Fallout Equestria: Sin and Sacrifice

Prologue

“Everything we do here in the past – even the smallest change – can snowball into an avalanche of trouble for the future!”

The sun shone brightly upon the sands of the San Palomino Desert. Occasionally, a breeze would stir a few grains and send them tumbling a little ways to add to the constantly shifting landscape of the desert. A small lizard scurried along, trying to avoid the heat of the midday sun by scurrying onto some artificial turf and ducking into a hole in the ground.

Up on a ridge a few hundred yards away was a very large, elaborate two story cabin which was part of an extensive golf resort. Two large wooden decks wrapped around the exterior of the cabin on the first and second floors. On the first floor deck was a set of deck chairs as well as an outdoor dining table where a trio of ponies had gathered. An older unicorn stallion with chocolate fur and a black mane and tail wielded a golf club, sending a golf ball flying toward out toward the green. The other, a younger yellow unicorn of a smaller stature than his companion, brushed away his golden mane, then floated a pair of binoculars to his eyes.

“You hooked it to the right,” he observed, gauging the distance between where the ball impacted the ground and the flag. “About one twenty feet off.”

“Shit,” growled the chocolate stallion as he floated a new ball out of a pail. After getting teed up he sent it flying on a much straighter course.

“Nice one, Deuce” said the yellow stallion before his binoculars brought the rear of a silver pegasus mare with a dark blue mane and tail laying on one of the deck chairs into his view. “Very nice.”

As if sensing the eyes on her backside, the mare turned her head and fixed the stallion with a glare.

“You don't quit looking at my ass, Mako, those binoculars are going to become permanently fixed to your eyes.”

“Sorry, Whisper. It’s like a magnetic pull or something,” the stallion snickered, giving her a wink.

“I’ll show you a pull.”

Mako had prepared to say something witty in response before being lightly rapped across the back of the head by Duece.

“Pay attention to my drive here, lover boy.”

The stallions went back to their driving game while the mare went back to her sun bathing. A short time later they were joined by a gray unicorn stallion with a mane of dark greens and blues. Following him was a black earth pony mare with a silver mane and tail. Deuce noticed the new arrivals first and gave them a nod before going back to his game, drawing Mako’s attention to the pair.

“Hey Chrome, we all good for the trip to Las Pegasus?” Mako asked as he smiled hopefully at the gray stallion.

Chrome shook his head before taking a seat on an empty deck chair. “No go, Mako. Central Command up in Canterlot elevated the threat level to red, so every base and every Stable-Tec site across the country’s on lockdown. MoM’s also got ponies crawling through every city looking for something.”

“So Pinkie Pie had another itchy nose,” Whisper deadpanned, “Well, I guess if you cry ‘timberwolf’ enough times one will show up eventually.”

“Yeah, but that one time is a real bitch.” Deuce remarked as he sent another ball flying.

Mako scrunched up his muzzle and crossed his forelegs. “Aw, that sucks. They plan on turning us into little pony popsicles in a couple days, and they won't let us go out and have one last hurrah. I was planning on showing Whisper a grand night on the town!”

“Like that would ever happen,” the pegasus scoffed.

The earth pony took a seat on the deck, “Boy I hope this crap stops when you two finally screw.”

Deafening silence descended on the group as the two flustered ponies stared dumbstruck at the mare. Chrome simply sat looking out at the desert with a smile, while a slight snickering could be heard from Deuce as he teed up another ball. Everypony knew by this point that something was going on between the two ponies- a few looks here and there, a kiss or two snuck under a stairway or in a corner, or even instance where the two of them just happen to turn up missing at times.

Fraternization wasn't really too big of an big issue with the brass, especially since the former Captain of the Royal Guard, Shining Armor, ended up marrying Princess Celestia’s niece Princess Cadance. Ponies in the military had relationships all over the place, Chrome even knew of some goings-on between the CO of the 526th Infantry Division and one of her Corporals, but technically such things still weren't officially allowed. So Whisper and Mako always played this game of back and forth, though pretty much everypony around them hoped they’d stop with the games eventually.

Whisper fixed the other mare with an intense glare, “You know what, Tig…”

Deuce quickly changed the subject, “You ever call Gail, Chrome?”

The stallion shook his head with a sullen expression. “She probably never wants to hear from me again.”

“She’s your sister, and if I know her like I do, I'm sure she forgave you that same day.”

Chrome shrugged his shoulders and leaned back. “I guess I could try and send her a message when she gets off of work.”

Whisper watched Tig as the earth pony sat down and pulled a screwdriver out of a little pouch hanging around her neck. She deftly sat with the screwdriver in her hoof, fiddling with a Pipbuck. “Whatcha got there, Tig?”

“Some new kid from the 526th got a holotape jammed in here,” she blew a stray piece of silver mane away from her eyes before working for a few more seconds. She smiled triumphantly as a little tray popped out of the top of the PipBuck from which she extracted a cassette tape about the size of a deck of cards. “It'll cost him a couple days candy bar rations, and perhaps a couple drinks in town when the lockdown is lifted, but I figure that’s a small price to pay. Considering not only was it jammed, but it was still playing the porno he had going. A quick adjustment to the program settings to turn off autoplay fixed that.”

The group shared a quick laugh but were cut off as they were suddenly covered in shadow. Looking up, they saw the silhouette of a large black warship hovering in the sky above them. As the ship repositioned and the sun shone upon it, they could see that large sections of it were made of clouds.

“The Fractus,” said Deuce, “one of the new Raptor class Cloudships.”

Whisper pulled her glasses down to get a better look before ruffling her feathers slightly, “Even as a pegasus, I still think it's creepy.”

“Well, if Stable-Tec was trying to keep this place a secret, that’s not going to help,” Mako chuckled.

Deuce laid his golf club on a nearby picnic table and took a seat. “Every high value military installation’s supposed to have one as security. Especially now if Command has upped the threat level.”

“Looks like a big floating target to me,” Whisper remarked.

The ponies looked skyward once more as a lance of green fire streaked across the sky before impacting the Fractus and blinding everypony with a mushroom cloud of green flame. The resulting shockwave knocked everypony to the ground and set the radiation counters on their Pip-Bucks off the charts. The ponies’ struggle back to their hooves was accompanied by the rapid sound of ticking and pinging as their Pip-Bucks informed them of the radiation in the air. Steadying each other, they looked up in horror as the Fractus began to violently list to port, the clouds that supported it having been vaporized in the blast.

“What was that?” Whisper shouted with her hooves over her ringing ears.

“Must have been some kind of missile,” Chrome rose unsteadily to his hooves, shaking his head.

Overhead, pegasi began to stream out of the Fractus like a swarm of bees fleeing their burning hive. In the few seconds since the missile struck the Fractus, it had lost enough altitude to the point that the ponies on the ground could just see the damage that had been done. The missile had struck just aft of amidships on the port side, leaving a large gaping hole that covered nearly the whole aft end of the ship. Many of the pegasi fought desperately to put out the green fires that were quickly consuming the Fractus, but the intense heat and radiation made it nearly impossible to get close enough.

Deuce came up beside Chrome with a nervous expression, “They need to put out those fires before one of them reaches the magazine.”

Suddenly, the piercing wail of an alarm began to sound over the resort intercom before being interrupted by a mare’s voice.

“All personnel report to the Stable. Assemble with your Officer-In-Charge in the designated assembly areas.”

Still watching the valiant but increasingly futile efforts of the pegasi up above, Chrome turned his head to the others. “Let's get going, guys.”

The others agreed with a collective nod of trepidation before they all turned and began trotting in the direction of the golf courses behind the resort building. As they stepped off of the deck and onto the artificial turf of the 18th green, the shockwave of a powerful explosion knocked Tig to the ground and forced the rest of the party to their knees. Chrome turned in the direction of the explosion and was horrified by what he saw.

Deuce’s fears had been realized. The intense fire had quickly spread throughout the Fractus and reached the aft magazine that contained the spark batteries for the main guns. The resulting explosion effectively ripped the cloudship in half, leaving two huge pieces and a hailstorm of debris falling to the ground. The largest piece, the bow, still had some control as it gradually angled itself away from the Stable. Chrome knew there was no way for the Fractus or her remaining crew to survive the fall; they would die so that others may live.

Turning back to his friends, Chrome saw their wide eyes and jaws slack. Looking up, he and his group bore witness to an even greater horror when they realized that the falling smoke trails they were seeing were not pieces of debris, but the flailing bodies of burning ponies that hadn't been vaporized by the explosion. The group collectively flinched and Tig let out a gasp as the first pegasus body hit the ground. The sound of breaking bones and crackling flames broke the group’s trance, so they broke into a full on gallop.

Looking behind him, Deuce realized that there were other, and in some cases, larger smoke trails coming toward them, one of them happening to be a burning sky tank.

“Get out of here! Go, go, go!” Deuce shouted as the group broke into the hardest gallop of their lives. Dodging left and right or jumping ahead to avoid the debris and bodies that began to impact more frequently around them, the group sprinted their way towards a small hill. Chrome had to jump and roll out of the way as the sky tank finally crashed into the ground, but was immediately helped to his hooves by Deuce’s levitation magic.

The group crested a small hill, bringing a series of four large metal doors that were set into the ground with the number 111 emblazoned in yellow upon them. Several groups of ponies nervously milled around them, their eyes all looking to the sky for danger. As Chrome’s group drew closer to the Stable they could see, the doors open and large elevator platforms slide into place where ponies would start assembling on them. When one elevator platform was filled it would begin its descent while another came back up in one of the other shafts. Luckily, no debris had caused major problems for the elevators so they were able to run optimally.

Whisper gave a triumphant whoop as they got nearer and looked behind her, “We’re gonna make it guys!”

Just as she finished her sentence, the group was once more lifted off their hooves as something crashed into the ground behind them. Chrome was propelled into Deuce before Whisper impacted his side, knocking the wind out of him. The tangle of ponies lay stunned on the ground before regaining their senses. Chrome did a headcount as he untangled himself from Deuce and Whisper and found that Mako was missing. He recounted and found that Mako was still missing. He called out for his friend, looking around to see if he was unconscious or hurt somewhere nearby or if he had been thrown somewhere further away.

As Chrome turned and spotted Tig again, he noticed that she had been standing stock still the whole time. As Chrome approached her he saw that Tigs’ whole body was shaking and her pupils had narrowed down to pinpricks. Fearing what he was about to see, he slowly followed her gaze until he saw a sight that nearly made him sick to his stomach. Another sky tank had come down behind them and sent them flying, but what had sickened Chrome was the blood that flowed from beneath it, staining the sand in a dark red trail that led up to a twitching yellow leg.

By that time Whisper had come up beside him, yelling Mako’s name. Chrome’s heart sank when he heard the strangled cry the pegasus emitted before she galloped over to dig at the sand.

“Come on guys! Help me!” She pleaded with tears in her eyes, her hooves covered in sand and Mako’s blood.

Chrome slowly walked up to her and placed his hoof on her shoulder to try and gently pull her away. “Whisper, stop. We have to go.”

The pegasus slipped away from him and began to dig in the sand again. As Tig nervously looked to the sky for more falling debris, Deuce walked up next to Chrome, and the two unicorns used their magic to envelop the sobbing mare and pull her away from Mako’s grave. Chrome quickly trotted past Whisper’s struggling form and placed Mako’s leg in the hole Whisper had made then covered it in sand to keep her from grabbing it as she floated past.

“Come on, Whisper. He wouldn't want you sticking around and getting yourself hurt.” Deuce placed her on his back and began to trot away with her forelegs desperately clinging around his neck.

Chrome stayed behind, wanting to spend a few final seconds with his friend. But they had to go. When Tig walked up and placed a hoof on his shoulder, Chrome turned to look at her with tears in his eyes. He had a close friendship with all of these ponies, but it would do him no good to lose it when he still had three others to care for; he knew Mako would understand. He turned, looking back one last time before he and Tig galloped away to catch up with Deuce and Whisper, who were standing on the elevator platform waiting for them. As soon as he and Tig stepped on, the elevator lurched downward and at an angle as it descended under the ground. Looking up one final time before the elevator door closed, Chrome noticed the corpse of the Fractus looming ominously closer in the sky.

The elevator traveled on its downward angle for a few minutes before it began to slow its descent. Within a few minutes a platform came into view. Ponies stood by dressed in blue jumpsuits with the number 111 emblazoned in yellow on the back and the collar handing out similar jumpsuits to the stunned ponies who were getting off of the final elevators. Once ponies had their suits they went down their specified corridors. As the elevator platform Chrome was on came to a squealing halt and thumped into place, locks set themselves firmly in place. All activity suddenly stopped as a rumble shook the stable and the sound of tearing metal echoed down the elevator shafts; the Fractus had made landfall.

Contrary to the atmosphere around her, a mare walked up to the elevator with what Chrome thought was too cheery of a smile considering everything he’d just seen.

“1st Special Forces and 526th Infantry, take the left corridor, 81st Artillery and 45th Supply, take the right. Be sure to take a Stable suit as you go.”

Chrome nodded to the others. They walked down the left corridor as instructed, wrapping five suits in his dark green magical field along the way.

“Um, sir?” came a voice from behind him.

Chrome stopped and looked back at the mare who had been sitting at the suit distribution table. She looked back at him with a confused expression.

“It’s only one suit per pony, if your suit gets soiled you can turn it in for a replacement later.”

Chrome was confused for a second before his mind caught up. He looked to the others who had went past him a ways before coming to a stop. Whisper still held onto the grim faced Deuce’s back, dead to the world while Tig forlornly stared at the fifth suit in Chrome’s magical grasp. Sullenly, Chrome placed the “extra” suit back into the box.

“Sorry,” he mustered up a weak smile to the mare before turning and joining the others.

The group continued on, passing endlessly dull gray walls. Tig remarked after passing the umpteenth foot of it that they could use a mural or something to break up the monotony. After going down a set of stairs they were met by a white unicorn stallion with a blue mane and tail, as well as a blue pencil thin moustache that adorned his muzzle. The group came to a halt as salutes were exchanged between Chrome and the stallion.

“Colonel Fancy Pants, 1st SF present, one absent. Sergeant Mako was killed during the attack.”

“I’m sorry to hear that; he was a great pony. Allow me to extend mine and Fleur’s sympathies.” The stallion acknowledged with a slow nod, a frown crossing his muzzle.

Chrome knew the Colonel took the loss to heart as well. He had become the group’s commanding officer shortly before the Battle of Vanhoover and had always shown great concern for the wellbeing of his troops, which made Chrome respect the stallion even more. Having grown up in Canterlot as the son of palace staff, Chrome knew of most of the nobles who frequented the castle. Fancy Pants, as well as his wife, Fleur Dis Lee, were the only ones he had great respect for. So it was no surprise to Chrome when he heard that Fancy had joined the army at the start of the war, enrolling in officer school and earning himself a commission.

“Come,” he said, turning to enter a nearby door as it slid out of the way. “Let's get you all taken care of. Your proximity to the megaspell blast has exposed you to some minor radiation. Fortunately, our status has awarded us some privilege so as not to be exposed to the standard, ‘clinical’ decontamination procedures.”

They followed Fancy Pants through the door and into a small locker room. “These will be our accommodations when we are reawakened. Stable-Tec has planned for wholesale destruction upon the surface, so we will all need a place to call home until such a time as we can start rebuilding above.” he gently placed a hoof on Whisper’s shoulder and looked her in the eyes. “And we will definitely bring those responsible to justice.”

He turned and led them further into the room. The locker room was pretty standard, with enough lockers to accommodate a group twice their size. On the left was a door to a shower area with individual stalls, which Fancy Pants politely waited outside while they went in to clean themselves with a stinging soap and a harsh brush meant to decontaminate them on the outside from the radiation they’d been exposed to. Chrome was glad to see Whisper able to go into a stall on her own power, though he had Tig keep an eye on her just in case.

Chrome turned the water on in his own stall and let the water warm. He stepped in and plopped down on the floor to let the water flow over him, the water washing away the tears he felt. He just sat, unmoving, letting his head hang as he tried to work through what he had just gone through, what had just happened to his friends. He wondered what had become of his parents in Canterlot or his sister in Vanhoover.

“Don’t want to keep Fancy Pants waiting.” said Deuce before turning and heading out the door. He must have dozed off or simply spaced out because the next thing he knew Deuce was prodding him with a hoof.

Realizing he hadn't actually washed yet, Chrome gave himself a quick scrub down, which left a burning sensation on his skin when he dried off. Once everypony was back in the locker room, Fancy Pants led them through a door on the opposite wall into the living quarters. The room itself was decently sized with some couches and tables in the middle along with a couple terminals against one wall, a jukebox in one corner, and a pool table in another. There were a series of doors along the wall that led to individual rooms that were big enough for a bed, a couple of dressers, and a decent sized walk in closet; there was even a room for Fancy and Fleur.

Fancy directed them to relax on the couches as a group of medical ponies entered the room as they set up IV stands and hooked everypony up to some RadAway to clean the last of the radiation from their body.

“Thank you ladies and gentlecolts, that will be all for now. I'll see that your equipment is returned to you.” Fancy smiled politely before he ushered the ponies out of the room.

Tig, meanwhile, had gotten up and went into her room to rummage through a chest containing her things that had been moved in beforehand. She re-emerged holding a Pipbuck and walked over to where Whisper laid on a couch, staring at the far wall.

“Whisper,” she said, placing the Pipbuck in front of her. “Mako gave this to me to do some work on it, and, well… I thought you might like to have it. I found a file on there that was for you, too.”

The earth pony turned and made her way back to her own couch while Whisper turned her head slowly to look at the PipBuck. Chrome watched as the pegasus stared for what felt like forever, emotions flashing across her eyes as she seemed to be at war within herself as to what to do with the PipBuck, as if she was afraid of what might be on it. Slowly, as if her limbs were fighting through sticky jam, she reached out and took the PipBuck in her forelegs and pulled it closer to herself. She pulled out the wireless earpiece and placed it in her ear before turning the knob and pushing a of couple buttons on the device. Her eyes widened as they focused on the screen before she once again became lost to the world.

Tig stopped next to Chrome and leaned in close to him. “Turns out that file has a picture of Mako and Whisper in Las Pegasus in front of one of those twenty-four hour wedding chapels. You know, the ones where you can get married by a Countess Coloratura impersonator. They must have eloped because Whisper was wearing a lovely looking wedding gown and had a golden band around her hoof. Mako, of course being Mako, was wearing a fancy suit complete with a top hat and cane with a gold ring around his horn. They looked so happy, Chrome.”

The pair looked over at Whisper, who hadn’t moved since she’d turned on the Pip-Buck. Tears made runnels down her cheeks. “It had to have been during our last R&R trip after Vanhoover, since Whisper hadn’t dyed her mane and tail yet. I turned the audio log off once I realized what it was, but I did hear him express his love for her and plans to treat Whisper to a proper wedding involving the rest of us and their families.”

The whole tale made Chrome’s heart ache, but now was the time to focus on the task of figuring out who to kill; not only to avenge Mako, but the poor pegasi aboard the Fractus as well.

Fancy Pants had given them all a few minutes to settle in before he returned. Deuce took the opportunity to ask the question that everypony had been thinking.

“What exactly did happen, Colonel?”

“Well, we did manage to get some information from Canterlot before the connection was suddenly lost. Hopefully if it is an attack, Princess Luna will be able to sort through it well enough. Last week you were all made aware that the Zebras somehow managed to attain the blueprints for our megaspells to re-engineer them.. It seems that sometime this morning, Central Intelligence was informed by the Ministry of Morale of a threat of a megaspell attack somewhere in Equestria, so the Ministry of Morale and the Ministry of Wartime Technology dispatched joint response teams to track down the suspects. While they were doing so, a missile carrying a much larger warhead than the one that struck the Fractus detonated in Cloudsdale. It would appear that because of the massive losses the pegasi have suffered and now all this, then they have chosen to abandon the surface and hide in their cloud cities.

Chrome noticed Whisper stir out of the corner of his eye with a gasp.

“Those cowards, they can't do that! I’ll fucking go to Cloudsdale myself and--”

“There is no more Cloudsdale, Whisper,” Fancy interrupted with a raised hoof, “The missile completely vaporized every inch of cloud that the city was made of in addition to every pony present, as well as those within a half of a mile. There’s nothing but empty sky where the city once was.”

“Just like the missile that hit the Fractus.” Chrome observed.

Fancy Pants nodded, “Quite, though our science ponies here in the stable surmise that the missile that hit the Fractus was smaller than the one that destroyed Cloudsdale, otherwise everypony on the surface would be ash right now. Their best guess is that since the Fractus was the closest cloudship that could mount a quick response to the Zebra attack, it was specifically targeted.

But anyway, back to the topic at hoof; right after the attack on Cloudsdale, a major facility belonging to the Ministry of Arcane Sciences in Splendid Valley was destroyed by a balefire bomb planted somewhere either in the facility or beneath it, then Manehattan was destroyed by a balefire bomb that was planted somewhere in the city. That was when we lost contact with Central Command. Some information has been trickling in through back channels that indicates Fillydelphia was struck by a large missile as well.”

The news hung like a heavy cloud over everypony, in the matter of a few hours; their home, as well as hundreds of thousands of ponies, were gone. Fancy Pants sighed and ran a hoof through his mane.

“Everypony, we were caught off guard today. It would appear that this is to be our home for now until conditions on the surface are deemed safe enough for Stable-Tec to give the all clear signal. I am also to inform you that in light of new circumstances, we are to begin the cryogenic stasis project the instant you have completed your treatment. The other ponies in the Stable have either been placed in stasis, or are in the preparatory stages.” He took note of everypony’s nervous expression and mustered the most reassuring smile he could, “Don’t worry old chaps, think of this as going to bed early before Hearth’s Warming. The sooner you get it done with, the sooner you can wake up for the good stuff.”

There was some trepidation on the faces of the others as they shared anxious glances with each other before Deuce and Tig each gave Chrome a weak nod. Whisper, meanwhile, had fallen silent once again, sullenly laying her head down on her forelegs and staring at the screen of Mako’s Pipbuck, of which she still cradled.

Fancy Pants watched the mare with concern before meeting Chrome’s eyes. “A word, Lieutenant.” He motioned towards his room with a movement of his head.

The door slid open as the the automatic lights flickered and hummed to life, illuminating a small office with a simple metal desk with one chair on one side and two on the other. On the far side of the office there was another door that Chrome assumed led to the couple’s room proper. While Chrome examined the room, Fancy Pants had settled himself into the chair on the opposite side of the desk and motioned for Chrome to have a seat in one of the others.

“I know that everypony on your team is devastated by the loss of Sergeant Mako; Fleur and myself thought rather highly of him as well. But it is very obvious that Sergeant Whisper has taken it particularly hard.”

“Yes,” Chrome replied after taking a seat, “I suppose telling you now wouldn’t make a difference, given the circumstance, but Tig had just brought it to my attention that Whisper and Mako apparently were very close.”

Fancy nodded, “Yes, and I hope you do not take offense when I say that I had already known this. During our post Vanhoover R&R, Fleur and I decided to take in the festival and splendor of Las Pegasus. While there we had run into the Sergeants, who seemed to be, shall I say, quite taken with each other. I will be honest, I never did approve of the discouragement of ponies finding love on the battlefield, as long as it did not interfere with good order and discipline. So when Sergeant Mako asked - sarcastically, of course - if Fleur and I would serve as their witnesses, we happily agreed.”

Chrome nodded. He felt the same way as Fancy did. And if the relationship between Mako and Whisper had been going on as long as it had, it obviously hadn’t affected their ability to get the job done.

“Unfortunately though, such a thing has its risks, as we have just been painfully reminded,” Chrome mused. Fancy Pants nodding in agreement.

“Yes,” Fancy said, “That is why I asked you in here. I need your assessment of Whisper’s current state, not just as her commander, but as her friend.”

“Well, Whisper is tough, but I know she cares deeply for those she loves, Mako doubly so. This obviously has hit her hard, and she is shutting down to process it. But I feel that her indomitable spirit will prevail, and with some help and guidance from not only us, her friends, but professionals as well, I hope that she’ll be able to pull through this rather successfully in the end. I know when we are awakened that the counselors will be hard pressed to help those ponies who will require their services not only to process their new reality in the future, but the memories of what happened today, but I would recommend she is seen by a professional.”

“I agree,” Fancy Pants nodded, “I will file the proper paperwork, and see that she is taken care of upon your “arrival” in our new Equestria, whatever that may be.” He glanced to the ceiling, wondering what sort of horrors awaited them on the surface.

****

A couple hours later, following their treatment and a quick nap, Chrome and the others had to walk down the dull gray corridor after dull gray corridor until they were a couple of levels down from where they started. They followed a series of frost covered pipes and red markings that indicated they were heading towards Hibernation Chamber 10-B, which Chrome figured was Stable-Tec’s way of trying to be non frightening with their phrasing.

The thought of stasis to some ponies conjured up images of those seen in Sci-Fi magazines of tubes and wires hooked up to vats of goo which held ponies floating inside hooked up to said tubes and wires while mad scientists performed all sorts of experiments on them. They began passing large windows on either side of the hall that looked in on rooms filled with metal pods, a closer inspection revealed a pony to be lying inside each one.

Chrome stopped to watch as a pegasus mare stepped into an open pod and laid down as if she were going to sleep as normal, soon the lid closed and the tempered glass was coated in a layer of frost. Even Whisper was intrigued by the wonders around them. They’d been given a briefing and seen an instructional video, but this was the first time they’d been down this far into the Stable and seen where they’d be staying for what they were told were the next few years.

“Now, I'm sure that the Lieutenant has briefed you all on what is to transpire?” Fancy Pants looked over his shoulder at the group as they passed through a door at the end of the hall and walked into a room that was indistinguishable from the rest.

“Sure, but perhaps you could tell us again?” Tig said as she nervously looked around at all of the machinery surrounding her.

“Certainly,” Fancy Pants said soothingly, trying to use his pre-war diplomatic experience of speech to calm the mare. “Thanks to a combined effort between the Joint Equestrian Forces, the Ministry of Wartime Technology, whom you all assisted in the development of the first wave of Power Armor suits, and Stable-Tec, we are standing in the first Stable developed with the purpose of observing the effects of long-term Cryogenic stasis on a pony.

In addition to this, the EDF hopes that by filling the Stable with members of the military we will provide a future Equestrian government with a ready and experienced fighting force, and the proper facilities to train an army.”

While Fancy was talking the group had entered a smaller room filled with ten pods and approached several ponies dressed in green scrubs and lab coats. Chrome figured the medical ponies were the former while the Stable-Tec science ponies in charge of the project were the latter. They were approached by one of each, an earth pony mare and a unicorn stallion.

The stallion, a grayish blue furred individual with a dark green mane and tail peered at the group through his glasses with an expression of formality and disinterest, “Good evening, I’m Doctor Juniper Sahti, and this is Doctor Vanilla Fig. My team will be monitoring the cryostasis process while Doctor Fig’s team will monitor your vitals and administer the drug cocktail that will allow you to be placed in stasis for the next few years.”

Tig raised her hoof in the air from behind Chrome. “Will it hurt?”

Doctor Fig took the question with a nod. “There will be some discomfort when the gas mixture is pumped into the pod prior to the freezing process when it mixes with the cocktail in your blood stream. But that just means everything is working normally. Trust me. Now, if you don't feel anything, there is a problem and you will need to immediately alert the medical pony that will be standing by your pod.”

“I think I’d rather get a book and some playing cards and just wait it out.” Deuce joked to Tig in an effort to get her to loosen up.

“Then it will be a long, boring wait, Sergeant Major,” Dr. Juniper looked down his muzzle at the stallion, “Until the all clear signal is received from Stable-Tec, this facility will be running at its minimum operating capacity. The environmental systems such as the heating, cooling, and of course, oxygen, will be shut off in nonessential areas; food stores will be sealed from contamination and vermin; the water purification system will also be shutdown to prevent wear and tear; to which point, both systems can only be activated and operated from the Overpony’s office, which is guarded by security turrets and sentry bots. That brings me to my final point; this facility will be staffed by robots while all of us ponies are in stasis.”

Chrome raised an eyebrow, “Everypony will be asleep?”

“Oh, don't worry,” Juniper chuckled, “This stable is outfitted with a top of the line maneframe that monitors every inch of the Stable. It takes in information from instruments as well as the robots and makes decisions based on a set of preprogrammed parameters. In the event of an emergency the maneframe is to wake up the staff so that the issue can be addressed and the rest of you can be monitored. That way immediate action can be taken should something occur that is a threat to the general population.

The group shared a wary look. To actually hear everything explained in such a way, it almost sounded like that once they were put to sleep there could be any number of ways that they might not wake up again.

“Well, not like we have much choice,” Chrome smiled in an effort to encourage the others. It was a shame Mako was gone, he would have known what to say; probably some witty remark about having a nice long dream about Whisper, “You ladies get your kerchiefs, Deuce and I will get our caps, and we'll all settle down for a nice post-apocalyptic nap.”

He did manage to get a smile from Tig and Deuce as well as a small bemused grin from Fancy Pants. Dr. Juniper’s frown suggested that he probably wasn't the joking type, while Dr. Fig simply rolled her eyes. The only one who wasn't smiling was Whisper, though Chrome figured she was thinking of Mako again; he hoped that over time that she could find some kind of peace.

“Well now,” Dr. Juniper clapped his hooves, “If everypony would please step this way, we can begin.”

They all followed the two Doctors over to a table upon which lay a tray and syringes full of a strange purple liquid. As they approached one by one, a pony would inject them, then the subjects would follow the doctors over to the pods where they were then instructed by Dr. Fig to don their Stable suits while the injection worked its way through their body.

Chrome, who had been carrying everypony’s suits, distributed them before floating his own out in front of himself. Ripping open the plastic bag, he pulled out the suit and a piece of laminated paper. A quick scan of the paper explained that the suit was made from a breathable cotton mesh, with special magically enhanced fibers that allowed the suit to provide the wearer with minimal protection from energy pulses and radiation. The enhanced fibers also allowed the suit to not only be able to fit somepony as small as Whisper, but it could also fit somepony as large as Deuce. This was accomplished by a quick press of a button on the left cuff which activated the spell that made the fibers stretch or contract as needed, which then made the suit fit to the pony wearing it. Once Chrome put it on and hit the button, it did feel pretty comfy.

Fancy Pants approached Chrome and saluted, “This is where I must leave you, everypony. I have to make a final report and then report to my own pod in the administration section.” he turned leave before suddenly stopping and turning to look at Whisper, “Again, my deepest sympathies for you loss.”

Chrome saw a perplexed look cross Deuce’s face as the group watched Fancy Pants depart. He was the only one who didn't know about Whisper and Mako, despite him being closer to her than Chrome or Tig. The pegasus sheepishly looked at him. “We ran into him and Fleur in Las Pegasus coming out of a casino near the chapel. Fleur insisted they be our witnesses after Mako brought it up and then took us out to dinner afterward. I’m sorry we didn’t tell you all.”

The group hugged her and they all assured her that it was ok; they understood. They stayed together for as long as they could, but eventually the doctors told them that everypony had to get into their pod. Regretfully, the group finally separated.

“I’ll see you guys in a few years.” Deuce smiled.

Chrome and the others each stepped up to their respective pods as medical ponies stuck monitoring tabs onto their bodies. Chrome waited and watched until the others had been locked and sealed into their own pods before he stepped into his own. He laid down on the soft blue cushion and then rolled over onto his side. Once the pod door had closed there was a hissing sound as the gas started to flood the pod; the temperature started to drop.

Unfortunately, Dr. Fig had understated how much it would hurt; because as soon as the gas mixed with the liquid from the injection in his bloodstream, it felt like every inch of his body was on fire and freezing at the same time. He winced and writhed for a bit before he suddenly felt his eyelids getting heavy. Within seconds, everything had gone black as Chrome fell into a deep sleep.