewalks in the front of dozens of two-, three-, even a few four-story tall buildings. Hundreds of ponies walked down the sidewalks. Yellow carriages with black and white checker-print accents that were pulled by ponies traversed the roads alongside ponies pulling wagons.

The thoroughfare terminated at a river fed by a waterfall cascading off of a higher spot on the mountain. On the opposite side of the river were large white walls covered with crenellations. Guards in gold and dark silver armor covered the top like the sentries at Megaton.

Further past the fortifications was the biggest series of buildings Daniel had ever seen. The walls of what he guessed was the royal palace were white, gold, and dark purple. The large conical roofs were topped by large steeples crowned with golden suns and silver crescent moons.

A single, wide drawbridge would allow traffic to go from the thoroughfare to the castle grounds. However the drawbridge was raised, and no traffic was allowed past several checkpoints that occupied the wide roads between them and the castle.

Daniel felt Princess Luna’s magic press under his chin and forced him to close his wide-open mouth. She chuckled.

“Breathtaking?” Luna asked softly. “I wish the world you come from could have splendor and extravagance such as the royal castle. From the few non-violent individuals my sister and I have interrogated, the story goes that your world was destroyed by a devastating war.”

“It was,” Daniel replied simply. “But I assume you want to hear more about Twilight and her friends, rather than me gawking over your world.”

“You assume rightly,” Luna replied in turn. She nearly ran into a pony exiting a store. The pony locked eyes with Luna and quickly bowed before she ran away with a small eep of terror. Luna frowned deeply.

“Are ponies afrai–?”

“I said we would not speak of my injuries,” Luna cut him off with a voice that rumbled with thunder. “Tell me about Twilight and her friends… now.”

Daniel frowned. Every pony that they had passed up until then had had similar reactions to Luna.

“I won’t lie to you and say that they’re the ponies you remember,” Daniel said slowly. “Twilight and Fluttershy carry a lot of scars, like you. Twilight lost part of her horn, and is in a leg brace after an explosion put a piece of shrapnel into her right knee. I did the best I could to fix it, but I’m not sure if she’ll ever recover the full use of that leg.”

“Your world is a cruel place,” Luna said bitterly as they approached the first of the checkpoints. It was a large barricade that ran the entire width of the thoroughfare. A guard in blue armor trimmed with dark red, with an equally red plume stood behind the barricade.

There were two things that stuck out to Daniel about the pony. He could look right through her as if they were made of glass. And the pony carried a combat shotgun on their side in a similar harness to the one that had attached the carbine to him.

“Greetings, Princess Luna,” the female guard said, saluting by thumping her chestplate with a hoof.

“And greetings to you as well, Sergeant Thunder Quartz,” Princess Luna replied. “Anything to report?”

“Nothing more than a few curious colts wondering about the strange weapon I have on me,” Thunder Quartz replied. “You southern ponies are absolute kittens.”

“Where are you from?” Daniel asked, his curiosity getting the better of him. He stared at Thunder Quartz, and through her. It was like looking through an empty Nuka~Cola bottle.

“From the Crystal Empire,” Thunder Quartz replied. “Equestria needed some ponies old enough to remember which end of the weapon you used to actually inflict harm on something.”

“What she means, Daniel,” Princess Luna said. “Is that the Crystal Empire disappeared a little over a thousand years ago, and only returned a few years ago. Ponies from that time period have not lived under the millennia of pacifism my sister brought to Equestria.”

This world ran on magic, like the world Grognak inhabited in the comic books. Of course there was some sort of long lost empire out beyond Equestria. At least they seemed like good guys, rather than the villains of a comic book arc.

“Ohhhh,” Thunder Quartz said with a chuckle. “He’s one of those outsiders you’ve been taking the guns from. Thought that armor was strange looking. Since he’s with you, you’re both clear to head on up.”

Thunder Quartz’s horn glowed, and a section of the barricade slid aside.

“So you’re taking our weapons to arm yourselves?” Daniel asked as they passed by Thunder Quartz.

“We are,” Luna said firmly. “We send back as many people as we can, and avoid conflict where possible, but Celestia, Discord, and I can’t be everywhere at once. Some of the bandits from your world have forced the hooves of our subjects, such as a cleaver-swinging maniac that attacked Manehattan. He allegedly screamed he was the real Butcher Pete and was on so many drugs no sleep spell could render him unconscious. Manehattan police ponies had to resort to lethal force for the first time in fifty-eight years. It made headlines all over Equestria. Then more and more bandits started to show up, so we’ve confiscated every weapon we could to protect ourselves from your world.”

Daniel winced.

So much violence and destruction. Why did it have to be raiders making it here? Why not have places like Megaton sending sane people to this world of peace and harmony?

Daniel hummed. “You said earlier that there were a few non-violent people you interrogated. Have there been any people worthy of not being kicked back to the wasteland?”

“A few,” Luna replied. “Though sadly most of those who end up here are raiders or dangerous animals. We do have one stallion from your world helping instruct our people how to safely use guns.”

“Speaking of guns,” Daniel said. “Will I get mine back?”

“We’ll have to see,” Luna said. “Come. We still have a long way to go until we reach the castle. We will discuss things with my sister.”

<>~<>~<>

Daniel had spent the rest of the walk filling Luna in on how Twilight and he had met, how Twilight was doing, and everything he knew about Rarity and Fluttershy.

Princess Luna had many questions when he got to the part where Fluttershy had taken over a raider gang. Questions he didn’t have the answer to. The conversation had died away after that.

They had reached the castle by then and had gone inside. The interior was just as lavish as the outside, with richly ornamented halls tall enough to comfortably allow a pony to fly around. The two of them spent several minutes silently walking down a series of passageways decorated with stained glass windows.

The silence was deafening. Everywhere he had been, there had always been noise. From the hum of Vault 101's generators and lights, to the creaks and groans of his house in Megaton. The sheer silence of the castle had him on edge. He tried to force his thoughts away from the silence by looking at the stained glass windows. Several of them depicted Twilight and her friends battling the villains of this world. One window displayed Discord holding puppet strings over Twilight and her friends. He wondered what it represented, but didn’t ask. He was saving his questions for when Celestia and Luna were in the same room.

They approached a set of massive double doors. Luna finally spoke up once again as she nudged one of them open.

“The throne room is–”

“What the FUCK, Celestia!” someone screamed on the other side of the opening door. Daniel shared a look with Luna.

“That was Twilight!” they both said.

Luna ripped open the door and raced inside. Daniel’s hooves skidded on the tile floor as he too hurried in behind her and nearly slammed into her hindquarters as she came to a sudden stop.

The room beyond was just as wide and grand as the hallways. Daniel spotted Twilight in her vault suit and Pip-Boy right away as she stood with his back to him, just in front of a dais holding two large thrones. One was black and silver, with blue cushions, while the other was white and gold with red cushions.

A large white alicorn in gold armor sat on the latter throne, staring down at Twilight with her mouth agape. Twilight stomped a forehoof.

“You thought that bringing me back was worth making the already unstable portals WORSE!?”

“I had no other choice!” Celestia yelled. Her voice boomed like thunder as she rose from her throne, eyes glowing as her watercolor rainbow mane turned into ethereal fire. “I could not leave you in the land that sends us murderers and rapists!”

“Sister, Twilight, what is going on!?” Luna yelled. Twilight spun around, and Celestia turned her attention to Luna.

“What’s going on,” Twilight snarled, “is that Celestia just explained to me her plan was to disregard repairing the unstable portals so she could pull me back to Equestria with dangerously experimental magic.”

“Starswirl is trying to fix the portal issue,” Celestia yelled. “I had hoped bringing you back could be more beneficial than the harm it caused. You are a master of magic. You could help him fix the portals!”

Twilight spun back around, her leg brace squealing in time with her sudden movements.

“You should have been more patient and let him fix the portals first. My horn is broken, Celestia, doing magic right now causes me extreme pain,” Twilight said with a furious facehoof. “Now Starswirl has more to fix, and I can’t even help him! Not to mention this could cause even more raiders to arrive in Equestria.”

“I-I’m sorry, but ever since Luna was attacked and those bandits from the other realm began to appear, I have feared you shared a worse fate than her! I was only trying to help you! You could have learned the spell I used to retrieve you to rescue your friends. It requires a deep personal connection with who you are trying to retrieve. Deeper than what I share with your close friends.”

Twilight inhaled deeply, and let out a large sigh.

“I appreciate the attempt. It was noble, but it has put Equestria at risk,” Twilight said as she turned to look at Luna. “Even more raiders or the robots that attacked Luna could be in Equestria as we speak. And… wait… Daniel, is that you? How are you here?”

“Hey, Twilight,” Daniel said with a small smile. “How about we all take a few calming breaths and discuss this like civilized people.”

“I concur,” Luna said. “Let us clear our heads and speak our minds without barbed words. Now, sister, start from the beginning. Why did you disregard Starswirl’s advice and use the experimental recall spell?”

“Because,” Celestia said, taking a deep, slow breath. “Twilight is far more skilled in magic than myself. Having her and Starswirl working together rather than in separate realms could have quickly resolved the issue with the portals, negating any harm bringing her back caused. It was a calculated risk that did not pay off, and I apologize for it.”

“Now, Twilight,” Luna said, gesturing to her.

“I forgive you,” Twilight said as she turned to Celestia. “The plan may have worked if my horn wasn’t broken… but I can’t stay here as my horn heals. I want to return to the other world and find the rest of my friends.” She turned to Daniel. “As for one of my friends, please tell me Fluttershy is here. I assume the lights the raiders were reporting in the tunnels were portals? Did she follow you into one?”

“The lights are portals,” Daniel said with a nod. “And I’m not sure. The portal sprang open right on top of me. If the portal snatched us all up, that would mean Fluttershy’s raider gang might be here as well.”

“Her WHAT!?” Celestia and Twilight both shouted.