Fallout: Equestria - Choice Millionaire

“It’s a lovely evening out, radio lovers. Just look at those foreboding clouds… melts a mare’s heart. I’m your host, Untold Song, and I’ve got a lineup of intriguing news.

“Today’s highlight is a surprise visit to Samedan’s Buckner House by the King. That King. So bring out your oldest beer from the vaults, pub owners. Things are about to get mental in the wasteland. Out west, we have reports that Steel Ranger representatives attempted to enter Tascleon, likely on some mission to requisition the town’s batteries. Here’s the best part: the rangers never got into the downtown area. A mob of fanatics, addicts, and hookers chased them out at gunpoint! Here’s to you, you wretched town, for holding your own. We’ll have more news after the break. For now, take it easy with some Sleepy Town Blues…”

A drunken jazz emanated out of my PipBuck. Its relaxed nonchalance as a background tune made an already tedious journey longer. Hours after leaving behind the processing mill, Celestia’s Folly was still a mirage on the horizon. Creed tried to cut the tension with conversation; I tried to forget he found pleasure in stomping ponies’ heads in.

We were crossing an abandoned farm, the soil plowed but never planted. One more victim to the eternal drought, as though it were not bad enough the world had already succumbed to a blanket firestorm. Creed thought aloud, “Some folks think the drought is nature’s retribution for the Great War… long overdue payback to wipe out the equines who started it.”

I looked up at the cloud cover with the suspicion this drought had equine causes as well. I asked, “And do you believe that?”

“No. The drought hasn’t exactly annihilated everyone yet, and it’s gone on for years. If I were nature, I would’ve brought upon a great flood and just sunk this vile wasteland.” Creed chuckled after a pause. Of course, he chose the flood. Pegasi could fly above the water level. “It must have something to do with the climate, considering how messed up it was after the bombs fell. Pockets of civilization have been surviving and maintaining food production even through the first decades, so odds are that ponykind will live through the drought.”

Ponykind would live. That was a certainty, at least. I supposed optimism for those little certainties was healthy for the soul. The only other certainty seemed to be that the wasteland in all its cruelty was constant. This catastrophe of a world was as good as it was going to get. That was why I made my wants simple––job, home, security––because none of them involved fighting the wasteland itself. Well, at some point after I took on the Stable Dweller name, that latter clause no longer applied.

Oh yes, it was thanks to Creed. Speaking of the Dashite, I realized I had gone nearly a minute without responding. He was tossing me glances now and then, patiently waiting for me to return to Earth. I opened my mouth, but the radiomare chipped in first.

“Did you miss me? We’re back with more news from earlier today. Baltimare’s own President Cornwell visited Urk to give a speech at the water treatment plant. I’ll spare you the political rhetoric and summarize the message––‘I hope you’re not still mad at us for screwing you over 64 years ago.’ He should’ve known making the speech on the anniversary of that incident was a bad idea.”

Creed grumbled. Upon his face, a furrowed brow formed.

Untold Song paused in that instance, leaving her soft breath the only sound audible. “Well, it’s not my place to say whether the citizens of Urk have gotten over having to sweep their streets of the swamp infestation, but as food for thought, I will tell you this: Baltimare soldiers had to arrest a couple of troublemakers trying to stash a gator’s egg in the President’s personal vehicle. And now, for something completely different––the Stable Dweller. The mare who slaughtered slavers and earned the respect of the DJ a week back. Remember how the last report said she was dead? Turns out Red Eye’s fan club had been hiding something from us all along! Now she’s come down south to clear up any confusion.”

At that news, Creed’s face lightened up, and the pegasus chuckled. “What a way to come back into the spotlight. And you’ve pulled open the curtains on just what Red Eye was hiding.”

“Fighting the good fight, as the DJ always said, the Stable Dweller teamed up with the Angel of Mason Road to clean house with the Buck Crusaders and rescue the caravan they were holding hostage. On behalf of all the civilized parts of the Southern Wasteland, I welcome you back from the dead, Stable Dweller, with this next song, Big Iron…”

“Word spreads fast,” I whispered. The guitar tune emanating out of the PipBuck was rubbing me the wrong way, and I was hardly five seconds in. It was a well–known fact that no one messed with Red Eye, not unless they wanted contract killers on their tail. I had a feeling the slavers would not hold off on the trigger to distinguish if I was the real thing. The risks of putting up this act were beginning to outweigh the probable returns.

“They were merchants. They’ll get a story from one end of the wasteland to the other as though it were just another commodity,” Creed answered, grinning that pleased grin.

No more than two verses into the song, I had enough. My hoof switched off the radio in a split second. I faked a chuckle when Creed raised an eyebrow. “Country isn’t my kind of music.”

“You wouldn’t be alone in that opinion.”

We traveled parallel to the main road, which would have run straight past Celestia’s Folly to a highway called the Agnes Route. According to the PipBuck map, the Agnes Route ran straight from the north to the deep south, well into Horde territory. Should the higher beings above look favorably upon us, I would not have to travel that road.

Our destination, Celestia’s Folly, rested due west. As the settlement rose on the horizon, the sun set behind it, the glowing clouds making for a stunning backdrop to a silhouetted castle. The city, boasting walls rivaling the stone cage around Fillydelphia, stood wholly above the wasteland, atop a hill.

At this point in nightfall, Creed finally diverted our efforts from marching to finding somewhere to set up camp. I was more than happy to agree. Not exactly because I lacked the endurance––granted I did––but more so because the long silences between us were growing unbearable. He was trying; so was I. That was not enough.

I was very proficient at socializing. In fact, they loved me up north. I was the salespony everyone should know. “Comet Scotia,” all the wastelanders would say, “she’s well–liked.” With loyal contacts in New Appleloosa, Friendship City, Manehattan, and Fillydelphia, I was set for a remarkably comfortable retirement. Then the Talons ruined me, and that stupid colt snitch too––I was digressing, though.

But I could not be blamed for finding it just a little difficult to have a chat with someone like Creed. He was a comic book hero, swooping in to save the day on a total whim. I was still writhing behind his back over the thousand caps I gave up to play along with his heroism. At the same time, he was a textbook psychopath, bathing in the blood of ‘evildoers’ and crushing heads with his hooves. Had no one else noticed the clash of values in that?

No, no. That was fine. I just needed to take a deep breath and hold fast. This was absolutely fine. He was going to get me to Baltimare, and he could dash into any heroics afterwards without me. I just had to keep up the act for a while longer.

Creed diverted our path to the north, having spotted a herd of abandoned carriages. The area around us was scattered with the decayed remains of a forest. The carriages sat upon the asphalt of a parking lot––a rest stop, from the looks of it. He motioned me to a ditch not far off. “I’ll scout from the air and see if there’s anyone who had the same idea as us.” He forwent waiting for my consent and flew up.

Minutes passed, but they could have been hours with how fast daylight slipped away. I watched the sunset and thought I saw a ray or two slip through the clouds… it was just an illusion. No one had seen the sun for centuries. Celestia’s Folly disappeared into the starless night; under the cover of a moonless sky, Creed landed in the ditch.

“We’ll set up a campfire in the center of this parking lot.” I followed his lead out of the ditch and into a graveyard of wartime luxuries. With the PipBuck’s green light, I illuminated the streamlined hulls of sky wagons, splendorous frames of self–propelled carriages, and the symbol upon them all––a wheel with four spokes torn off to resemble a peace insignia. Most vehicles up north sported the same logo, that of a company called Medium Rare Metalworks.

Creed and I had to maneuver through tight openings to get to the center. With the carriages right at my sides, I could see clearly then that the frames were rusty, the windows and wheels broken, and the contents stripped clean of anything valuable. These vehicles were just empty husks. As hollow as the world that created them.

Some individuals felt nostalgia for the Old World––usually the customers who bought junk like paintings and music records. That obsession made no sense to me. Wartime Equestria was, as I have been told, its own variety of hell. It had to have been beyond redeemable for someone to hit a megaspell–sized reset button. Still, the nostalgia created a demand for Old World junk, which suited me just fine, so long as there were caps to be gained.

There was a clearing in the furthest depths of the lot with a diameter no more than three ponies in length. Together, Creed and I made a pyre from the wooden components of the carriages around us. A lighter in Creed’s adept hooves started the flames. True to his word, he took to cooking our dinner, preparing two tins of carrots. Not the preservative–infested variant either––these were fresh carrots, grown from unsullied soil and nurtured by earth pony farmers. Without a hint of dishonesty, these carrots were the best meal I had eaten in years.

I wolfed down my portion within mere minutes, filling my stomach with a kind of warmth and assurance only a luxury meal could provide. It was a fleeting sample of a richer life than I could ever afford; such moments only strengthened my resolve to pursue that life anyway. I would have it all as soon as Creed stopped his generosity streak. We really needed caps.

Speaking of the winged devil. “Stable food must’ve been terribly dull. You devoured those carrots like a feral ghoul.” Creed took a pinch of a carrot between his teeth, tantalizing me with the recent memory of blissful eating. I realized too late that I was practically drooling at the display. He grinned that pleased grin, surely his signature of contentment, derived from my frustration… and from the fear he inspired in raiders, moments before their heads were stomped into glue.

The carrots in my stomach stirred in all the wrong ways. In spite of the rising acid, I laughed and shot back, “All of us in the stables just haven’t had the chance to taste food blessed by the sun.”

“It definitely shows.” Creed kept his eyes upon me, and I could tell he was looking for the telltale signs of a pony wearing a facade. Too bad I had years of experience to back me up. “You earthborne ponies are practically always borderline starving. If only the Enclave knew it could’ve taken over just by airdropping loaves of bread.”

I gave a hearty laugh, but it died seconds later in my throat once I realized Creed was not laughing with me. His grin was gone, replaced by a neutral expression. My tail began to twitch. I had to remind myself which saddlebag contained my stable pistol––it never hurt to have a gun ready when traveling with a suspicious psycho.

We stared one another in the eyes until a sigh from Creed broke the spell. He stated casually, “You don’t trust me.”

I was lacking in perception. Of course he had noticed something was up.

“What? After what we’ve been through in a single day?” I asked. After becoming a plaything for that slaver during one of his ploys and after cutting it close with a grenade during one of his heroic antics, why would I have even a shred of distrust for Creed? That brutal execution he pulled on the Buck Crusaders certainly added to his trustworthy repertoire. “We’re practically fire–forged friends.”

Creed took slow bites of his remaining carrots. If he was aware of the lie, he was a master actor for masking it. Audible gulp. His hooves clapped together, and his smile returned full force. “Of course. And seeing as we’re going to be partners for some time, we should get to know each other more… About that story you said you’d tell?”

The memory popped into mind instantly, just not in a form I could present. There was some tweaking to be done, so for the time being, I simply stared listlessly at him. Creed was a good sport, though, never changing expression in the momentous silence that greeted his question.

“Alright. I’ll start.” The Dashite stretched his forelegs. “This one’s about my old CO, the most experienced pegasus in all the Enclave. Had tons of foresight, while the higher–ups were twiddling with how best to rain hellfire on the Earth. He’d bring me below the clouds when I was just a cadet and show me all the awful things that happen in this wasteland.

“Believe me, I was terrified beyond belief; I wanted to make like Spitfire back to base and hide beneath my bunk. My CO was full of understanding, though––he just held me in place and forced my eyes and ears open to the horror. For weeks after, I puked, cried, and drank ‘til I purged all feeling away. That was when my CO told me something I’d never forget: ‘the world below is filled with evil and corruption. As is our slice of heaven here. But don’t you ever think that either world is beyond redemption. You, the Enclave, the individual wastelander, have a duty to restore it––to show the wasteland that there is such a thing as progress.’ He never told me how I had to restore the wasteland, and the higher–ups certainly didn’t agree with my proposals. So they did the best thing they could for me and banished me as a Dashite. That brings us to now.”

…I was not entirely sure what I had been expecting. Living in the wasteland certainly forced one to grow up fast, but what Creed went through sounded downright brutal. The thought that his story might be standard training for the Enclave military left me feeling a little chilly. Just imagine that: an army of Creed Brooks, angels of the wasteland.

I took a drink from my canteen.

Not many wastelanders knew all that much about the Enclave. All they ever saw was the occasional scout on patrol; in their minds, all the pegasi were the same shadowy soldiers in black bug–suits. Most of the confirmed information had to come from the Dashites––one in Friendship City, another in New Appleloosa––but I suspected they might have exaggerated a few details. The paranoia surrounding the Enclave was more likely than not the byproduct of their biases.

I dismissed the thought of asking Creed for confirmation. It was rather discourteous to probe so much and offer nothing in return. “You seem rather chipper for someone who’s been exiled from home,” I said.

“So do you.”

“Fair point.”

I knew my story by heart. Granted, this variation took a few liberties with the truth. But here was a good tale: “I got my cutie mark in photography, as I told you. Specifically, I gained my mark after taking some photos of a mare named Event Horizon. A pony larger than life, loved by all and gladly capable of returning the feeling. I was surprised the stable could even hold her.”

“Come now, Comet. I can’t be the only landmark to take photos of!” I was not truly making stuff up when I lied. All I said was the truth––bent, exaggerated, cropped, provided a pinch of distortion. That made it easier to sleep at night, when I first started.

“Event Horizon had a policy she strictly abided by for many years… make someone’s day, every day. She made the depressed smile, the grumpy laugh, and the dying––she gave them peace. She was sunshine, if it ever unveiled itself from behind the cloud layer.”

“You don’t have to be sad for long, Comet. If you always move on.” I was taught by the best.

“A few days after I took the photos, Event Horizon killed herself. Stole a gun from the armory, put it to her head, and pulled the trigger. Never an explanation why. I couldn’t understand, and I still think about why she did it. A pony whose purpose in life was to teach others how to find joy… just goes ahead and ruins their day by dying.”

“I think this is the only way…”

“Sure, it’s the best thing. Comet.”

“She lives on, at least, in the photos. She’s with me even if she wanted to leave me. She’ll always be with me,” I said, gesturing to my cutie mark. The delivery on those last lines was definitely too shaky and too affected. An amateur slip–up. I lost control temporarily.

“Do you have the photos with you now?” Creed asked.

I stared into the fire. “No.”

Thankfully, Creed decided then to call it a night. He tossed me a rolled up blanket, colored olive green, over the fire. The blanket felt like it could withstand arctic weather and weighed close to nothing. I considered it some sort of pegasus witchcraft.

He opened and closed his wings a few times. “We should be up at sunrise, tomorrow. We could reach Celestia’s Folly within morning… How does that sound?”

“I can wake myself up.” I shrugged.

Creed laid out his own blanket and assumed a fetal position with his back against the fire. “Good. Sweet dreams, Nova,” he yawned. Facing the fire, I rested with a clear line of sight on the Dashite. Within minutes, the only motions coming out of him were his steady breathing and some twitching in his wings.

The stable pistol in my hooves reflected the dancing flames from the campfire. It was unbelievable how polished and maintained the firearm remained; it brought ease to know I had a reliable weapon at hand, other than the shovel. As I played with the angles to see how the light lent its brilliance to the design, a realization struck me––I turned the safety on.

Comet Scotia

Current reputation
Southern Wasteland: Liked
Red Eye’s Slavers: Hated
Gawd’s Talons: Hunted
Megacorps: Hated

Perks
Putting on the Mask – You have taken up the identity of “The Stable Dweller.” The Southern Wasteland remains unfazed. Others are more likely to hand you errands… I mean quests.
Names to Run Away From – Creed Brook has a reputation of killing all the scum on the Mason Road. With him as your companion, raider encounters become much less common. Cleansing evil does not require mercy. Slavers and raiders are instantly hostile upon encounter and harder to talk down.