Fallout Equestria: Shadow Guard

Chapter 2

Ponyville meeting

The Sprite bot responds happily, "Yep. It's been a good 200 years since last we saw each other Silent. I believe the last time we saw each other was when you helped disarm that Megaspells the Zebras had snuck into Canterlot while I was with Twilight meeting with Princess Luna."

Silent looks a little sad and asks, "Can you tell me what happened? We just came out of cryo-stasis and currently know very little except the dangers of the Equestria named the wasteland by the ponies around here."

The Sprite bot sounded a little sad as it says, "Well things went bad real fast. Princess Luna and Celestia are both gone along with the mane six. No ruler is currently in charge and most of the main cities are now to destroyed and full of bad magic for any pony to enter. Most of the Steel Ranger groups have gone from their original codes and are killing ponies just for any pre-war technology. Finally is the fact that most of the stables will not even open up and those that have are almost all dead."

Silent kicks the ground hard as he says, "Shit! This is gonna make it even harder for me and the other Shadow Guards to do our job. We're currently heading to Ponyville to meet up with the other Shadow Guard units so as to locate a good Operations Base to move into later on. Do you know any places around that might work for us?"

The Sprite bot sits silently for a minute or so before responding, "I might know one place in particular and I have updated your Pip-buck with the current place and I also helped update your map."

Silent nods and responds, "Thanks, Spike. Where are you by chance? It might be helpful to know if we might be able to help you if you need assistance."

It responds, "Sorry but I can't tell you Silent. I am currently at a place even you don't know about but I can tell you  one thing. You need to keep a close eye out for anything wrong that dealt with Goldenblood. Right before the end of Equestria, Goldenblood found out about you and your groups and sent a coded message out to a few ponies in different Stables. They might have kill orders on you or they might just cause problems along the way."

Silent nods as he replies, "Thanks for the info Spike. You stay safe where ever you are and come by anytime with the Sprite bots to give me any information you find out. It would be good to go out on missions with good Intel since it's almost like we are in the Zebra Empire again."

Spike chuckles a little before replying, "Stay safe Silent. I don't got to many old  friends out here anymore and you being around helps out a lot for my old mind. Also just as an extra warning, be careful near Ponyville because there is a large amount of Raiders in that area setting up there."

Silent nods, as the Sprite bot heads off in a random direction, and turns around to head back to the others that are looking at him curiously.

The first one to ask something was Small who asked, "So...can I kill the Sprite bot now?"

He turns to Small and states, "No. An old friend of mine seems to be able to use them and he can assist us with gathering information. I also got bad news for everypony here. It seems Ponyville ruins are full of raiders and slavers at the moment."

Small grumbles a little bit at having her fun taken away from her.

Bottle looks unhappy at this as he replies, "Well seems the town there is gone so no more trading route there."

Silent replies calmly as he says to Bottle, "Actually no. We are meeting up with some friends of ours there so the raiders will probably be dead by the end of our meeting. Good news is that we have a Base of Operations that I can give you. It seems my old friend had no use for it and sent me a link to its location. I'll mark it on your map for when you want to head on over to our area after this travel is done."

Bottle smiles and says, "Less raiders and a new trade route will get me more business. That's pretty good but I might not always be able to help your group. May I give the information to some other traders who can trade with you?"

Silent nods as he replies, "Sure but we will probably have guidelines about the place and we will need them to give a promise to never tell anypony. After all we are not suppose to exist and if we suddenly are recognized by lots of ponies than we become useless in our tactics."

Silent than turns around and says, "Let's get back on schedule. We still got about two to three hours of light and I know of a military bunker not to far that is probably still useable to rest at."

About thirty quite minutes into the walk towards the old military bunker, Silent Shot decided it would be nice to strike up some sort of conversation to make the walk go by faster.

So he brought up some questions that he had been wondering for a while but never had the time to ask them. “So Bottle, earlier you said not to trust an alicorn, but why?” Silent Shot asked as Bottle looked at him to listen to his question.

“Well, the Alicorns nowadays out in the Wasteland are artificial Alicorns, but being an alicorn means you have the horn and magic of a unicorn, the wings and flight of a Pegasus, and the strength of an earth pony. And along with that they can teleport, read minds, and heal radiation. This makes them very dangerous alone, but even more so because they side with the bad folks around these parts or in some cases I hear that they foalnap ponies. You would be a lucky pony to win, or even escape a fight with them alive since they are probably as powerful as Celestia was.” Bottle finished, making sure to get the point of Alicorns being the devil across. “You have any more questions in need of answering Silent?”

“Actually, for now, I do have one more. Where would be the safest place in this Wasteland to be?” Silent asked his final question for that point in time.

“I would have to automatically say Friendship City. It’s a huge settlement located in the Statue of Friendship off the coast of mainland Manehatten. There you can trade, buy, sell, shelter, and do almost anything. It’s also especially great for hearing news. Most folk that can settle down there to get out of the horrors of the Wastes. It's also one of the safest places actually right near the ruins of a large city.” Bottle answered as he walked alongside Silent.

“Thank you Bottle, it is definitely good to know these things out here in the Wasteland.” He replied, showing Bottle a small smile.

After another hour or so of quite walking, the groups showed up at the old military bunker.

“Alright everyone, we’re finally here. This place should be empty but take caution just in case,” Silent commanded, trotting over to open the big circular steel door that was hidden in the side of a hill.

He brightened the screen on his pip-buck to brighten things up a bit and looked inside, seeing a large deserted room with rubble and a few old supplies around.

“We’ll rest up here for tonight, tomorrow bright and early we will all continue the journey over to Ponyville. The rest of the path there should not be too long but will very much be at least a day’s travel.” Silent informed as he made sure everyone was there and closed the door to the bunker.

After closing the door to the bunker and lightly sealing it by putting the bar down on the door, he turns around and sets his gear down along with everyone else.

Turning to Small, Blood, and Avery he says, "Okay search for any equipment left behind here in the rooming area. Bottle you and your group can check this main room in the lockers. Data come with me to check the vault in the back. If there is anything here that attacks, kill it without thinking."

Small, Blood, and Avery head off as he and Data head towards the vault in the back. Upon arriving he looks at Data and says, "Okay do your thing and get this open. Inside will probably be some stuff that may come in handy later which will include a list of stuff we might look for later if any are still around."

Data nods as he gets to work by taking the outside of the number lock off and begins to wire his pip-buck to it so as to hack inside. While doing this he asks, "Sir, may I ask a question about something?"

"Go ahead, Data. You usually ask the most important questions." states Silent as he waits for Data to finish.

"What exactly are our goals after we fix Equestria, sir? If we fix Equestria and nowhere else...I might just be the only Griffon left." he states as he backs out of the program and enters back again after failing two of his three attempts to enter.

"Well, we will wait for higher orders before we can actually figure that out. I would say that not only ponies need to be saved but if they attack us they aren't friendly." He states as he sips some water from a canteen.

"I wanted to know because I noticed the other ponies looking at me weird like they had never seen my kind before...do you think any of my kind live?" He asks as he backs out again from another problem in hacking.

"Well...it might just be this area that no Griffons are at. No one will know until we either find another Griffon to ask or find a pony who knows. I do know that with what we find here, we may find a clue to where a couple of Stables or bunkers may be that had Griffons inside." Silent replies as he caps his canteen and puts it away.

"Thanks for the reassurance, sir. We're in." he replies as he disconnects his pip-buck from the vault as it begins to unseal.

"Good. This should hold all the information we need for some of the places we will need to go later after our base of operations is made." he replies as he uses his magic to help open the door faster.

They both look inside to see two racks of weapons across both side walls were still full of good conditioned and stocked weapons. Boxes along the sides were full of ammo, grenades, food, water, and many other items for soldiers from back in the day. In the middle was a large contraption holding a shiny and odd looking set of Power Armor with duel Miniguns and what looked like a tank cannon on its back. In the very back was a shelf full of folders with the words Top Secret across them in bright red and an Unhappy looking Pinky Pie with a bubble saying, "You look inside and are not allowed. I will know."

Silent looks at the Power Armor and says out loud, "Well I'll be darned. Applejack actually was able to make it. I never thought she would be able to."

Data looks at Silent and asks, "What is it? I know it's Power Armor but it looks...a lot different than normal ones do."

Silent smiles and says, "This is an experimental armor made by Applejack near the end when we went in. She wanted to make it in hopes of helping the war more but this armor was suppose to be impossible to make with only one Magic core inside. It would practically need a Megaspell to make it work and if it's complete it must have one inside."

Data's eyes go wide as he says, "This is a very deadly weapon and with it being here...it could work for anyone who found it."

Silent shakes his head and says, "Your wrong actually, because this Power Armor is only useable by a certain bloodline because of the protection spells on it. Applejack made this armor for herself so she could go into battle but since it is here...she must be dead as well as her bloodline. I would take it with us but...it would kill any who touch it that isn't the rightful owner. We can scavenge everything else here but we will have to bury this here after we take everything."

Silent sighs before going around the Power Armor rack and heading to the back as he says, "This is our main reason for coming here. There is a list of every Stable and Military Bunker all across Equestria listed here. There is also a list of Megaspells and their last locations before the Megaspells hit. If they are still there along with most of these locations, we can begin to gather not only more troops in case of battle but we can also begin to reconstruct Equestria using the help of these ponies and weapons. I just hope to Celestia that none of these Megaspells have been found by anyone yet or we may be faced with terrible things in the future."

Data walks beside him and says, "Sir, we have faced many things together and I bet one hundred bottle caps and free drinks for a week that we can face these problems with help from some locales without an issue."

Silent smiles and says, "I will hold you to it and you better make sure the drinks are Wild Pegasus if you find them. Those are the only things that I will drink of alcohol and you know it."

Data chuckles and says, "You better be ready to lose then and have enough caps to buy me some cool gadgets then."

Silent says, "Your on sparky."

After their bet was made, Silent and Data gathered up the racks of well-preserved weapons along with the boxes of ammo, grenades, food, and water. And true to Silent’s earlier word, they tore the ground away, dug a huge hole in the ground, and with Silent’s unicorn magic, levitated the dangerous power armor into the hole and filled it back up. Making sure they got everything they did a quick check around the secret stash room and shortly exited, closing the vault like door after them. Data and Silent brought the supplies into the rooming area where the rest of the team was searching around for things left by others who had previously been here. They spotted a small pile and laid out the supplies they found next to it.

“There wasn’t too much here but we did find some healing potions, pain killers, a few boxes of ammo, and a hideous pile of bones. We’re assuming it’s pony,” Avery reported to Silent as she pointed to each supply in the pile and the lump of bones as she spoke.

Shortly after the report, Bottle and his group came back into the rooming area. They brought back with them a pack of alcohol and a few packs of cigarettes.

“There wasn’t too much over there but alcohol and cigarettes are worth some good caps,” Bottle spoke as he entered the room with the items.

“Alright it looks like we found a good amount of materials. Let’s dispatch a fair amount for everyone,” Silent commanded as he started with splitting up the food and water rations, a bit for everyone in both groups.

Next he paired ammo to guns and gave them out with some thought of who would handle which best. Giving the heavier fire arms to Blood, more high tech to Data, the explosive weapons to Small, a quicker stronger gun to Bottle, a melee weapon to himself, and the rest of the pistols and melees to the rest of Bottles group which Bottle thought was only fair, especially since his team didn’t use weapons too often. Lastly he gave each group the split amount of the healing potions, pain killers, alcohol, and cigarettes.

“There we go. Good find everyone, we should be set on supplies for a little while. Or at least until we get to Ponyville which is all we need,” Silent finished up.

With their new materials and supplies, everyone organized their saddle bags and, those who had them, their pip-bucks, and took out a small amount of their food rations to pull them over for the night. In the morning the rooms were checked once more and they headed out, leaving the bunker in a good condition to return to later on if shelter was needed and they were near.

“We should be about 3 to 4 hours out from Ponyville. We’re almost there, keep your heads up.” Silent encouraged.

They walked for a little before the yellow and teal earth pony named Silent Sunset started to frantically look around with absolute fear and terror in her eyes as she continued to walk. After doing this more, Silent Shot noticed and looked at her kind of oddly before walking over to Bottle.

“Hey is Silent Sunset okay? She looks like she’s seen a zebra or a mega spell go off or something,” He softly yet concernedly spoke.

Bottle looked behind him at Silent Sunset who had been looking to her right with horror still plastered onto her face. “Sunset?” Bottle asked concerned. “Sunset what’s wrong?” He continued.

Then he saw Silent Sunset point an extremely shaky hoof slowly in the air, pointing straight ahead of her. Bottle squinted his eyes and tried to see what she was looking at and in the far off distance, he spotted it. Now Bottle was the one with fear on his face. What he saw was the one thing he never wanted to ever lay eyes on here in the Wasteland. In the distance was a rather tall pony with a deadly grin on its face. Its body was a green that was similar to the color of the Wasteland sky, with a long mane of crimson red. The other two features that sent shivers up ponies spines and fear into their hearts, was the fact that this pony… had a pair of Pegasus wings, and a unicorn horn… this pony was an alicorn. The most feared creature of the Wastes.

“Run.” Bottle spoke sternly. “Run! RUN EVERYBODY RUN LIKE TARTARUS!!!” He shouted as he started to run, the rest following him in confusion except for Silent Sunset who knew of the unicorn’s presence as well.

“IT’S AN ALICORN, FOR CELESTIA’S SAKE RUN!!” He shouted one last time as realization hit everyone in the two groups as they sprinted, or for those with wings flew, as hard and fast as they could for Ponyville.

But the alicorn, having a horn, was just able to teleport to catch up with them. At first she teleported right behind them. Taunting them. Like food. Then it teleported next to them. And finally, in front of them. Causing everyone to stop instantly, not wanting to ever cross the path of this horrid creature. The alicorn let out a retched laugh, freezing everyone where they stood. Then in an instant Blood Spray, not thinking before acting, readied his heavy weapons machine gun, and started to rapidly fire at it. Before a single bullet hit the alicorn though, it teleported right behind Blood Spray, causing him to stop in fear. It lifted Blood up in the air with a magic choke hold, and teleported the both of them in front of the groups again.

With its ghastly and multiplied voice, the unicorn spoke, “Tsk tsk tsk. And WE thought you helpless creatures would know better than to try and attack a alicorn goddess like ourself.”

Blood tried to get out of the magical choke hold, but to no avail. So it didn’t kill him, the alicorn released its magic hold on his throat, and held him in magic restraints. Holding his hooves together so he was immobile. Silent got pissed yet afraid to see his team member to be taken and treated like that.

“Let him go you dreadful creature! You are holding one of the few Elite soldiers of Equestria and have no right to do so.” Silent shouted sternly.

This only brought back the Alicorns laughter. “You really thing WE, a goddess and immortal being will listen to the likes of you?!?! Hah, fat chance. You shall learn to listen to us!!”  It shouted as it started to bend Bloods back by pulling his hooves backwards to meet. “Or so help us, your companion will die in an instant!!”

Blood screamed as his back was close to being snapped completely in half. Silent stayed quiet as to not piss off the alicorn again so it wouldn’t hurt his teammate any further.

“Much better,” It spoke again, glaring and smiling savagely at him. “Now, if you will kindly follow me. I must deliver you to a team of my own. Or shall I say, a large group of mine. A huge raider group.” It finished up, teleporting behind the groups and taking out a few extremely efficient and dangerous weapons that it aimed at them. “Now get going!!” It ordered, as everyone started to walk.

As they moved, Silent Shot constantly formulated plans that he kept throwing out of his mind for one reason only. Because it would get Blood Spray and possible others killed, and he couldn’t have that. It didn’t take long to get to the camp of raiders, and when they did, the alicorn teleported in front of them.

She still had Blood Spray in a magic grip and held him up before the group before speaking once more. “You all followed our orders, and we will have a small reward for you.” It darkly finished off.

The magic grip covered Blood’s entire body and it started to pull him apart bit by bit. Silent noticed what was happening as Blood started to scream, and hurriedly went to grab his weapons out to attack when the alicorn it used its magic to hold everyone in place so they had to watch as their teammate and friend was torn apart in front of their eyes, being completely unable to do anything to stop its actions. First blood started to drip down from the sockets of Blood’s arms and lets as in an instant they were ripped completely off all at once, resulting in a harsh loud scream from him.

Blood poured from the places his limbs once were, causing a slow painful death as Blood ironically, slowly lost his own blood. The alicorn kept going though, and in a matter of minutes, his torso was ripped completely in half, breaking his spine in the process which ultimately killed him. Silent Shot and everyone else felt lifeless, empty, and full of guilt as they were forced to watch the massacre of their beloved teammate play out before them.

Silent and the others of his team  scream in anger as their weapons aim towards the Alicorn. The Alicorn seeing enough firepower that could do damage from the high impact magic zebra weapons decided to get out of there and leave the ponies to fight. With a crack of light and smoke, the Alicorn disappeared leaving the raiders to face a very unhappy squad of warrior ponies.

(Perk activated Bitter Sweet)

Silent aims his Sniper rifle, Carbine, and Pistol in his magic at the nearest raiders to him and lets loose a barrage of death. One raider unlucky enough to get hit by the sniper instantly turns to ash by the magic blast as another Diving for cover flies backwards to hit a wall of a burned building from a three round burst from the carbine. Between a group of three raider ponies ducking behind cover, one of them never rises from the 10mm pistol bullet in its head.

Avery  dived from the sky as her wings open up and she flies by at head level letting her swords come from her wings. Ponies unlucky enough not to see her flying towards them don't even realize how they die as their heads fly or fall from the stumps of their cut necks. Those who duck rise up again only to have knives hitting them in the face or heart. One pony screams as they try to take the knives out of their gouged eyes. Blood seeps from them as they stumble around screaming for help from the dead around her.

Small screams in fury as she lets out fire from her muzzle at the raiders next to her. They scream as the ungodly Blue flames seem to not go out even as they roll to try and put them out. The metal of their armor begins to melt into their coat as the flames cook them alive slowly. Those not close enough for the fire, she aims with her grenade launcher and fires off a few rounds. The grenades don't explode but let out a pinkish gas that begins to melt the raiders slowly as they scream trying to get out of the pink death mist. One raider gets out as her legs fall off of her leaving her stuck lying in place until one of her fellow raiders steps on her making her explode into pink mist and gore.

Data growls unhappily as he has dived into a group of raiders with a sledge hammer in claw before activating a rocket on it sending each raider pony flying hard into buildings to the point where they splatter on impact. Data then dives into cover after throwing a metal box out which opens into a turret which opens fire onto raiders behind some cover. The raiders die instantly from the magic bullets that go through the cover like it was butter. Data than fires off a small round device from his claw machine that lets out a cloud of small metals. The raiders are confused at first before they scream as one raider blows up from inside out. The others try to run but to late as they die the same way while escaping.

Bottle and the others get to cover as they try to fight but are a little scared of what they see of this group of ponies that they had travelled with. Bottle than has a horrible thought, 'If this is what a group of six can do...what would one hundred of them do!"

He shivers but ducks down as the raiders begin to attack back even though not as effectively. Through the five ponies of Squad Death fight without a care in the world while killing raiders, the raiders outnumber them about thirty to one in numbers. Silent groans in pain a s he receives a bullet to his flank as he turns to fire at another group of raiders.

Bottle is concerned as he says, "Silent! We are outnumbered and have nowhere to run. We need to make a defensive fortified area!"

Silent seems not to listen as he yells in anger more while his team echo in unison. Bottle looks at these ponies turned Berserkers fighting even with the wounds each have. As the fight looks to be turning for the worse something incredible happens that Bottle would have not believed, a miracle occurred.

(Perk activated War Buddies and All Together)

From behind the hoard of raiders attacking them came a roar of anger as some of the raiders before them seem to vaporize from explosions, gunfire, and clouds of gas. The raiders turn to this new threat to see more ponies dressed the same as Silent and his team charging towards them. Being attacked on two sides, the raiders decide they had enough and begin to try and flee as best they can. Unfortunately they were to late as they soon became surrounded and fall under the fire of the full force of the Shadow Guard.

As the last raider tries to crawl away with two hooves missing, Silent walks up and puts a bullet through the back of his skull. Silent turns and says to the new group of ponies, "Hello my comrades. It has been a bit since last I saw you all."

A pony comes forward and says, "Well Silent, it's been one long Tartarus ride since we all woke up. We saw what happened and that just confirms Tartarus came to Equestria since we slept."

The pony standing there was a blue and green Earth pony with a pair of rocket launchers on his saddle bags.

Silent smiles sadly and says, "All to true Zap. It's also what we got to fix if we get the chance."

Another pony came forward and says, "Zap has been having trouble since he saw how the family Apple farm looked. He hated how bad it looked."

The pony in question looked to be a bright pink and yellow Pegasus with a set of grenades going across her sides and two pistols strapped to her hooves.

Silent nods and says, "I know the feeling all too well, Bubble. Bet you wish you had stayed making candy instead of doing this."

Another pony steps up and replies, "Well Bubble could never stay in one place long so I doubt that would have worked."

This pony was a neon green and black manned unicorn stallion with a bunch of sharp swords and throwing knives strapped to him.

Silent nods and says, "Kinda why we all got into this Nova. We all couldn't stand watching things get this bad but here we are."

Two identical mares step up and say at the same time, "You know us all too well Silent, it's kinda why you are the best to lead us all when we are together."

Both unicorn mares where white with orange manes but they had different gear. The left one had a set of power hooves on all her hooves as well as a power hammer on her back. The other had a lot of pistols all across her back and sides.

Silent nods sadly as he says, "Well that didn't help Blood or others near us did it, Hope and Faith?"

They all look at the blood pieces that was once Blood Spray before they nod and bow a little as Silent walked up to the body and took the tags as he says, " We are Death. Death leads to new roads of life, let ours make many brighter roads ahead. You have made a brighter road ahead for all of us so now sleep with your family with Celestia."

All of the Shadow Guard than say, "Sleep with Celestia in peace."

Bottle and his group watch this with varied expressions as they stay silent. Bottle seems to feel like this was a private matter that was only for these warriors before him. Silent was quite the opposite in her wanting to go over and join them. She had some kind of feeling in her that told her to go join them and stay near them to change the world. Sea Breeze felt like she was watching something that would change the world like this was a turning point where things going to either get better or worse because of these ponies.

After their moment of silence, the leaders of each Shadow Guard group got together and started to discuss their next move of action.

“Now that we rid most of Ponyville of the raiders, I think we should claim it for the Shadow Guard and the nice folk of the Wasteland until we leave for our Operations Base. I will be giving each of you the coordinates before we leave in case we have to split up,” Silent spoke his idea, having the leaders of the other groups nod in response.

“You’re probably the best leader out of all of us, give us your instructions to do just that Silent Shot,” Zap Apple said with a small smile, knowing Silent would know exactly what to do.

“Alright, leader of group War, Zap Apple, scope the perimeter and make sure there is nothing with a beating heart or a conscious that might be of danger to us, and if there is, take care of it.” Zap Apple nodded, going back to their group and giving them the same instructions before they split out to followed orders.

Silent continued, “Leader of group Hunger, Nova Super, find and collect as much food, medicine, alcohol, and drugs as is lying around here but be careful of traps like mines or other things.”

Nova Super nodded, giving the instructions to their group and grabbing saddle bags to hold the items before going out to scavenge. “Leader of group Plague, Bubble Gum, collect any and all ammo, weapons, explosives, and armor that are in this town and from the dead raiders." Bubble Gum nodded before going back to their group, giving orders, and splitting up to scavenge for everything ordered to.

Silent Shot thought for a moment before speaking again, “Leader of group Havoc, Faith Burst, secure the perimeter and set up wooden makeshift barriers with post towers so we can put up guards to watch for dangers.” Faith Burst nodded, trotted over to their group, giving out the orders, and gathering the materials needed before heading out to secure the perimeter.

“And leader of group Void, Hope Burst, set up camp in the biggest most put together building around here so we have a place to put our supplies and so we’re not out in the open when we’re sleeping or taking breaks.” Silent finished, watching Hope Burst nod before heading back to the last group waiting for orders to instruct them and be off on their job.

He then walked back to his group who were checking their items. “Alright guys, we have the first shift of lookout. Make sure the only things that get in here, are other, non-harmful fellows, like the group that joined us earlier on. Otherwise, if it is something that will do any sort of harm, kill it. There will be a big wall around the town with posts for the lookouts to use, make sure not to leave those posts and keep a sharp eye until your shift is up.” Silent instructed, earning yes sir’s and nods before they headed out to the posts.

Right before Silent went out to find an empty post to use, Silent Sunset walked up to him, previously deciding she wanted to join the team and help change the Wasteland for the better. “Silent Shot, sir,” She spoke trying to get his attention and succeeding when he turned around to look at her.

“Yes Sunset?” He asked.

“I was hoping to see if I may join your group and follow with you, to change the Wasteland for the better, and help your group and your cause.” Sunset spoke, trying to not sound as nervous as she was and instead try to sound strong and sturdy to show she can handle things and that she wouldn’t be extra meat weighing them down.

Silent Shot was oddly impressed, not taking her to be the type who wanted a fight. “Well, if you were accepted onto team Death, what would you do to help and not be just some deadweight?” Silent asked.

“Well, I have a keen eye for spotting out mines and hidden items, and I’m pretty handy with my pistols and melee. And along with that, I’m known for being sneaky since over time I have learned how to fly, act, and move silent, making it easy to perform sneak attacks,” Silent Sunset listed off, hoping that was enough to seem worthy.

“Those are quite some nice traits you have,” Silent got into a small thought and continued. “Well, how about this. If you can do lookout with the rest of my team, and do it well. That means, kill anything that would cause harm or do any danger, and only, and I mean only, let in folk that in no way shape or form would be any danger to us. Think you can handle that?” He finished, waiting for a response.

“Sir yes sir! I won’t let you down!” Silent Sunset exclaimed, trying to hold in her excitement but not succeeding very well. She then set out for a post at the wall to be on lookout from.

Silent shakes his head as he says to himself, "Ponies in this age must think we are some kind of supermare group or like an improved version or the Steel Rangers. I just hope she lives through all this cause she might be a good fighter and a reason this wasteland of a home can become great again."

Silent shakes his head to clear those thoughts and says, "Data, I need you right quick before we go on guard duty."

Data flaps his wings and lands beside Silent before asking, "Sir? What might you need?"

Silent replies as he shows his pip-buck and says, "First chance we get after we are all done with this town, we are heading to this location. Do you have any Intel on the area and what this place is?"

Data looks at it before checking it against his archive of information before stating, "It's one of the four places where they made a Ministry Mare Emergency Bunker. Probably hasn't been opened because it is well hidden and because it needs authorization of your degree or higher sir."

Silent nods and says, "After the others come back from their trips and have everything gathered, we will be heading there post haste. We need a reliable place to Bunker down and guard without problems and that place might be our best chance. What might they have their as defenses?"

Data thinks for a bit before saying, "Well...I would probably say mines, some turrets, some robots that may be anything, and probably laser grids. Some of those I can handle but the mines and robots I got nothing for. I would suggest trying Zap Apple to try his blood code for the robots but the mines I got nothing for."

Silent smiles and says, "Sunset will be joining us and she has good experience with mines. She will be most handy for that then. Do we have any idea of the internal structure?"

Data shakes his head as he states, "Only Ministry Mares were able to go in and that means that Zap Apple can get us in. The problem is hacking the terminals inside. They will probably all be very high on security and will cause the defenses to attack if we fail them."

Silent thinks a bit before he says, "Doesn't Bubble have a batpony that was a hacker before she got recruited?"

Data nods and says, "She does...I believe her name was Black Berry. She was supposedly the cause for the Megaspells from activating in the Zebra nations and was killed on record but joined up with us."

"Perfect! So we are going to need them to come with us when we head inside. The others will guard the outside until we are done so that we can seal the outside afterwards. I do know that there will be a map in there with locations of all of the secret projects that may still be around as well as a list of any Stables where members of the Ministry Mares were placed." Silent states as he smiles.

"Good idea sir. I better get back in case we are attacked before we head off." states Data as he turns and leaves.

Silent walks over to a carousel looking place and smiles a little as he goes to an open window and jumps through. Upon landing, he looks around and the destroyed shop that once was a beautiful store for clothes. The clothes where in a pile and looked to be rotting in a corner where they were neglected for years. He heads for the stairs and climbs up them before turning the corner and entering a filly's room.

He sits down at the broken window as he says to himself, "I wish none of this ever happened. Rarity, Sweetie Bell, Blood Spray, Scootaloo, and even Appleblossom...I miss them all so much. It was always so nice around here during the Summer where I could run around with the others as we searched for our cutie marks. Even the Apple Family Reunions were great with all those great desserts that me and the others would sneak off with while the Apple family was not looking. We got in so much trouble back then."

Behind him was the sound of hooves as Bottle says, "What became of those days of such joy for pony kind? None of us even remember what caused such a time of joy to disappear."

Silent sighs before he says, " The wonderbolts saved seventeen ponies from zebra pirates within the territory of the zebra empire but was seen as a bad thing by the Zebra empire at the time. Several Wonderbolts died in the mission causing tension between Equestria and the Zebra Empire and minor hostilities and trading problems continued for years. Things deteriorated between Equestria and the Zebra Empire after the zebra empire sent terrorists into Equestria and the incident at Littlehorn Valley where the civilians were rounded up and killed by the Zebra Empire."

He looks sad before continuing, "Princess Celestia abdicates in shame, and Princess Luna becomes ruler of Equestria after the incident at Littlehorn Valley. The Zebra Empire soon declared all out war on Equestria with Nightmare Moon now in charge. The elements of Harmony soon took up seats in six ministries to govern Equestria and hold the peace as best they could. As you know Megaspells were soon created and things just went even more downhill from there. The ministry Mares soon became worse during their offices and before long...let's just say that my group had a lot of work cut out for us."

He motions with his hoof out the window as he says, "As you know, this came to be right after my groups went into stasis. We were ordered to go in by Ministry Mare Rainbow Dash because of something Pinkie Pie told her. We got into our bunkers and slept for the last 200 years waiting to come back out. Being the only remnants of our old nation, it is our job to help rebuild everything we have left here and make this wasteland into a proper and happy place again."

Bottle looks at silent and asks, "How will you do that? There are dangers everywhere out here and it will stay that way until somepony can fix everything at once."

Silent turns to Bottle and replies, "I do not know yet but what I do know is that we must find the known and lawful relatives of the Ministry Mares and get orders from them. The currently are the only ones who can help us fix everything and restore order to this chaos. Our nation is on the brink of death and we must stop it even at the cost of everything we have. It is our mission and we must complete it at all costs so that ponykind can live again like we once were."

Bottle nods a little and says, "Me and what's left of my caravan are heading out now. I thank you and yours for the help and we will meet again at that base of yours that you marked for me. I just hope that next we meet...nopony has to die and that you have found a way to fix all this."

Silent pats Bottle on the back with a hoof and replies, "No problem Bottle and remember that you and anyone like you is welcome to see us at our place. If you can get information of any kind from across the Wasteland please get it to us so we might be able to help others."

Bottle smiled at Silent before he left the building to gather the rest of his group together. He and his group said some goodbyes to Silent Sunset before heading off back into the untamed wastes. Silent Shot watched them leave through the broken window in the room atop Carousel Boutique. Silent soon left the building to check on how things were going and it seemed, by news of the leaders of the other teams, that it was all good. No threats or monsters were inside the temporary barriers that were put around Ponyville. A good amount of food, water, medicine, alcohol, and drugs were found throughout the town, along with weapons, ammo, explosives and armor.

The guards hadn’t seen much dangers close by outside the barrier, and a small section of the town had been set up as a temporary camp where the newly found supplies were taken to and where some rested. It had been hours since Silent had his team go up for lookout at the posts by the barrier, so he gathered them, including Silent Sunset who had done a fantastic job, and had the lookouts replaced with team Void’s troops.

“There wasn’t nearly enough stuff for me to kill, that lookout shift was booorrinnggg,” Small Fire complained.

On the other hoof though, Silent Sunset was as happy as could be when she got the news saying she was able to join with Silent and the rest of team Death. The group took rest at the camp set up and slept until morning. Once that time came, Silent got the leaders grouped back up together.

“Alright, we need to take down the temporary barriers and camp, it’s time to start heading over to the Ministry Mare Emergency Bunker. The route there shouldn’t be too long, but we should leave as soon as everything we found is gathered up and once everything is taken down. Let’s get to work,” Silent Shot commanded.

The squad leaders informed their groups and they all split jobs. Some gathering certain materials, some taking down the temporary barrier, and some helping to take down the camp. After about an hour or so everything was down and gathered up, and the squads headed out. Silent stayed in the front of everyone along with Data Spark since they had the route to get there.

“Finally, we can have a base to come back to that is safe and hidden away from the rest of the Wasteland,” Silent said more to himself than anyone else, happy that at least something was better for them now.

Silent pulls up his map on his Pip-buck as he calls the leaders of each team over before saying, "Here are the exact coordinates where we will meet up in case we are separated by any opposing force."

They all nod slowly as they mark the spot on the map as a point of interest so they do not lose track of where they are going as Silent says, "Okay everyone, get to your groups and let's get to our new home base."

He gets with his group as he gets them all into position letting Small Fire deal with the basic training on Silent Sunset as they begin to move out. With his team leading the way, the other groups slowly begin to make a square like formation behind them with everyone keeping an eye out in their direction.

A feeling deep inside welled up to the surface as his mind began to doubt his own plans, "What if I fail my comrades and we all die for this mission...I already lost four of my crew and I do not know if we will be able to find any more who might join our cause."

He sighs as he keeps trotting along before looking ahead and he says to himself, "I need to just hold off until we get there and then I can worry. After all I am the only one who can lead these soldiers until we can get orders from higher up...but when will we get these orders....when."

_____________________________________________________________________________________

Shadow Guard Squad - Death

Level up

New Perks added - Old Friends, All together, War Buddies

Old Friends = Having friends from the days of old helps but they also like you more. Anytime you head into an area with a friend from your old days you get an Intel bonus and extra scouting for enemy locations.

All Together - With all squads together comes with good command skills, + 2 ranks in combat skills when all units are fighting together.

War Buddies - Having faced war together with these others, you get a +50% bonus to dmg when working together with them in combat.

Shadow Guard Squad - War, Plague, Hunger, Void, and Havoc

Level up

New Perks added - War Buddies, All together

War Buddies - Having faced war together with these others, you get a +50% bonus to dmg when working together with them in combat.

All Together - With all squads together comes with good command skills, + 2 ranks in combat skills when all units are fighting together.