Fallout: Lavender Wastelander

Deathclaw Joe smiled as he sniffed the largest bushel of flowers on the top shelf of the display stand.

He had only seen roses in old pictures, but Equestria gave him the chance to smell them, and their scent was nearly indescribable. The best that he could think of was that they smelled… nice. Maybe sweet? Like the scent of a freshly bitten apple or mutfruit. But… better, somehow.

Deathclaw Joe needed to share the experience with Lisa and Samantha. Silver would love them too.

“Do you take bottle caps?” Deathclaw Joe asked the trembling pale-yellow woman—mare, he needed to get the lingo right—behind the stand. Her green eyes were pinpricks, carefully watching his every move.

“F-free,” she managed to stutter through chattering teeth.

Deathclaw Joe’s smile faded. If the mare kept shaking, she’d rattle herself apart, but at least she was talking. It was better than most. Even with Princess Twilight—and then Princess Celestia—as his chaperone, the slamming of doors preceded him as panicked mothers pulled their children inside.

He didn’t blame them, he could have stepped on the children if he wasn’t careful. His height was even more pronounced after the transition to Equestria, and he was taller than his first visit now that he was an alicorn. He glanced towards Princess Celestia, who was busy beside him sniffing her own bushel of roses.

He had an inch or two over Princess Celestia now, yet he had barely met Princess Luna’s eye level during their battle.

Deathclaw Joe watched Princess Celestia spot the trembling flower mare, and her face scrunched with puzzlement before she looked back to him and her expression clarified with understanding. She sighed and draped a wing across his back. The brush of the delicate feathers across his scars sent his head rushing to the clouds. Something about being around other alicorns was just…

He clenched his teeth and yanked his thoughts back on track. He needed to stay focused. The kingdoms hadn’t unified yet; he would not allow himself to screw up when he was so close to securing everyone’s safety.

Self-discipline and a sharp mind were his best weapons.

“Roseluck, he’s not here to hurt you,” Princess Celestia said to the flower mare in a soothing, matronly tone. The same tone Samantha used when introducing Silver to someone unfamiliar. “He’s a friend of mine. We’ll pay what everyone else pays.”

“O-okay,” Roseluck said, her voice still shaky. Deathclaw Joe wanted to try and help calm her down.

“These, flowers, are… nice.” Deathclaw Joe said in his best paternal voice, attempting to match the soft reassurance of Princess Celestia. He chewed his tongue with every word. He could spit rhyming lines in the heat of battle, or wax poetic at a table full of corpses. But comforting a stranger… he was more suited to hitting things. Princess Celestia patted him on the back for the effort.

“Thank you,” Roseluck said, a small smile creeping out. She bowed to both Princess Celestia and him, before asking in a surprisingly more confident tone, “So, if roses are a sign of love, and you’re both alicorns doing some rose shopping… Does this mean that you two are together?”

“Considering it,” Princess Celestia said. Her smirk was delectably devious, leaving no question for the mare, who shot upright with a bright smile at the insinuation. “The Deathclaw King and I were on our way to Twilight’s castle to talk about royal business when I saw your wonderful roses. Such a beautiful bounty is worthy of a once-in-a-lifetime event.” Princess Celestia leaned in close, whispering conspiratorially. “Don’t tell anypony, but could you hold enough for a bridal bouquet?”

Roseluck threw a foreleg to her head and collapsed backwards in a swoon.

“What did I just watch?” Deathclaw Joe asked as he and Princess Celestia both turned back onto the main road through Ponyville. Their destination—Twilight’s castle—was impossible to miss. He had seen the crystalline tree all the way from Canterlot during his first Equestrian visit. The scale of the structure now that he was in Ponyville…

“A seed being planted,” Princess Celestia said, interrupting his thoughts with a jester’s smile. “Roseluck will tell her friends, and then they will tell their friends. Letting the rumor spread will prepare my subjects for the announcement.” The smile slowly faded as she glanced towards the horizon. “They don’t need any more unexpected surprises.”

Canterlot’s crater glowed like a jade bonfire on the mountainside.

“Electrum never said what the death toll was,” Deathclaw Joe said. He knew it was the wrong subject to bring up, but grim curiosity had taken the wheel. “Do you have estimates?”

Celestia dropping her gaze to the dirt sent Deathclaw Joe screaming internally at himself for his idiocy. It was his turn to drape her with a wing. The movement was automatic, as if some instinct compelled him to comfort her. He had reflexively done the same when he had rescued Twilight from her attacker.

“Two-thousand-and-thirty-nine in Canterlot, with three times as many injuries,” Princess Celestia replied, her voice low. “Most of the fatalities were military personnel. Cloudsdale, though…” She shook her head and pressed herself into him. “They tallied up the survivors and subtracted it from the last census. It’s not accurate since Cloudsdale was a tourist and trade destination, but it's the best we have.”

Princess Celestia shuddered.

“Forty-nine-thousand and counting as ponies succumb to radiation poisoning. We haven’t had the time to manufacture enough rad-away for a nuclear attack.”

Deathclaw Joe ground his teeth.

So much pointless death dealt to those that didn’t deserve it. He doubted that there were anywhere close to fifty-thousand people in the Capital Wasteland. It would take his kingdom dozens of generations to even think about approaching that number.

“When I heard the news, I became bellicose,” Deathclaw Joe said. He wished he still had his fists to clench. He settled on flexing the wing not holding Celestia. The pride of teaching Princess Twilight a combat spell had only slightly soothed his cold rage. “Your world is beautiful. It should not become as ugly as I am.”

“Would an ugly stallion have two wives?” Princess Celestia tittered, some of her cheer resurging. He knew she wanted to change the subject, so he obliged.

“Only two? I thought it was soon to be three?” Deathclaw Joe asked, curling his lips with a grin. His rash suggestion of uniting the kingdoms had worked out in his favor. But what was Princess Celestia getting out of him?

He pushed the thought aside as he bumped his loincloth-clad rump into Princess Celestia’s bare flank. He had so much mass over her that it was like a wrecking ball hitting a garden fence.

“Careful!” Princess Celestia yelped while stumbling. She recovered quickly with a wing flap to keep herself from falling over, then quickly laughed it off. “My word, if you can hit me that hard with your hips going that direction…”

Deathclaw Joe reminded himself that he didn’t have a soft palm to slap against his forehead as he beamed himself with his own hoof.

“Owwww, please don’t be another Lisa,” Deathclaw Joe groaned through a grin, massaging the goose-egg that he planted between his brows. He was probably Equestria’s first two-horned unicorn.

“Should have done your research on me before stepping your hoof into a marriage deal,” Princess Celestia said with a grin. She spread her wings and took flight, turning around once her hooves had passed his head height. She motioned with a hoof for him to follow her.

“And you’ve done research on me?” Deathclaw Joe asked, thumping his chest with a hoof.

It was a silly question. Of course she had. Every raider that had been banished back to Earth had said the same thing. Celestia, Luna, or Discord had interrogated them with truth spells making them admit everything. And the children sent back didn’t need to be interrogated to admit everything to the ‘nice fuzzy people’.

“From the look on your face, I think you figured it out.” Princess Celestia punctuated herself with a wink. “You’ve certainly cleared a lot of filing cabinet space with your feast. We had information on nearly every raider gang in the metro tunnels, and out of the lot, only you and possibly three others were worth negotiating with. I should thank you for saving the Equestrian lives that would have been spent taking those tunnels.”

Deathclaw Joe didn’t know if he should have been impressed or afraid. She didn’t need muscles to flex. She had power and a sharp mind, and centuries of wisdom to draw from. She also had far more land and military power than he did.

“If you interrogated the raiders you captured, you know my holdings are a fraction of a fraction compared to Equestria,” Deathclaw Joe said. He tapped his chin with a hoof. “I must have something of immeasurable value if you’re agreeing to become equals through marriage.”

And not simply send in her army.

“You are as cunning as the raiders said you were,” Princess Celestia said with an approving nod. “What you hold is a fortress in the human world. An arterial network of chokepoints and easily fortified concrete bunkers with rail lines running between them. A place where—when we develop the technology to make our own portals—Equestrian soldiers can fortify and sally forth from.”

Deathclaw Joe bellowed with laughter.

“That’s why I never had us move out of those tunnels,” he said. The metro stations were the castles of his feudal lords. “I saved your army attrition from taking the tunnels, and by agreeing to marry me those tunnels become yours for occupation without having to take it by force from the rest of us.”

Celestia nodded and waved her hoof again.

Deathclaw Joe’s mirth quickly drained as he shook his head.

“I can’t fly.”

“Oh, I can help teach you right now,” Princess Celstia said genuinely. She landed softly and spread her wings. “Hold your wings out like this.”

Deathclaw Joe shook his head.

“No, I mean, I literally can’t fly,” Deathclaw Joe said as he spread his wings. He flapped them, and rose off the ground, but he lost too much height by the time he had his wings back into position for another flap. He forced a few more flaps, but groaned as if someone were pressing a red-hot piece of steel between his wings.

“Oh,” Celestia gasped. She closed the gap between them to study his scars with a pained expression of genuine concern. “The whip scars on your back…”

“Sadly, my alicorn ascension didn’t come with free muscle damage removal,” Deathclaw Joe grumped. “The only thing my wings are good for is a speed boost to charge towards someone.”

Like a certain pink-haired woman. He needed to apologize to Fluttershy… for a lot. She was part of his gang, and he had betrayed her trust just as much as the raiders he had killed.

“I’d like to apologize for assuming you could fly,” Princess Celestia said genuinely.

“No offense taken,” Deathclaw Joe said with a nod. He had kept his alicorn transformation a secret for as long as he could, even from his own people. Celestia had no way of knowing his wings only partially worked.

Celestia smiled, and her horn glowed gold in time with a small bead almost entirely hidden inside of her right ear.

“Detail, I’m going to have to teleport back to base,” she said in a professional, near monotone voice. “I’ll pick up the second detail at the castle. Take lunch.”

Deathclaw Joe looked around for anyone. Who had she been talking to? Bodyguards?

“You won’t see them,” Princess Celestia said as her horn glowed soft gold once more. “They’re extremely good at their jobs.”

For a moment the world flashed gold. When Deathclaw Joe’s eyes cleared, the two of them were standing together on a balcony made of purple crystal overlooking the main road through town.

A hoarse, older female voice croaked behind him. “You might want to move.”

Deathclaw Joe turned around and came face-to-barrel with a sniper rifle. A gryphon with a head full of gray feathers and wrinkles around her beak lay atop a mattress on a table, perched in a way to have a clear line of sight down the main route through town.

“I think I do,” Deathclaw Joe said as he sidestepped out of the way of the large silencer on the gryphon’s bolt action rifle.

She smirked as she reached into a saddle bag and pulled out a pack of cigarettes.

“Also avoid making any more magical swords around the princesses,” the old gryphon woman said as she stuck a cigarette in her mouth. She had a plastic bracelet around her wrist. The black lettering was bold enough against the white plastic for Deathclaw Joe to read it. Canterlot General Hospital, Blackhawk, G. “I was close to giving your brain a vent hole.”

Deathclaw Joe chuckled sheepishly. Summoning a weapon around one of the royal leaders of Equestria hadn’t been his best idea. Especially since he was known to have already fought one of them in semi-self-defense. His conflict resolution typically didn’t involve deescalation, so the fight had been at least halfway his fault.

“I’ll keep that in mind,” Deathclaw Joe said as Princess Celestia approached the old gryphon’s side and politely bowed.

“Anything to report?” Princess Celestia asked.

“Besides having the broadside of a barn pull a weapon on you, no,” Blackhawk said, smirking again at Deathclaw Joe. She lit the cigarette and burned most of the stick in one drag.

“Very well,” Princess Celestia said. “Go take some leave time.”

The gryphon bowed with a smile before she started collecting her things.

Princess Celestia turned away from the gryphon and slowly walked towards the balcony’s double doors. Deathclaw Joe followed behind.

His eyes wandered from her disheveled mane, down her back, and to her long tail.

He didn’t know if she did it by accident, but it raised just enough to glimpse a peek of what lay underneath, teasing him.

“So,” Deathclaw Joe said to help distract himself from staring. “How old are you?”

“The question should have been how young,” Princess Celestia said as she cracked open the balcony doors. She left only enough space to allow her thinner frame to slip through. She looked over her shoulder with an impish grin. “And it’s young enough to outrun you… catch me if you can.”

She flashed him with a full tail raise and flicked the tip of his nose with the end strands of her tail.

Deathclaw Joe nearly passed out from the headrush. He pushed through it in time to catch the doors slamming closed.

“Well, that just isn’t fair,” Deathclaw Joe chuckled as he limbered up for the chase.

He was going to catch her, and when he did, it was going to be a night they both wouldn’t forget.

<>~<>~<>

Daniel knew from Twilight’s twisting facial expression and false starts what the answer was going to be.

“I…” Twilight finally said, her voice thin. Tears welled up in her eyes. “I'm so sorry I never told you before now. It’s just that there's been so much going on, a-and I don't like to think about how I'm going to outlive all of my friends."

The tears escaped, cutting lines through the grime accumulated on her fur.

Daniel’s jaw worked itself over as he stood there, half dazed. He’d known it was a possibility that she was immortal, she had told him about Princess Celestia and Princess Luna’s long lives, but to have it confirmed was like getting the results back from a lab test saying that a disease was terminal.

Expected, but still unwelcome. The weight of the unknown had been taken off his shoulders, only for the answer to replace that weight.

Twilight would stay young forever while he grew old and feeble, then died. Immortality was a blessing and a curse. Maybe that was why alicorns were so attracted to one another. Mortal partners would fade away, but being among kindred spirits would last forever.

He had two options. Allow himself to despair that Twilight would eventually lose him and be alone, or accept it and do something about it.

"Hey, Twilight," Daniel said softly, cupping her chin with his hoof as his horn glowed. “I’m not mad that you didn’t tell me earlier. But now that I know, I think I really need to give you your gift.”

Daniel had wanted to get her something earlier, but the portal dragging him to Equestria had ensured that things were too crazy to focus on something like a gift. And until the Knock, he hadn’t separated from Twilight long enough to get anything.

Daniel stepped back as he levitated the teddy bear he had bought between him and Twilight. Rarity had restored the bear and made additions. It was dressed in a pair of glasses and a white lab coat with a blue and yellow cloth mock-up of a vault suit underneath. Sewn to one of its paws was a tiny book Rarity had made for the bear, while in the other paw was a gray cylindrical piece of cloth that was supposed to resemble a test tube, but Daniel thought it looked more like a snake.

“I-it’s perfect!” Twilight stuttered. Daniel’s heart skipped a beat as her eyes lit up with pure joy. She wrapped it in her own telekinesis and pulled it gently to hug against her breastplate. She held it close with her forelegs as she collapsed onto her haunches. “I love the little accessories.”

“I have no idea where Rarity found enough cloth to make them,” Daniel said, grinning ear to ear. “I know sometimes we don’t have the best communication, but I wanted to get you something that showed how much I love you. He’s a little friend for you so you’ll never have to sleep alone again, and he loves science and storytime just as much as you do.”

Twilight threw her forelegs around his neck, pulling him into a crushing hug that included the bear between them.

“That’s so sweet and considerate,” Twilight said, her voice overflowing with joy. Daniel’s heart fluttered hearing her so happy. She gave him a short kiss on the lips before she added, “Thank you.”

A touch of pride mixed in with his happiness having it confirmed that he had paid attention enough to know what to get her. It helped soothe some of his worries on how inexperienced he was, and how rocky their relationship could be at times.

“You’re welcome, Twi,” Daniel said. He loved Twilight so much, even after only a few days of really knowing her. “I couldn’t have done it without Rarity. She worked tirelessly trying to match every little detail I wanted to add. I’m glad you like it.”

“I really do,” Twilight said, kissing the bear—then him again—before she gently slipped the bear into her saddlebags. “That brightened my day.”

Daniel smirked, laying on his best impression of what he thought suave sounded like.

“Not bright enough that we’re skipping on sharing a bathtub and pillow together, eh?”

“Definitely,” Twilight said as she playfully smacked him in the shoulder. Her horn glowed with magic… then fizzled out.

Daniel’s heart rate jumped. “You okay?”

“Yeah,” Twilight said, scratching her mane with a hoof. “They must be blocking teleportation or something to the castle.”

“We are,” a stallion said, sending Daniel wheeling to face a concrete gray unicorn stallion in a black well-tailored suit. His black mane was short and slicked back with gel.

The air shimmered and flickered before a second stallion appeared beside him. It reminded Daniel of a stealth-boy wearing off. He aimed his carbine at the first stallion.

“Who are you?” Daniel asked with a growl. The pair had been invisible during their whole conversation, listening in to their private moment. The hairs on the back of his neck stood on-end as the sensation of being watched without his permission violated his thoughts.

“Equestrian Strategic Surveillance,” Twilight answered for the stallions in an angry snarl. “If I remember my government departments correctly, you people had most of your funding cut until the changeling invasion.”

“That’s correct,” the first stallion said. “But recent circumstances have seen a need to increase our funding and change our priorities. Now we’re running security.”

“What does the ESS normally do?” Daniel asked.

“Mostly spy on Equestria’s citizens without their knowledge or consent,” Twilight growled.

“In Celestia we trust,” the second stallion said through a smirk. “All others are under observation.”

“Spies, huh?” Daniel asked. “That explains your invisibility spells.”

“More or less,” the first stallion said, shrugging.

“So, are you two being vague and threatening for a reason?” Daniel asked. “My wife and I were having a moment, and you’re ruining it.”

“Yeah,” Twilight said beside him. “Get to the point or leave me and my husband alone.”

The stallion stepped back, his tone shifting instantly as he bowed.

“Oh, I’m so sorry, Princess Twilight, we were not informed that you and Daniel Neeson had married,” the stallion shifted to bow in front of him. “A million apologies, Prince Neeson. We will inform the guards that you are on the entry list and additionally may keep your weapons on government property.”

“W-what?” Daniel spluttered. “Prince?”

“Something else I didn’t tell you about,” Twilight said. She looked away, blushing for a moment before she glared at the ESS stallions. “Now, is there anything else you two spooks are here to talk to us about? ”

“Yes,” the second stallion said. “Princess Celestia is not responding to comms, and Princess Luna is busy calming the dreams of Equestrians after the loss of Cloudsdale and Canterlot. We need a royal to await the arrival of Princess Cadance.”

“Why is she coming here!?” Twilight yelped, flailing her wings. “Equestria is dangerous right now.”

Daniel nodded in agreement.

“Because we’re sending refugees from Canterlot and Cloudsdale to temporarily live in the Crystal Empire,” the ESS agent said. “Princess Cadance wished to personally reassure them that they would be safe, happy, and comfortable in her land. The ESS is working closely with the royal guards to ensure that nothing will endanger the princesses.”

Daniel frowned. Knowing Equestria’s recent streak of bad luck, there would be something that would endanger the princesses.

It was just a matter of waiting and seeing.

<>~<>~<>

Private Gold Medal yawned as he leaned back in his chair, lazily turning the page of the book he was in the middle of reading instead of watching the road.

The checkpoint was, in theory, on high alert. However, Canterlot and Cloudsdale had been bombed by humans, and tourism to Equestria had cratered since the portals and psychopaths had first appeared. Private Medal was confident the Gryphonia-Equestria border was safe enough without his eyes on the road.

He never understood why there was a road checkpoint since gryphons and pegasi flew through the air checkpoint. But then again, earth ponies and unicorns like himself didn’t have wings.

A bright red flash outside the guard shack ripped Private Medal’s attention away from the book. He peered out of the window, looking for his fellow guard pony.

“Copperhead?” Private Medal called. He squinted, wishing that he was a batpony so he could see clearly in the darkness beyond his little shack. “You good out there?”

There was no response. Channeling magic through his horn, Private Medal sent a globe of light skyward to illuminate the area.

He screamed as a pair of talons reached down from the roof. They grabbed the lip of his helmet and dragged him through the window, carrying him out by his chin-strap to bring him face-to-face with a smiling gryphon, one he recognized from the only ‘no entry permitted’ poster in the checkpoint.

“Hello, my little pony,” Greg Steelbeak growled with sadistic glee as he pressed a gray and black, boxy limbless crossbow to Private Medal’s temple.

“P-p-please!” Private Medal begged and choked as his back hooves flailed in the air. His front were busy fighting with his chin strap as he looked around for any route to escape.

He caught moonlight glittering off a suit of royal guard armor. Ashes were all that remained inside the suit.

Something had disintegrated Copperhead.

“Tsk-tsk-tsk, always no fight in you little ponies,” Greg Steelbeak said, dropping Private Medal. He landed wrong, rolling an ankle.

“OW!” Private Medal screamed.

Six more gryphons landed and surrounded him, all dressed in black armor and carrying weapons, human weapons that Private Medal had only seen in the newspaper.

Private Medal rolled onto his back, staring up at the half-dozen hook-beaked predatory birds surrounding him. Steelbeak launched himself off the roof of the guard shack, hovering above the circle.

“He doesn’t want me to kill him,” Steelbeak said with a sigh of feigned annoyance. “I guess killing him is up to you boys. Claws only, and spare the face. I want him to watch Equestria burn before he bleeds out.”