Fallout Equestria: The Roaring Infernoby Abaddon_SatanasChaptersA rocky beginningMeeting happy treesThis little filly lost her parentsOddton: a town of odditiesOddton ContinuedA rocky beginningThe wastes of Baltimare are a harsh place with crime, drugs and conflict at every corner growing up can be a painful experience, some colts and fillies don't make it out there in the wasteland and if they do they change inside, it can change their mind and corrupt them and they will no longer be able to tell right from wrong, I was one of those colts, at 15 I lost both my parents and I was lost without them and I was scared. I was walking along the outer streets of Baltimare we had just left the park which was an old hoofball stadium which had been rebuilt to act as a society we were on our way back to the safety of our house when we got mugged, first he asked for any Meds we had so we handed our med-x and stimpacks over and they noticed we were not carrying weapons so I heard laughter I was crying because I had seen muggings happened before and they never ended pretty so when he started firing bullets I used my parents almost as a shield and I fell to the ground and played dead covered by the warm corpse of my mother and father. After a hour I couldn't hear any hoofsteps nearby so I got up and nearly vomited when I saw what remained of my parents; their faces were like Swiss cheese and I could see insects starting to feast on the foul smelling corpses. I took my chance and I ran I hoped and dreamed I wouldn't run into those bandits again and I made it home I was crying and Sweating at the fact that I had lost all of my family in a blink of an eye and I went to sleep that night crying myself to sleep I mean what would any other colt or filly do. I awoke in the middle of the night to the sound of the front door squeaking open and my heart hit my chest was it the raiders coming to finish the job I hid under the bed with the 10mm pistol that I took to bed with me that night, my heart was racing as I heard them going through my stuff hoping that they would not ascend the stairs, I heard the creaking of old wooden floorboards and I wished they would break but I would have no such luck. The hoofsteps slowly creaked towards my door so I took aim with the pistol but I didn't fire incase it was just another pony trying to get some supplies, the door opened and in stepped a green unicorn she had a yellow mane and I couldn't see her cutie mark because she was wearing some type of armour over her flank. She stepped in and took notice of me but didn't raise her gun because she saw my tear soaked pillow and my shaky grip of the gun and she put her hoofs up I said in between sniffles "W-W-WHAT do you want p-please don't hurt me." She flinched when she saw me aiming the gun at her but she also saw the gun shaking and slowly took a step forward. I flinched and dropped the gun but she still kept her hoofs up she must have been surrendering but I was confused to why she was surrendering because I had dropped my weapon, "Are you alright" she said with a voice that was so sweet it must have been dipped in honey, she moved closer now she knew I had dropped my gun she proceeded at quicker pace and when she reached me and she nuzzled me I stopped crying and I was sniffling and she said to me "what's your name." she said with a tone of a nice kind mother so from the voice of this mare I would of guessed she had been a parent before I tried to answer in a straight voice "flashing light" I did not deter from her touch as she was calming me down. This mare sat with me for what must have been a hour of her stroking my mane as she managed to coax me to sleep but I would not stay that way for long as I kept getting nightmares of the tragedy, but after the second time I decided to stay awake as it must have been about 4 am so I stayed up and I wanted to ask this mare some questions, "excuse me miss, but what is your name" she quickly answered "Happy Trees" I found that name ironic as the concept of happy trees to me as a child was silly and because the trees around me would not even be slightly happy with the weather especially the radiation storms. When the sun rose the horror of the night remained as I was still shaking as I had only got a few hours sleep because of constant nightmares, Happy Trees came and sat down beside me as I drank a nuka cola and ate a box of sugar bombs "Light we cannot stay here we are in a obvious place for raiders to come and look for loot and I am surprised you and your parents lasted this long." I expression didn't change for the better after hearing the news so I ran upstairs and quickly grabbed to 2 things I would need while moving out of the city my 10mm pistol which I called Pistal as I spelt it like that from a young age and a picture of the wall off my family and are old dog who disappeared one night and we haven't seen since. I came down and Happy Trees was packing the last of the food, water and Meds into her pack and she gave me one and I was carrying little bits of the supply because she did not want to overencumber me for a long journey. We walked for what felt like years it was never ending and when we found a nice town to stay in we would buy food, water and Meds and then we would leave and not come back and I was sad as I made a few friends in these towns. We were walking past a small town and we heard someone shouting for some help and when we looked to see who it was it was a yellow earth pony mare with a orange mane wearing some pipes over her chest was trying to get in a building to helped what sounded like crying. As soon as I heard the crying I immediately went and tried to help by trying to smother the flames with as cloth I had took out of my saddlebags and by trying to smother it i set it on fire as it could not extinguish the flames, I sighed and an idea popped into my head as I spread my wings and took a running leap and dove into the burning wreckage and as I searched it was proving to be quite tricky because of the smoke from the flames I could feel the feathers on my wings start to burn but I powered through until I found a room and I tripped over a toy or at least it sounded like that the squeak it made, sitting I the corner wrapped in hooves and blankets was a little blue earth pony with a midnight blue mane crying on the corner. I grabbed them and ran for the door and dove out my wings ablaze and the adrenaline coursing through my veins I let out a giggle as before I extinguish my wings I notice how it doesn't hurt but I still fill a dull tingling sensation and it turns out that I am alive this gives me a rush of energy, I start giggling madly that I fly back to the house and let the fire touch me with its warm embrace and I want to feel it all over my body so I set fire to my hoof and the burning sensation is a nice sensation all over my body I then spread the flame to my other hoof and then my back hooves and I walk back to Happy Trees and as I leave smouldering hoofprints a bandit jumps out armed with a long metal stick and he is carrying a backpack that is connected to the long stick and he is twitching he must have been the one who did this and as he looks set to set me ablaze I leap forward and use a blazing hoof and plant him right in the jaw and as it makes connection it starts sizzling like an onion in and hot Frying pan and when he is down i start to move closer towards his weapon and as I remove him from it I remember that he nearly committed murder on an innocent filly so my blood runs cold which was ironic because of the surroundings, I think about how to end this as many horrible images go through my skull as I hear a voice shouting out stop and I shake my head and notice happy trees with the filly and their parent hiding the filly from view as I realise what was going on and the pain hits me all at once, I collapse as I still hear the flames and the last thing I hear is happy trees coming to my aid as I fade off into unconsciousness. Meeting happy treesHappy Trees POV I ran up to Flashing Light as he collapsed I quickly put out the flames on his wings and hooves and out if the corner of my eye I saw the raider running away with his tail in between his legs I called over the filly Light had saved and asked if they could follow me to safety before some ghouls find us the mare replied "yes where are you from miss" she asked while i hauled Flashing light onto my back, I replied "nowhere... ooff ... nowhere we just walk and have been for a year now started in manehatten after I meet Flashing light here in a house all alone crying. "Oh, did he say why he was crying?" "his parents were killed earlier the day I found him and he said he had to play dead under the bodies of the raiders who attacked them and he stayed there for a few hours" the FILLY immediately sunk her head with sorrow and I quickly said "yeah just proves how harsh these lands are little lady. where are your parents by the way i didn't see anyone nearby." She quickly started sniffling so we stopped by a wreckage of a former building it looked relatively untouched so we quickly took shelter in and got tk the top floor to get away from ghouls and molerats that were around "sssshh, i'm sorry sweety but I need you to be quiet because if there is ghouls out there they will hear us" I say giving the young filly a hug, I really have a way with kids don't I. (13 years ago) I walked down the road to the next settlement I was not a looter however I was just looking for some jobs to do quickly to earn some extra caps. I approached a small train station where I see a red mare with a orange mane doing some farm work, I call out to her "Hello, don't shoot I am not here to hurt you" I say quickly putting my forelegs up to show I meant peace the farmer quickly goes to draw her shotgun but sees my sign and lowers her aim but keeps the gun ready to fire, " what do you want, we don't want no trouble," I quickly reply back "just looking for some work, need to pay a debt and need a little bit extra to buy food, Meds you know the usual stuff" I lower my forelegs to take a small step forward and regain my balance I can see the mare thinking and she says "you any good with a sniper or any long range weapon" I nod my head I wasn't the best but you have to learn "we have alot of children here so we require some fresh food and water and there are some super mutants with some nukes but they don'the know what to do with them, so keep your distance but they have a farm just a little while south East of here, if you get the food and water we can give you some basic supplies and shelter from the night if you want." (Present day) I shake my head as hear flashing light coming too I move too support his head as the filly sits in the corner sobbing lightly, I see Light shaking his head and clenching his teeth proberly from the pain, I can't really blame him as from watching he did take alot of damage and he was on fire for quite a while, I see him try to sit up as I get his flask tof give him a drink he gulps the water down ferociously and does a small nod of appreciation as his voice was creaky from dehydration, "you all right mister sleepyhead" he quickly pushes a hoof into my mouth to shut me up "now is not the time trees" he says with some annoyance in his voice as he clears his voice and proceeds to get up to check our surroundings, "so what happened after I passed out" he says as he scans the horizon noticing the occasional city but what mostly used to be farmland. "Carried you hear while talking to the filly in the corner, don'the know her name or, what happened to her parents she teared up when I asked her" I say quitting down towards the end of the sentence so she wouldn't hear. "Well I am going to ask her name because I don't want to call her filly or kid the whole time as that is disrespectful, right Happy Trees" he says staring me in the eye test the end of the sentence making reference to me calling Light kid alot of the time mostly be caused it annoyed him and made him sulk light like a little baby, "you liked me calling you kid or kiddo didn't you" "NO I didn'the I have matured more then you over the year I have been travelling with you soexcuse me I am going to talk to the scared filly in the corner" he says pointing at the filly with his hoof." This little filly lost her parentsI trotted up to the filly who had calmed herself down and was looking at the view of the city in the distance I cleared my throat and started to speak “Excuse me kid I just wanted to know how you were holding up, it has been an eventful day for us all hasn’t it?” I asked as I sat down next to her, she just nodded and used a forelegs to wipe her muzzle so I could tell she had been crying “can you introduce yourself please because we haven’t had time for a proper introduction yet” I say coming clean as I was not going to beat around the bush and try to drag a conversation out of her. “My name is Jade Gemstone but I was always called Gem for short” you could tell she was only going to tell us her name so I thought I would try to get her to tell us about her parents “you don’the have to tell us if you don’the want to but where are you parents Gem?” “You know where you saved me” I nodded in conformation “my parents were burned by that monster you saw burning our house” when she said this I felt my blood runs cold as I wish I had put an end to that raider scum right then and there but I had to push the thought aside as I was in the company of children so I had to stay calm “did you know the pony trying to burn down your house” I asked “no” she says, it doesn’t suprised me but I thought I would ask her. “Would you like, even to join us on our travels or do you want us to drop you off at the nearest settlement” I ask to which she immediately ponders the question you could tell by looking at her that a part of her wanted to go back to her parents house but even she knew how dangerous it was and she also did not want to be left at a settlement with a bunch of strangers so she speaks up “don’t leave me” she says as she dives into my chest hooves wrapping around my shoulders a feel some wet patches on my chest as my fur gets wet from her tears as I try to comfort her “sshhh shhh don’t cry we won’t leave you if you don’t want us to” I start stroking her mane with my hoof and she eventually calms down she starts to snore as I place her down on the floor gently as not to wake her as she probably hasn’t had a lot of sleep so I walk over to happy trees and say “we should stay here for the night and get some rest so lets block all the ways into the room and I will sit and keep watch because I have probably had the most rest even if it was accidental” I say with a chuckle at the end of a sentence. The night was uneventful a couple radroaches scuttling into view only to walk away towards a dumpster other then that it was peaceful so I decided to place a barricade down and try to get an actual bit of sleep as I was quite tired and I was still aching a little bit from the fight earlier I bring my wing over and notice that the feathers were not damaged and I just had a few out of place so I spent a little bit of time preening my wings and when I was satisfied with the condition I dosed of as I heard the sounds of crickets in the distance and a barely audible sound of the mares I was with breathing as I closed my eyes and faded of into a dream. I was startled awake by a banging as I heard 5 or 6 voices from outside the barricade I was and I heard a rough scratchy voice shouting “hand over the chems and nobody will get hurt” “no just got these and we need them please don’t take them” that second voice sounded really familiar so I flew to the barricade and as soon as i touched it the wood caught fire and i heard my mum screaming so I pulled the barricade down and saw my mum on fire and getting shot the flesh on her bones exposed and sizzling, I looked down at my hooves and they where burning but there was no pain and the raiders were also on fire my dad just stares at me and just screams at me “you are not my son, you are a monstrosity” as he says this his skins starts to melt as his eyes pop out of their sockets and I am left staring at those blank voids I side of a skull, I want to vomit but my body is lime it is controlling itself and I am the passenger as my mouth opens up and words are spat with fire sizzling on the floor as the world around me turns red with flames. “All these peasants will now down to me or they will burn hahahahahahahahahahaha” I laugh out with a very demonic chuckle at the end. I shoot up sweating and I see Happy Trees and Gem staring over me with obvious worry in their eyes and I realise I must have been tossing and turning in my sleep which must have been loud because we were on a wooden floor, I calm down and breath out and Happy Trees places a hoof on my shoulder and says “oh Celestia I thought you were having a seizure I was about to some Brahmin hide your mouth to stop you biting your tongue.” I look at her and say “thanks for the consideration but no know I just laid down and I must have had a nightmare you know normal stuff for me” I say as I stand up and stretch my wings and Happy Trees notices and looks shocked “how do you still have all of your feathers on your wings I saw them burning when we were outside Gem’s house,” “yeah I noticed that they were not even scorched I am just as confused as your are” I say as I fold my wings and shrug my shoulders, I quickly try to move the conversation off of me and ask “where are we heading anyway we didn’t really get to the bottom of where we were heading because of my sudden case of unconsciousness, “we were just heading south to scraptown but if Gem wants to change our course we can go somewhere else we will just have to get the map out. After much debate about where to go we had decided to keep heading towards scraptown which despite the name was one of the more well run towns in Baltimare and we decided we would try find some shelter there and then we would find some work to earn some caps. We made sure we were well packed and we started to move with me wings out ready to scout out the distance with some binoculars at a moment’s notice but I didn’t need them as there was not much action which was probably because we left at dawn so no raiders were awake or they were so drunk they couldn’t see their muzzle in front of their face. As the sun reached its peak we had arrived at a fenced in community with a big warehouse inside of it which wasn’t on my map so we were wary when we approached the gate and saw a big iron door with a microphone we approach the microphone and speak into the speaker “hello, hello what is this place” I spoke into it, we hear a hissing noise and a cough and a voice of some sort of female say “oh hello, we didn’t think we were getting a restock so soon but the store will be happy to hear that” she starts to ramble on and we quickly say " no no no sorry we aren’t a caravan we are just some ponies walking through and we noticed your settlement and we were just going to take a look and do some trading and maybe stay the night here.” “Oh my apologies we were just expecting a food caravan, but yeah welcome to oddton I will open the door for you” the voice says and with the audible click of a button the big metal door opens up to a dark blue room with a curtain which probably leads to the town, we pull back the curtain and we see a little town which seems to be mostly inside and must be 50 metres tall and I couldn’t see anypony flying around and I turn to the left and notice a pony like shape but it is what is attached to the pony like shape that scares me. What I see is a pink pony with a yellow mane in bangs but as she smiles and waves at us I see fangs jutting out of her upper and lower jaw and I look into some orange eyes with some vertical slits instead of a normal pupil she keeps smiling and waving as i slowly approach her. “Well hello there I can guess by your reaction to our entrance and to your reaction to me so I will answer some of your questions that you have about me or the pretty little town that I look over” she says as I try to rake my brain for what questions to ask, “What are you” I ask as I feel a gripping sensation on one of my backlegs which must be Gem as she probably is scared of the dark and of the unknown and I can’t really blame her as I am feeling the same. “I expected that question first well I am a batpony or a thestral if you would prefer the technical term and I can guess by the fact you asked that you do not know what a thestral is” “no we haven’t sorry” as I glance over at Happy Trees as she has been quiet probably because she is shocked at this species that she has never seen before “no need to apologise for that, not many ponies know that we exist except from some stories of a nocturnal race of pony from before the war but most ponies think that is just some mumbo jumbo made up by a crazy stallion” she says with a giggle at the end of the sentence before resuming her answer to my earlier question “thestrals are nocturnal but be are also different in a lot more ways then you on the outside” she says as she spreads her wings and for the first I see that she has not feathered wings like mine but leathery, jointed wings with claws on them and I extend my wings out of shock only to make contact with Happy Trees muzzle I quickly fold them only to see the thestral mare stifling a giggle as she clears her throat “didn’t see that coming did you, anyway as I said we are very different from you ponies we are nocturnal as I said and we also sleep upside down just like a bat because of our tails” she sighs and drops her cheerful persona “the next difference may be too much for you to take but I tell you this as the mare in charge of oddton that I am serious. We are omnivores and by that our diet is mainly meat with some fruit in it” she pauses to allow us to take that in. I will say this I was scared because they looked like she could do some damage with her fangs and her wings but she also looked so inviting so my fear was quickly lost as I wasn’t surprised as we had dealt with a cannibal settlement earlier. “Ok so you aren’t screaming so I take it you aren’t scared” she says as she raises and eyebrow. With the blink of an eye Happy Trees has a gun between her eyes and starts talking “you bitch I thought there was something fishy about this place that is why you let us in wasn’t it just so you could feast on us like we are some tiny little helpless Brahmin well no that is not how it is going to go down do you understand” I quickly run and tackle Happy Trees to the ground before she could do something she will regret “calm down Happy Trees this is not you what’s the matter,” “these monsters eat other ponies they must be exterminated” she spits at the thestral with obvious venom in her voice as she tries to wrestle her way out of my grip to get back to her gun but I somehow managed to keep her down, I look up at the batpony and noticed that she has recovered and was baring her fangs at Happy Trees and was also hissing at her and I quickly speak up at her “hey hey calm down Ms I am sorry for my friend’s reaction I had absolutely no idea of what she was going to do” I plead with her as the last we need out in the wasteland is another enemy and definitely not a nocturnal meat eating species. I stand between Happy Trees and the thestral as we all of a sudden here some weeping in the corner and look to see Gem huddled over in the corner as she obviously didn’t want to see any fighting as the past couple days has been way too much for a filly of her age, I look over at the thestral mare and almost like an instinct has activated in her she goes over and starts to sooth the filly and even hooks her tail around a nearby pool and starts to rock her to sleep and her demeanour has changed at the flick of a switch. After a few minutes Gem in napping and the mare is protecting her on the inside of her wings and I look up at her and she notices and she gets down and is careful to place Gem on her back, I whisper “What was that” to her and she quickly answers “parental instinct all female thestrals have it, we hear the sound of crying from anything from a pony to a Brahmin we have to try and stop it in the most peaceful way” as she says this I swear I can hear Happy Trees silently giggle at the word peaceful so noticing she isn’t going to be kind so I am going to have to be the ambassador for our group. “Are you sure you are okay with us staying here for a bit” I asked shocked that she would consider letting us stay after Happy Trees incident at the entrance, the mare whose name is Sweet Moonlight started to tell us about her town and as we were walking we noticed that there was only a few ponies walking around but the trading stalls were run by other races: griffins, changelings, other thestrals and even one or two crystal ponies Sweet Moonlight noticed our gazes and spoke up “yes there are not many ponies which is why we have the town the name Oddton because of its many oddities that live here” she answers like a cheesy salespony and we eventually reached a lone dark blue door with a symbol of a moon with an number 37 next to it “this where you can stay if you want and because of the problem at the front I will let sleep here for the first night free of charge but if you choose to stay here we can start charging you rent” she says as switches to buisnesspony in an instant. “Thank you Sweet Moonlight I am sure we will enjoy it” I say as she smiles and walks back to the entrance. Oddton: a town of odditiesWe closed the doors to our house and went to sit down on the chairs they had Happy Trees started to get more vocal "why are you treating these monsters like normal ponies and acting as if there is nothing wrong" I quickly shush her and place Gem down on the sofa because at the very least she was going to have a very comfortable sleep. After I had made her comfortable I push Happy Trees into another room and shut the door quietly "What the Buck is your problem Trees we had been accepted into a well defended settlement for the first time for years and you go and start being racist to the thestrals" I shouted at her with no remorse because she could not only killed an innocent mare but she could also just signed our own death warrants by making hundreds of thestrals, griffins, changelings and ponies had at us and want to kill us. This argument went on for what felt like hours with Happy Trees trying to make a point but I just keep shutting her down "Happy Trees we are going to say sorry to that mare and we are going to spend some time here just so you can get used to not being like you have been around these thestrals, what if we were out in the wasteland and we saw a thestral attacking another pony I don't want you making the wrong choices out there like you nearly did in here" after I finish explaining what was wrong she just sinks and her ears just remain planted on her head and she sulks off into the back of the house and hear the door close. The afternoon went by as Gem slept like a log for at least 4 or 5 hours and when she woke up she had completely forgotten about had happened before she went asleep she looked over at me and asked "where is Happy Trees?" And I point to the door at the far point of the room as I approach the door I knock but hear no response I push gently on the door and I realise it is unlocked. I quickly call out "I am coming in Happy Trees." When I open the door I notice that Happy Trees is hanging from the bar on the roof which must be for thestrals to hang from I quickly run and place my body beneath hers so she is no longer hanging and I quickly shout out "Gem come here quick it is important" I quickly hear the clopping sound of hooves on a wooden floor and as soon as she sees me and Happy Trees she screams I quickly try to talk to Gem before she faints "Gem I need you to be strong and go to my bag and grab the small knife in one of the small pouches quick I can't support her for long. After about a minute she comes running in and she levitate the knife up to the makeshift noose and cuts it and I feel the weight of Happy Trees become too much and we both collapse and me and Gem hear a loud knock on the front door and I am unable to get it so Gem goes to answer it and invites whoever it is into the room, it turned out to be Sweet Moonlight and she runs to me but I quickly look at her and then Happy Trees as she has passed out and I can see her breathing very shallowly she notices and goes over and checks her pulse and listens for a minute and comes back over to me "she is stable but it would be best to take her to the resident doctor Placebo and get a professional's opinion" she says as she looks over at Gem and then over to Happy Trees and I say "could you possibly help me move her she is a lot heavier then she looks" I say with a weak chuckle at the end Sweet smiles weakly and picks up Happy Trees and proceeds to take her to the medical clinic. When we arrived at the health clinic which was a small building with some red lights out the front it looked very similar to every other building around it but was only different by the lights out the front, we walk in the front and it is empty so Sweet Moonlight lets us in and we place Happy Trees on one of the examination beds and she says she is going to get the Doctor I think his name was Placebo. Gem sat down next to Happy Trees with her head tucked under Trees' foreleg and was trying her best to keep the unconscious Trees warm. After about 5 mins Sweet Moonlight came back in with 2 identical changelings which at first made my heart jump as they could have passed for security but as soon as one of them noticed the prone pony on the bed she rushed up to her and the other one came over to me and hugged me she said "Sweet told us what happened and me and my brother placebo just feel dread and the second we walked in here we could taste the sorrow and pain coming off of you and your compatriots and we just feel sorry for you." After a while of hugging me the changeling released me and went to the other changeling who was a male and they looked at each other and after some time she came back over to me and said "she is going to be okay but we want to know what would have brought her to this state, ponies do not just try to do this normally. "We were walking through to town and we noticed a big wall around a building and we wanted to check it out and when we noticed that there was an intercom we rung and entered not thinking anything of the area or the pony on the intercom and when we noticed that Sweet Moonlight was a thestral Happy trees got really silent and when Sweet said that her kind ate meat Trees put a gun up to her head and nearly shot her if it I hadn't of been there and she got mad as to why I was protected some monsters" I paused choking back tears as the weight of the situation finally had been made apparent and hit me all at once as I restarted "she still let us stay here so when we got to are house me and her had a huge argument and she went and let herself be in the room while I just slept on the couch, I woke up and I went to see if she had calmed down and she was hanging from the metal bar on the ceiling" as I finish telling the story tears are falling freely from my eyes and see the changeling and Sweet come over to comfort me as I just cry into the carapice of the changelings. After crying for about 5 minutes I calm down enough and I see Placebo go to keep a eye on both Trees and Gem and the other changeling stays by my side I quickly ask the changelings "I'm sorry I didn't ask this sooner but what is your name?" And she looks at me and realises "oh I said my brother's name but not mine sorry about that my name is Mimic" she answers as she smiles at me "what do you do here Mimic?" "Many things but mostly a nurse for my brother here and you can tell the difference between us because Place is missing a fang and I have a tear in my wing, I knew you were going to ask me that so I had to answer before you asked us" she said as she stayed by my side to help us through this situation. Oddton ContinuedWe stayed in the clinic for about 1 week as it turned out that Happy Trees' brain went without oxygen for 10 minutes so she went unconscious so we stayed beside her nearly the whole time she was out to make sure she was not brain dead. Luckily on the 2nd day they got an answer as quick check on the brain revealed that nothing vital was starved for too long but another couple of minutes could of had a very different outcome. On day 6 I went out and explored the city and it turned out to be a nice little town and the variety of the species that were here just made every corner you walked around different and it helped that Sweet told some of the guards about us so we were not not receiving much hostility but there were still a bunch of people that were not happy at a bunch of new ponies wondering about and this was an understatement. I had just turned a corner and was looking for a small cafe called Scraps run by a diamond dog named scruffy who was an ok cook but was really not kind to me and Gem when we went to him the first time he treated us like such but apprantely he treated all the regulars like that but he didn't learn that we were new ponies as he had a hatred for new ponies getting quick audiences with Mayor Sweet Moonlight. Inside the cafe it was a nice little place with a few thestrals and a couple griffins, we walked up to the main desk and looked up at the diamond dog and we ask for anything without meat and when he realises that we were those new ponies that were getting special treatment he walks around to the front of the desk and the griffins come around as well and the diamond dog says "you ponies pick the wrong cafe to come to today" he says while cracking his front paws, I immediately push Gem behind me and quickly whisper to her "go back to Trees" she quickly dashes off and I proceed to exhale through my nose to look as threatening as I could possibly be and this proves to be not enough as one of the Griffin henchman quickly throws me through the kitchen and I hit a shelf covered in various cooking alcohols and when the griffins see this they quickly grab a lighter and set me alight, the tips of my wings and my hooves catching fire as I feel a familiar feeling coursing through my veins as the flames do not feel like they are hurting but they feel like they are tickling ever so slightly. I let out a deep chuckle and slowly trot towards the Griffins I stay as close as I can but also circling him like the Griffin would in the wastes to catch some food, I look over my shoulder to see the customers holding Scruffy and the other Griffin back as I slowly walk towards the Griffin as his pupils shrink and he gulps and gets into a lame fighting stance I quickly clock him with a burning hoof right upside the beak as I am now laughing out loud now and I quickly change my target to Scruffy when I look at him with my wings nearly completely ablaze he wimpers and his ears go flat against his head I walk up to him and put my burning mane up to him and say "boo" I hear some water dripping and it turns that the dog has wet himself. I shake my head and I notice the fire on me and I quickly tried to find a way to put myself out and I went into the kitchen and dunk my head into the sink and quickly splash water onto my wings and quickly put it out and I shake my mane in order to try and get it to dry and I quickly run back to the clinic. I walk into the clinic after walking through the town with little to no interruptions as my mind is going into overdrive as I am scared that my body is not even hurt from being lit on fire and that it didn't faze and me and it tickles and the laugh I was making in the cafe made me shiver as a dull pain had started to appear on my body andnas I walk into the room that Happy Trees was given the doctors notice me and how my cuts had started to bleed and Placebo runs over to me "what happened to you?" She asks as I am surprised by her quick reaction to me and it also knocked me out of my thoughts "ahhh.... uhhhhhh" I stammer back and she already has bandages and rubbing alcohol nearby and I hear her tilting the bottle of makeshift disinfectant and as she presses it to my skin and I can't help but let out a scream as the alcohol burns but not like the fire earlier I hear clopping of hooves and a noise of someone sniffing as Sweet Moonlight walks and without looking at my body asks me "Who did it?" She says with authority that it scared me as I had never seen her like this and I answer with a fearful expression in my face "scruffy and 2 griffins" I say as she comes over to me and sits down next to me "tell me what happened NOW" she spits at me as a leader of a settlement learning that members of the settlement had attacked ponies and tried to seriously attack them. "We went to the Cafe owned by scruffy and he walked round with 2 griffins, when I could tell there was a fight brewing I sent Gem back here and they proceeded to throw me through the kitchen and I hit a shelf covered in bottles of alcohol they set me alight and something happened" I said as i didn't want to say what happened in case it made me seem dangerous and Sweet would kick me out of her town. "Are you lying to me because you are not missing any feathers" she says eyeing me with her slit pupils scanning me, I shake my head and sink back because she is making me really uncomfortable. Sweet gets in my face and is baring her fangs in a show of dominance and it makes me sink back and I start to get a feeling of dread and I begin to panic as an instinct inside me starts to look at her eyes and her fangs and my eyes glance at a door and my heart jumps in my chest my vision starts to go all hazy and I start to feel faint but I hear a voice "SWEET STOP" as I see a black blur in my vision I pass out. 3rd person pov Flashing light collapses and placebo notices this and immediately rushes to his aid as Mimic is now baring her fangs back at Sweet she steps in front of Light and says with venom literally dripping from her fangs "Do you see what you've done Sweet he has collapsed, you need to know when to lay off of someone" mimic glances to her sibling "what's the damage and as she turns her head she notices that Placebo is performing CPR on flashing light and instantly both the thestral and changeling's eyes go wide as they see Placebo trying to resuscitate the fallen Pegasus stallion she takes a break and looks at the pair "What are you doing just standing their get over hear and help me" mimic and Sweet run over as Placebo looks at Sweet Moonlight and says while baring his fangs "Not you you have done to much damage go and back a break and if we can revive him you owe him your life after this." Sweet Moonlight just falls back tears brimming as she just looks at the changelings attempting to revive the stallion on the floor of the clinic and she runs off back upstairs. The changelings continue the CPR on the stallion almost communicating without talking and proceed to try for couple minutes until they hear a laboured breath and a cough as the stallion opens his eyes slightly and immediately shuts few the bright light from the changeling's eyes.
A rocky beginningThe wastes of Baltimare are a harsh place with crime, drugs and conflict at every corner growing up can be a painful experience, some colts and fillies don't make it out there in the wasteland and if they do they change inside, it can change their mind and corrupt them and they will no longer be able to tell right from wrong, I was one of those colts, at 15 I lost both my parents and I was lost without them and I was scared. I was walking along the outer streets of Baltimare we had just left the park which was an old hoofball stadium which had been rebuilt to act as a society we were on our way back to the safety of our house when we got mugged, first he asked for any Meds we had so we handed our med-x and stimpacks over and they noticed we were not carrying weapons so I heard laughter I was crying because I had seen muggings happened before and they never ended pretty so when he started firing bullets I used my parents almost as a shield and I fell to the ground and played dead covered by the warm corpse of my mother and father. After a hour I couldn't hear any hoofsteps nearby so I got up and nearly vomited when I saw what remained of my parents; their faces were like Swiss cheese and I could see insects starting to feast on the foul smelling corpses. I took my chance and I ran I hoped and dreamed I wouldn't run into those bandits again and I made it home I was crying and Sweating at the fact that I had lost all of my family in a blink of an eye and I went to sleep that night crying myself to sleep I mean what would any other colt or filly do. I awoke in the middle of the night to the sound of the front door squeaking open and my heart hit my chest was it the raiders coming to finish the job I hid under the bed with the 10mm pistol that I took to bed with me that night, my heart was racing as I heard them going through my stuff hoping that they would not ascend the stairs, I heard the creaking of old wooden floorboards and I wished they would break but I would have no such luck. The hoofsteps slowly creaked towards my door so I took aim with the pistol but I didn't fire incase it was just another pony trying to get some supplies, the door opened and in stepped a green unicorn she had a yellow mane and I couldn't see her cutie mark because she was wearing some type of armour over her flank. She stepped in and took notice of me but didn't raise her gun because she saw my tear soaked pillow and my shaky grip of the gun and she put her hoofs up I said in between sniffles "W-W-WHAT do you want p-please don't hurt me." She flinched when she saw me aiming the gun at her but she also saw the gun shaking and slowly took a step forward. I flinched and dropped the gun but she still kept her hoofs up she must have been surrendering but I was confused to why she was surrendering because I had dropped my weapon, "Are you alright" she said with a voice that was so sweet it must have been dipped in honey, she moved closer now she knew I had dropped my gun she proceeded at quicker pace and when she reached me and she nuzzled me I stopped crying and I was sniffling and she said to me "what's your name." she said with a tone of a nice kind mother so from the voice of this mare I would of guessed she had been a parent before I tried to answer in a straight voice "flashing light" I did not deter from her touch as she was calming me down. This mare sat with me for what must have been a hour of her stroking my mane as she managed to coax me to sleep but I would not stay that way for long as I kept getting nightmares of the tragedy, but after the second time I decided to stay awake as it must have been about 4 am so I stayed up and I wanted to ask this mare some questions, "excuse me miss, but what is your name" she quickly answered "Happy Trees" I found that name ironic as the concept of happy trees to me as a child was silly and because the trees around me would not even be slightly happy with the weather especially the radiation storms. When the sun rose the horror of the night remained as I was still shaking as I had only got a few hours sleep because of constant nightmares, Happy Trees came and sat down beside me as I drank a nuka cola and ate a box of sugar bombs "Light we cannot stay here we are in a obvious place for raiders to come and look for loot and I am surprised you and your parents lasted this long." I expression didn't change for the better after hearing the news so I ran upstairs and quickly grabbed to 2 things I would need while moving out of the city my 10mm pistol which I called Pistal as I spelt it like that from a young age and a picture of the wall off my family and are old dog who disappeared one night and we haven't seen since. I came down and Happy Trees was packing the last of the food, water and Meds into her pack and she gave me one and I was carrying little bits of the supply because she did not want to overencumber me for a long journey. We walked for what felt like years it was never ending and when we found a nice town to stay in we would buy food, water and Meds and then we would leave and not come back and I was sad as I made a few friends in these towns. We were walking past a small town and we heard someone shouting for some help and when we looked to see who it was it was a yellow earth pony mare with a orange mane wearing some pipes over her chest was trying to get in a building to helped what sounded like crying. As soon as I heard the crying I immediately went and tried to help by trying to smother the flames with as cloth I had took out of my saddlebags and by trying to smother it i set it on fire as it could not extinguish the flames, I sighed and an idea popped into my head as I spread my wings and took a running leap and dove into the burning wreckage and as I searched it was proving to be quite tricky because of the smoke from the flames I could feel the feathers on my wings start to burn but I powered through until I found a room and I tripped over a toy or at least it sounded like that the squeak it made, sitting I the corner wrapped in hooves and blankets was a little blue earth pony with a midnight blue mane crying on the corner. I grabbed them and ran for the door and dove out my wings ablaze and the adrenaline coursing through my veins I let out a giggle as before I extinguish my wings I notice how it doesn't hurt but I still fill a dull tingling sensation and it turns out that I am alive this gives me a rush of energy, I start giggling madly that I fly back to the house and let the fire touch me with its warm embrace and I want to feel it all over my body so I set fire to my hoof and the burning sensation is a nice sensation all over my body I then spread the flame to my other hoof and then my back hooves and I walk back to Happy Trees and as I leave smouldering hoofprints a bandit jumps out armed with a long metal stick and he is carrying a backpack that is connected to the long stick and he is twitching he must have been the one who did this and as he looks set to set me ablaze I leap forward and use a blazing hoof and plant him right in the jaw and as it makes connection it starts sizzling like an onion in and hot Frying pan and when he is down i start to move closer towards his weapon and as I remove him from it I remember that he nearly committed murder on an innocent filly so my blood runs cold which was ironic because of the surroundings, I think about how to end this as many horrible images go through my skull as I hear a voice shouting out stop and I shake my head and notice happy trees with the filly and their parent hiding the filly from view as I realise what was going on and the pain hits me all at once, I collapse as I still hear the flames and the last thing I hear is happy trees coming to my aid as I fade off into unconsciousness.
Meeting happy treesHappy Trees POV I ran up to Flashing Light as he collapsed I quickly put out the flames on his wings and hooves and out if the corner of my eye I saw the raider running away with his tail in between his legs I called over the filly Light had saved and asked if they could follow me to safety before some ghouls find us the mare replied "yes where are you from miss" she asked while i hauled Flashing light onto my back, I replied "nowhere... ooff ... nowhere we just walk and have been for a year now started in manehatten after I meet Flashing light here in a house all alone crying. "Oh, did he say why he was crying?" "his parents were killed earlier the day I found him and he said he had to play dead under the bodies of the raiders who attacked them and he stayed there for a few hours" the FILLY immediately sunk her head with sorrow and I quickly said "yeah just proves how harsh these lands are little lady. where are your parents by the way i didn't see anyone nearby." She quickly started sniffling so we stopped by a wreckage of a former building it looked relatively untouched so we quickly took shelter in and got tk the top floor to get away from ghouls and molerats that were around "sssshh, i'm sorry sweety but I need you to be quiet because if there is ghouls out there they will hear us" I say giving the young filly a hug, I really have a way with kids don't I. (13 years ago) I walked down the road to the next settlement I was not a looter however I was just looking for some jobs to do quickly to earn some extra caps. I approached a small train station where I see a red mare with a orange mane doing some farm work, I call out to her "Hello, don't shoot I am not here to hurt you" I say quickly putting my forelegs up to show I meant peace the farmer quickly goes to draw her shotgun but sees my sign and lowers her aim but keeps the gun ready to fire, " what do you want, we don't want no trouble," I quickly reply back "just looking for some work, need to pay a debt and need a little bit extra to buy food, Meds you know the usual stuff" I lower my forelegs to take a small step forward and regain my balance I can see the mare thinking and she says "you any good with a sniper or any long range weapon" I nod my head I wasn't the best but you have to learn "we have alot of children here so we require some fresh food and water and there are some super mutants with some nukes but they don'the know what to do with them, so keep your distance but they have a farm just a little while south East of here, if you get the food and water we can give you some basic supplies and shelter from the night if you want." (Present day) I shake my head as hear flashing light coming too I move too support his head as the filly sits in the corner sobbing lightly, I see Light shaking his head and clenching his teeth proberly from the pain, I can't really blame him as from watching he did take alot of damage and he was on fire for quite a while, I see him try to sit up as I get his flask tof give him a drink he gulps the water down ferociously and does a small nod of appreciation as his voice was creaky from dehydration, "you all right mister sleepyhead" he quickly pushes a hoof into my mouth to shut me up "now is not the time trees" he says with some annoyance in his voice as he clears his voice and proceeds to get up to check our surroundings, "so what happened after I passed out" he says as he scans the horizon noticing the occasional city but what mostly used to be farmland. "Carried you hear while talking to the filly in the corner, don'the know her name or, what happened to her parents she teared up when I asked her" I say quitting down towards the end of the sentence so she wouldn't hear. "Well I am going to ask her name because I don't want to call her filly or kid the whole time as that is disrespectful, right Happy Trees" he says staring me in the eye test the end of the sentence making reference to me calling Light kid alot of the time mostly be caused it annoyed him and made him sulk light like a little baby, "you liked me calling you kid or kiddo didn't you" "NO I didn'the I have matured more then you over the year I have been travelling with you soexcuse me I am going to talk to the scared filly in the corner" he says pointing at the filly with his hoof."
This little filly lost her parentsI trotted up to the filly who had calmed herself down and was looking at the view of the city in the distance I cleared my throat and started to speak “Excuse me kid I just wanted to know how you were holding up, it has been an eventful day for us all hasn’t it?” I asked as I sat down next to her, she just nodded and used a forelegs to wipe her muzzle so I could tell she had been crying “can you introduce yourself please because we haven’t had time for a proper introduction yet” I say coming clean as I was not going to beat around the bush and try to drag a conversation out of her. “My name is Jade Gemstone but I was always called Gem for short” you could tell she was only going to tell us her name so I thought I would try to get her to tell us about her parents “you don’the have to tell us if you don’the want to but where are you parents Gem?” “You know where you saved me” I nodded in conformation “my parents were burned by that monster you saw burning our house” when she said this I felt my blood runs cold as I wish I had put an end to that raider scum right then and there but I had to push the thought aside as I was in the company of children so I had to stay calm “did you know the pony trying to burn down your house” I asked “no” she says, it doesn’t suprised me but I thought I would ask her. “Would you like, even to join us on our travels or do you want us to drop you off at the nearest settlement” I ask to which she immediately ponders the question you could tell by looking at her that a part of her wanted to go back to her parents house but even she knew how dangerous it was and she also did not want to be left at a settlement with a bunch of strangers so she speaks up “don’t leave me” she says as she dives into my chest hooves wrapping around my shoulders a feel some wet patches on my chest as my fur gets wet from her tears as I try to comfort her “sshhh shhh don’t cry we won’t leave you if you don’t want us to” I start stroking her mane with my hoof and she eventually calms down she starts to snore as I place her down on the floor gently as not to wake her as she probably hasn’t had a lot of sleep so I walk over to happy trees and say “we should stay here for the night and get some rest so lets block all the ways into the room and I will sit and keep watch because I have probably had the most rest even if it was accidental” I say with a chuckle at the end of a sentence. The night was uneventful a couple radroaches scuttling into view only to walk away towards a dumpster other then that it was peaceful so I decided to place a barricade down and try to get an actual bit of sleep as I was quite tired and I was still aching a little bit from the fight earlier I bring my wing over and notice that the feathers were not damaged and I just had a few out of place so I spent a little bit of time preening my wings and when I was satisfied with the condition I dosed of as I heard the sounds of crickets in the distance and a barely audible sound of the mares I was with breathing as I closed my eyes and faded of into a dream. I was startled awake by a banging as I heard 5 or 6 voices from outside the barricade I was and I heard a rough scratchy voice shouting “hand over the chems and nobody will get hurt” “no just got these and we need them please don’t take them” that second voice sounded really familiar so I flew to the barricade and as soon as i touched it the wood caught fire and i heard my mum screaming so I pulled the barricade down and saw my mum on fire and getting shot the flesh on her bones exposed and sizzling, I looked down at my hooves and they where burning but there was no pain and the raiders were also on fire my dad just stares at me and just screams at me “you are not my son, you are a monstrosity” as he says this his skins starts to melt as his eyes pop out of their sockets and I am left staring at those blank voids I side of a skull, I want to vomit but my body is lime it is controlling itself and I am the passenger as my mouth opens up and words are spat with fire sizzling on the floor as the world around me turns red with flames. “All these peasants will now down to me or they will burn hahahahahahahahahahaha” I laugh out with a very demonic chuckle at the end. I shoot up sweating and I see Happy Trees and Gem staring over me with obvious worry in their eyes and I realise I must have been tossing and turning in my sleep which must have been loud because we were on a wooden floor, I calm down and breath out and Happy Trees places a hoof on my shoulder and says “oh Celestia I thought you were having a seizure I was about to some Brahmin hide your mouth to stop you biting your tongue.” I look at her and say “thanks for the consideration but no know I just laid down and I must have had a nightmare you know normal stuff for me” I say as I stand up and stretch my wings and Happy Trees notices and looks shocked “how do you still have all of your feathers on your wings I saw them burning when we were outside Gem’s house,” “yeah I noticed that they were not even scorched I am just as confused as your are” I say as I fold my wings and shrug my shoulders, I quickly try to move the conversation off of me and ask “where are we heading anyway we didn’t really get to the bottom of where we were heading because of my sudden case of unconsciousness, “we were just heading south to scraptown but if Gem wants to change our course we can go somewhere else we will just have to get the map out. After much debate about where to go we had decided to keep heading towards scraptown which despite the name was one of the more well run towns in Baltimare and we decided we would try find some shelter there and then we would find some work to earn some caps. We made sure we were well packed and we started to move with me wings out ready to scout out the distance with some binoculars at a moment’s notice but I didn’t need them as there was not much action which was probably because we left at dawn so no raiders were awake or they were so drunk they couldn’t see their muzzle in front of their face. As the sun reached its peak we had arrived at a fenced in community with a big warehouse inside of it which wasn’t on my map so we were wary when we approached the gate and saw a big iron door with a microphone we approach the microphone and speak into the speaker “hello, hello what is this place” I spoke into it, we hear a hissing noise and a cough and a voice of some sort of female say “oh hello, we didn’t think we were getting a restock so soon but the store will be happy to hear that” she starts to ramble on and we quickly say " no no no sorry we aren’t a caravan we are just some ponies walking through and we noticed your settlement and we were just going to take a look and do some trading and maybe stay the night here.” “Oh my apologies we were just expecting a food caravan, but yeah welcome to oddton I will open the door for you” the voice says and with the audible click of a button the big metal door opens up to a dark blue room with a curtain which probably leads to the town, we pull back the curtain and we see a little town which seems to be mostly inside and must be 50 metres tall and I couldn’t see anypony flying around and I turn to the left and notice a pony like shape but it is what is attached to the pony like shape that scares me. What I see is a pink pony with a yellow mane in bangs but as she smiles and waves at us I see fangs jutting out of her upper and lower jaw and I look into some orange eyes with some vertical slits instead of a normal pupil she keeps smiling and waving as i slowly approach her. “Well hello there I can guess by your reaction to our entrance and to your reaction to me so I will answer some of your questions that you have about me or the pretty little town that I look over” she says as I try to rake my brain for what questions to ask, “What are you” I ask as I feel a gripping sensation on one of my backlegs which must be Gem as she probably is scared of the dark and of the unknown and I can’t really blame her as I am feeling the same. “I expected that question first well I am a batpony or a thestral if you would prefer the technical term and I can guess by the fact you asked that you do not know what a thestral is” “no we haven’t sorry” as I glance over at Happy Trees as she has been quiet probably because she is shocked at this species that she has never seen before “no need to apologise for that, not many ponies know that we exist except from some stories of a nocturnal race of pony from before the war but most ponies think that is just some mumbo jumbo made up by a crazy stallion” she says with a giggle at the end of the sentence before resuming her answer to my earlier question “thestrals are nocturnal but be are also different in a lot more ways then you on the outside” she says as she spreads her wings and for the first I see that she has not feathered wings like mine but leathery, jointed wings with claws on them and I extend my wings out of shock only to make contact with Happy Trees muzzle I quickly fold them only to see the thestral mare stifling a giggle as she clears her throat “didn’t see that coming did you, anyway as I said we are very different from you ponies we are nocturnal as I said and we also sleep upside down just like a bat because of our tails” she sighs and drops her cheerful persona “the next difference may be too much for you to take but I tell you this as the mare in charge of oddton that I am serious. We are omnivores and by that our diet is mainly meat with some fruit in it” she pauses to allow us to take that in. I will say this I was scared because they looked like she could do some damage with her fangs and her wings but she also looked so inviting so my fear was quickly lost as I wasn’t surprised as we had dealt with a cannibal settlement earlier. “Ok so you aren’t screaming so I take it you aren’t scared” she says as she raises and eyebrow. With the blink of an eye Happy Trees has a gun between her eyes and starts talking “you bitch I thought there was something fishy about this place that is why you let us in wasn’t it just so you could feast on us like we are some tiny little helpless Brahmin well no that is not how it is going to go down do you understand” I quickly run and tackle Happy Trees to the ground before she could do something she will regret “calm down Happy Trees this is not you what’s the matter,” “these monsters eat other ponies they must be exterminated” she spits at the thestral with obvious venom in her voice as she tries to wrestle her way out of my grip to get back to her gun but I somehow managed to keep her down, I look up at the batpony and noticed that she has recovered and was baring her fangs at Happy Trees and was also hissing at her and I quickly speak up at her “hey hey calm down Ms I am sorry for my friend’s reaction I had absolutely no idea of what she was going to do” I plead with her as the last we need out in the wasteland is another enemy and definitely not a nocturnal meat eating species. I stand between Happy Trees and the thestral as we all of a sudden here some weeping in the corner and look to see Gem huddled over in the corner as she obviously didn’t want to see any fighting as the past couple days has been way too much for a filly of her age, I look over at the thestral mare and almost like an instinct has activated in her she goes over and starts to sooth the filly and even hooks her tail around a nearby pool and starts to rock her to sleep and her demeanour has changed at the flick of a switch. After a few minutes Gem in napping and the mare is protecting her on the inside of her wings and I look up at her and she notices and she gets down and is careful to place Gem on her back, I whisper “What was that” to her and she quickly answers “parental instinct all female thestrals have it, we hear the sound of crying from anything from a pony to a Brahmin we have to try and stop it in the most peaceful way” as she says this I swear I can hear Happy Trees silently giggle at the word peaceful so noticing she isn’t going to be kind so I am going to have to be the ambassador for our group. “Are you sure you are okay with us staying here for a bit” I asked shocked that she would consider letting us stay after Happy Trees incident at the entrance, the mare whose name is Sweet Moonlight started to tell us about her town and as we were walking we noticed that there was only a few ponies walking around but the trading stalls were run by other races: griffins, changelings, other thestrals and even one or two crystal ponies Sweet Moonlight noticed our gazes and spoke up “yes there are not many ponies which is why we have the town the name Oddton because of its many oddities that live here” she answers like a cheesy salespony and we eventually reached a lone dark blue door with a symbol of a moon with an number 37 next to it “this where you can stay if you want and because of the problem at the front I will let sleep here for the first night free of charge but if you choose to stay here we can start charging you rent” she says as switches to buisnesspony in an instant. “Thank you Sweet Moonlight I am sure we will enjoy it” I say as she smiles and walks back to the entrance.
Oddton: a town of odditiesWe closed the doors to our house and went to sit down on the chairs they had Happy Trees started to get more vocal "why are you treating these monsters like normal ponies and acting as if there is nothing wrong" I quickly shush her and place Gem down on the sofa because at the very least she was going to have a very comfortable sleep. After I had made her comfortable I push Happy Trees into another room and shut the door quietly "What the Buck is your problem Trees we had been accepted into a well defended settlement for the first time for years and you go and start being racist to the thestrals" I shouted at her with no remorse because she could not only killed an innocent mare but she could also just signed our own death warrants by making hundreds of thestrals, griffins, changelings and ponies had at us and want to kill us. This argument went on for what felt like hours with Happy Trees trying to make a point but I just keep shutting her down "Happy Trees we are going to say sorry to that mare and we are going to spend some time here just so you can get used to not being like you have been around these thestrals, what if we were out in the wasteland and we saw a thestral attacking another pony I don't want you making the wrong choices out there like you nearly did in here" after I finish explaining what was wrong she just sinks and her ears just remain planted on her head and she sulks off into the back of the house and hear the door close. The afternoon went by as Gem slept like a log for at least 4 or 5 hours and when she woke up she had completely forgotten about had happened before she went asleep she looked over at me and asked "where is Happy Trees?" And I point to the door at the far point of the room as I approach the door I knock but hear no response I push gently on the door and I realise it is unlocked. I quickly call out "I am coming in Happy Trees." When I open the door I notice that Happy Trees is hanging from the bar on the roof which must be for thestrals to hang from I quickly run and place my body beneath hers so she is no longer hanging and I quickly shout out "Gem come here quick it is important" I quickly hear the clopping sound of hooves on a wooden floor and as soon as she sees me and Happy Trees she screams I quickly try to talk to Gem before she faints "Gem I need you to be strong and go to my bag and grab the small knife in one of the small pouches quick I can't support her for long. After about a minute she comes running in and she levitate the knife up to the makeshift noose and cuts it and I feel the weight of Happy Trees become too much and we both collapse and me and Gem hear a loud knock on the front door and I am unable to get it so Gem goes to answer it and invites whoever it is into the room, it turned out to be Sweet Moonlight and she runs to me but I quickly look at her and then Happy Trees as she has passed out and I can see her breathing very shallowly she notices and goes over and checks her pulse and listens for a minute and comes back over to me "she is stable but it would be best to take her to the resident doctor Placebo and get a professional's opinion" she says as she looks over at Gem and then over to Happy Trees and I say "could you possibly help me move her she is a lot heavier then she looks" I say with a weak chuckle at the end Sweet smiles weakly and picks up Happy Trees and proceeds to take her to the medical clinic. When we arrived at the health clinic which was a small building with some red lights out the front it looked very similar to every other building around it but was only different by the lights out the front, we walk in the front and it is empty so Sweet Moonlight lets us in and we place Happy Trees on one of the examination beds and she says she is going to get the Doctor I think his name was Placebo. Gem sat down next to Happy Trees with her head tucked under Trees' foreleg and was trying her best to keep the unconscious Trees warm. After about 5 mins Sweet Moonlight came back in with 2 identical changelings which at first made my heart jump as they could have passed for security but as soon as one of them noticed the prone pony on the bed she rushed up to her and the other one came over to me and hugged me she said "Sweet told us what happened and me and my brother placebo just feel dread and the second we walked in here we could taste the sorrow and pain coming off of you and your compatriots and we just feel sorry for you." After a while of hugging me the changeling released me and went to the other changeling who was a male and they looked at each other and after some time she came back over to me and said "she is going to be okay but we want to know what would have brought her to this state, ponies do not just try to do this normally. "We were walking through to town and we noticed a big wall around a building and we wanted to check it out and when we noticed that there was an intercom we rung and entered not thinking anything of the area or the pony on the intercom and when we noticed that Sweet Moonlight was a thestral Happy trees got really silent and when Sweet said that her kind ate meat Trees put a gun up to her head and nearly shot her if it I hadn't of been there and she got mad as to why I was protected some monsters" I paused choking back tears as the weight of the situation finally had been made apparent and hit me all at once as I restarted "she still let us stay here so when we got to are house me and her had a huge argument and she went and let herself be in the room while I just slept on the couch, I woke up and I went to see if she had calmed down and she was hanging from the metal bar on the ceiling" as I finish telling the story tears are falling freely from my eyes and see the changeling and Sweet come over to comfort me as I just cry into the carapice of the changelings. After crying for about 5 minutes I calm down enough and I see Placebo go to keep a eye on both Trees and Gem and the other changeling stays by my side I quickly ask the changelings "I'm sorry I didn't ask this sooner but what is your name?" And she looks at me and realises "oh I said my brother's name but not mine sorry about that my name is Mimic" she answers as she smiles at me "what do you do here Mimic?" "Many things but mostly a nurse for my brother here and you can tell the difference between us because Place is missing a fang and I have a tear in my wing, I knew you were going to ask me that so I had to answer before you asked us" she said as she stayed by my side to help us through this situation.
Oddton ContinuedWe stayed in the clinic for about 1 week as it turned out that Happy Trees' brain went without oxygen for 10 minutes so she went unconscious so we stayed beside her nearly the whole time she was out to make sure she was not brain dead. Luckily on the 2nd day they got an answer as quick check on the brain revealed that nothing vital was starved for too long but another couple of minutes could of had a very different outcome. On day 6 I went out and explored the city and it turned out to be a nice little town and the variety of the species that were here just made every corner you walked around different and it helped that Sweet told some of the guards about us so we were not not receiving much hostility but there were still a bunch of people that were not happy at a bunch of new ponies wondering about and this was an understatement. I had just turned a corner and was looking for a small cafe called Scraps run by a diamond dog named scruffy who was an ok cook but was really not kind to me and Gem when we went to him the first time he treated us like such but apprantely he treated all the regulars like that but he didn't learn that we were new ponies as he had a hatred for new ponies getting quick audiences with Mayor Sweet Moonlight. Inside the cafe it was a nice little place with a few thestrals and a couple griffins, we walked up to the main desk and looked up at the diamond dog and we ask for anything without meat and when he realises that we were those new ponies that were getting special treatment he walks around to the front of the desk and the griffins come around as well and the diamond dog says "you ponies pick the wrong cafe to come to today" he says while cracking his front paws, I immediately push Gem behind me and quickly whisper to her "go back to Trees" she quickly dashes off and I proceed to exhale through my nose to look as threatening as I could possibly be and this proves to be not enough as one of the Griffin henchman quickly throws me through the kitchen and I hit a shelf covered in various cooking alcohols and when the griffins see this they quickly grab a lighter and set me alight, the tips of my wings and my hooves catching fire as I feel a familiar feeling coursing through my veins as the flames do not feel like they are hurting but they feel like they are tickling ever so slightly. I let out a deep chuckle and slowly trot towards the Griffins I stay as close as I can but also circling him like the Griffin would in the wastes to catch some food, I look over my shoulder to see the customers holding Scruffy and the other Griffin back as I slowly walk towards the Griffin as his pupils shrink and he gulps and gets into a lame fighting stance I quickly clock him with a burning hoof right upside the beak as I am now laughing out loud now and I quickly change my target to Scruffy when I look at him with my wings nearly completely ablaze he wimpers and his ears go flat against his head I walk up to him and put my burning mane up to him and say "boo" I hear some water dripping and it turns that the dog has wet himself. I shake my head and I notice the fire on me and I quickly tried to find a way to put myself out and I went into the kitchen and dunk my head into the sink and quickly splash water onto my wings and quickly put it out and I shake my mane in order to try and get it to dry and I quickly run back to the clinic. I walk into the clinic after walking through the town with little to no interruptions as my mind is going into overdrive as I am scared that my body is not even hurt from being lit on fire and that it didn't faze and me and it tickles and the laugh I was making in the cafe made me shiver as a dull pain had started to appear on my body andnas I walk into the room that Happy Trees was given the doctors notice me and how my cuts had started to bleed and Placebo runs over to me "what happened to you?" She asks as I am surprised by her quick reaction to me and it also knocked me out of my thoughts "ahhh.... uhhhhhh" I stammer back and she already has bandages and rubbing alcohol nearby and I hear her tilting the bottle of makeshift disinfectant and as she presses it to my skin and I can't help but let out a scream as the alcohol burns but not like the fire earlier I hear clopping of hooves and a noise of someone sniffing as Sweet Moonlight walks and without looking at my body asks me "Who did it?" She says with authority that it scared me as I had never seen her like this and I answer with a fearful expression in my face "scruffy and 2 griffins" I say as she comes over to me and sits down next to me "tell me what happened NOW" she spits at me as a leader of a settlement learning that members of the settlement had attacked ponies and tried to seriously attack them. "We went to the Cafe owned by scruffy and he walked round with 2 griffins, when I could tell there was a fight brewing I sent Gem back here and they proceeded to throw me through the kitchen and I hit a shelf covered in bottles of alcohol they set me alight and something happened" I said as i didn't want to say what happened in case it made me seem dangerous and Sweet would kick me out of her town. "Are you lying to me because you are not missing any feathers" she says eyeing me with her slit pupils scanning me, I shake my head and sink back because she is making me really uncomfortable. Sweet gets in my face and is baring her fangs in a show of dominance and it makes me sink back and I start to get a feeling of dread and I begin to panic as an instinct inside me starts to look at her eyes and her fangs and my eyes glance at a door and my heart jumps in my chest my vision starts to go all hazy and I start to feel faint but I hear a voice "SWEET STOP" as I see a black blur in my vision I pass out. 3rd person pov Flashing light collapses and placebo notices this and immediately rushes to his aid as Mimic is now baring her fangs back at Sweet she steps in front of Light and says with venom literally dripping from her fangs "Do you see what you've done Sweet he has collapsed, you need to know when to lay off of someone" mimic glances to her sibling "what's the damage and as she turns her head she notices that Placebo is performing CPR on flashing light and instantly both the thestral and changeling's eyes go wide as they see Placebo trying to resuscitate the fallen Pegasus stallion she takes a break and looks at the pair "What are you doing just standing their get over hear and help me" mimic and Sweet run over as Placebo looks at Sweet Moonlight and says while baring his fangs "Not you you have done to much damage go and back a break and if we can revive him you owe him your life after this." Sweet Moonlight just falls back tears brimming as she just looks at the changelings attempting to revive the stallion on the floor of the clinic and she runs off back upstairs. The changelings continue the CPR on the stallion almost communicating without talking and proceed to try for couple minutes until they hear a laboured breath and a cough as the stallion opens his eyes slightly and immediately shuts few the bright light from the changeling's eyes.
