Ashen, Ashen. All Fall Down
“We... we are basically good."
"Haven't you been paying attention, Littlepip? Deep inside, we're all raiders."
"No! That's not true."
"No? Even the best of us fall to evil at the drop of a hat.”
― kkat, Fallout: Equestria
Where must we go?
We must wander the wasteland to find our better selves.
Mad Max: Thunder Road
In the collective memories of the area survivors, the town had always been there. The settlement grew up from a family farm, to a family of farms, then it became a town when a rail link arrived to provide shipping of farm products to the big centres making it a prosperous community. Growth ceased when the highway bypassed it. Freeways are fast and straight and will not bend to the desire of a town. The municipality remained the regional centre for the movement of goods but nothing new was built until it was decided that the town should adapted and move its entrance closer to the highway like a welcoming mouth trying to draw passerby’s in.
Greed and bigotry turned economies based on trade into economies based on the building of weapons and a war that lasted decades. What is known of the Last Day is that the Zebra Empire attacked first. They were backed into a corner by rumors of fantastic discoveries made by the Equestrian Nation. The city of Cloudsdayle was the first to be stuck and it burned as it fell from the sky. The Pegasi abandoned the war and Equestria. They slammed the cloud making machines on full and blocked the sky from the world.
Megaspell bombs flew from the West, Bailfire bombs from the East, and the world died.
In the eyes of the enemy, the town wasn’t strategic enough to warrant its own ordnance. Nuclear shockwaves blew out every door and window leaving empty sockets making the buildings skull like. Food stores dwindled, and the water became poisonous. Surviving residents left. The town’s welcoming approach attracted looters, hoarders and burners.
The band of brothers and sisters walked into the small town. Four male, two female. Three Earth pony, three Unicorn. They all wore the sky-blue coveralls with a gold band going up the centre, around the Eisenhower collar and back down the midline. It made them instantly recognisable as Stable Dwellers. They had collected bits of scrap to use as barding. Sheet metal shards, chunks of leather stitched together. All extremely inefficient to bullets, let alone lasers. They didn't try to hide their uniforms with their makeshift armour or their near pristine saddlebags. It wasn't relevant to them. They were on a quest to become heroes.
The entrance to the town turned into a main-street framed by a sign on one side and a statue of a pony on the other. Half the sign had been obliterated by a shock wave. What remained was a square of plywood hanging like a heavy flag. Raiders had defaced the remains long ago.
Welcome To
Fuck You
“Must be a town of raider poets,” joked the comedian of the group.
“Look sharp, scan for red bars in and around these buildings. Snipers and such.” The leader said, maintaining his air of responsibility.
The Unicorn female named Nsaid, used her magic to levitate a bulky rectangular plate from her saddlebag. She scanned the area in front of her. “Nope, no reds, no badies. No greens for that matter.”
“I’ve never seen a green bar on that thing. It's always bad or caution.”
“Raiders must've liked this guy,” said the inquisitive one while admiring the statue. “No graffiti, no bullet holes. Just a statue of an ordinary Earth pony,” the one beside the leader said.
“I'll tell you what, I'll let you carve your initials on it when we leave,” mocked the joker.
“No! We won’t act like them. We have more self respect,” leader stamped his hoof.
“Ya,” she hesitated, talking more to herself. “No cutie mark either.”
They walked to the first intersection which had a stone statue in the centre of the roundabout. This one was well defaced with spray paint and bullet holes. It stared out of town with one hoof raised. The Unicorn with the device scanned the area. “Clear! My Pip Buck says that a statue with one hoof raised means the subject fought in battle but died later.”
“Same face though. Probably massed-produced during the war. Why would this one be vandalized?” mused the thoughtful one.
“Because he's a war hero. Raiders hate that. Time to find a place to bed down for the night.”
The centre of town was a larger version of the first intersection. It did not contain a roundabout. At the intersection of the six roads stood a raised platform. A broken statue lay on its side in the centre of a dry and dirty fountain. The six roads represented the six ministry mares, but the town wasn't large enough for any ministry hubs. There was one official government building that was thoroughly burned and destroyed.
Curiosity climbed the platform and inspected the broken statue. “This one has a cutie mark, a gun. Not very original for a war hero. Looks like both his forehooves were in the air before it got toppled. What does that mean?”
“Pip Buck says he died in battle. Is it the same face?”
“Could be. Bastards shot it up a lot. Unobstructed view from up here. Let's try that building on the corner.”
The squad chose the corner store because it was well looted and mostly empty of debris, skeletons and feces. Previous occupiers had constructed a fire pit by a window. It appeared that most of the smoke from previous fires drifted out the window most of the smoke from previous fires drifted out the window opening, blacklining the walls with greasy soot. The technician made a camp fire from the remnants of an old chair. The group opened one can of beans and warmed it in the embers. They passed it around, taking one spoonfull each time it made its way around. They took pride in their ability to be systematic in their vigilance.
“All right patrol, what have we learned today?”
“The grain silos are a rotten mess. Nothing is even growing out of them. The fields are covered in thistles and a knotweed tried to pull me in when I touched it. My hypothesise is that it drags in living creatures to use as fertilizer. What’s left in the water tower is so radioactive you’d need to swallow a mouth full of Radaway for each gulp of water.”
“Are you all right?” asked the leader’s companion.
“Yes, just a little scratched up. No need to waist a healing potion.” She lifted her forelegs to show the abrasions received fighting her way out of the hungry knotweed.
“Wasteland be boring. And this town is thoroughly ransacked. I found three bottle caps, a bunch of spent cartridges and no bullets, that's all,” grumbled the pony with the least amount of armour and the one most spoiling for a fight.
“Didn't even learn the name of this place. It's only a little off the beaten path but well pillaged.
Nothing in any store except some busts of that war hero. They each had blue eyes. And some posters from the Ministry of Image marketing ‘Silent Sentinel’ statues as a place to lay flowers and to recognise the sacrifice of soldiers. And insisting that your town get one before the next town over does. Another war propaganda and money-making scheme brought to you by the Ministry Mares,” the science officer reported.
“I think you’re wrong, mostly. From what I’ve read, a lot of soldiers didn’t return home. It may have been comforting to have a place to go and remember loved ones.”
“Yah, but why did everything have to be such a scam?”
“Maybe besides being an agricultural hub, this town made sandstone statues as a side project and shipped them around Equestria.”
“So, the only thing that sets this town apart from any other wasteland shithole is a bunch of statures?”
“I can understand raiders not wanting to carry off a bunch of rock. But from what we’ve seen, raiders smash and vandalise everything they can’t loot. Why leave the one at the town entrance intact?”
“I think we have a bigger mystery here, gang,” piped up the nerdy one, “Did anypony notice that what we said was wrong about each statue we passed was missing or corrected when we found the next statue? The first one was undamaged. The next one was vandalised in just the way I said it should be. Face missing, cutie mark added.”
“This is the lamest of mysteries. Who cares what happened to some statue years or even hundreds of years ago.”
“Still, kinda weird.”
“Weird,” mocked the joker.
“Weird,” teased the companion.
“Weird,” imitated the science officer
“Weird,” ridiculed the stern pony.
“Weird,” said the sandstone statue sitting just behind the group.
“Monster,” shouted leader pulling the pistol from his saddlebag and shooting off the statue’s ear.
“THOU SHALL NOT WASTE AMMUNITIONS,” returned the statue as his ear regrew inside a twisting puff of dust.
The team sat frozen watching the sculpture move its head back and forth. “Are you a friendly ghoul?” curious asked. “We come in peace and we don’t know anything about ghouls.”
“I'm not a ghoul. Not too sure what I am. I have some memories from before the war. I lose old memories if I don't use them, like you. My brain kinda works like yours. Want to see it?”
“What, your brain?” curious asked again.
“Sure, watch.” The living sculpture placed his hooves on his temples as his ears along with his head and face cascaded away in waterfalls of sand. His hooves held a lump of heavily crevassed sand on a stalk with his blue eyes starring forward. The sand crawled back up his shoulders and swirled around reforming his head.
“Well, that was the creepiest thing I will ever see,” groaned the action seeking one.
“Not if you keep traveling the wasteland. It's just a trick anyway. I’m not really made of sand, but I don’t give away my personal secrets to strangers. Just breaking the tension. So, time for some introductions. They call me Sandy Shoals. I don’t think that’s my birth name, it’s the name of a settlement and somepony though it suited me.”
“I’m Apex, and this is my wife Juniper Berries. She’s already found her new life name. You see, we're on a heroes’ quest. Giving up our past life and names. We left our stable and are on our way to greatness. Legend has it that our stable was a medical facility before the Steel Rangers liberated it a century ago.”
“I’m sorry to interrupt, but did you say, ‘Steel Rangers liberate’? That’s not been my experience in the Wasteland. They’re looters and technology hoarders. They wear the magickly-powered armour that’s not even their own. Which begs the question, why did they allow you to keep a PipBuck?”
“How do you know we have one?”
Sandy Shoals drew breath to sigh, “I saw you pull it out of your saddlebag. It’s a PipBuck 2000. Hoof-held device that’s rather cumbersome in a fire fight. Let me see it.” Nsaid, the science unicorn reluctantly levitated their prize possession over. Sandy Shoals flipped it a few times. “This one has a crude Eyes Forward Sparkle magic targeting spell. It will indicate direction and gauge whether or not ponies or creatures around you are hostile. The S.A.T.S. (Stable-Tec Arcane Targeting Spell) seems intact. Keep it close to your head while shooting and it should work fine. Let me show you mine. It’s based on an advanced PipBuck for elite Pegasi fighters.” A blue oval appeared on Sandy’s left forleg. “I came across the schematics in Canterlot. Instead of using wires and circuits, I use gold and silicon. I can make my mind see at a very small level, so it’s made at almost the molecular level. The ghoul professors at the Royal University are happy to teach again, if you ask nicely. Or, if they’re stuck in a constant replay of their last day alive, you can trick them into repeating all the classes you need. I don’t sleep, and I think I’m immortal, so I probably collected a few degrees there.”
“What’s it like to be immortal? I mean, how do you know?”
“It’s like having all the time in the world and nowhere to go. It’s very easy to have the ‘I’ll do it tomorrow’ attitude because there is always a tomorrow. How do I know I can’t be killed? I just know. I certainly tried often enough.”
“Gasp, what? It’s forbidden to speak like that!” said Juniper Berrys.
“Canterlot Dragons have tried to swallow me whole until they taste nothing but sand and spit out what they can. I’ve fought warlords hoof to hoof and even let them cheat with hidden weapons. They just end up exhausted. The adage of pounding sand comes to mind. I’ve fought in gladiator tournaments with raiders and slavers. Explosives, acids, flames, nothing effects me. I’m suddenly reminded of one time a raider snuck in a fire hose and blasted me in the face with it. I dissolved into the dirt on the floor. I let him have his victory strut around the showground. Then I started drumming on the concrete terrifying him and the audience. You must make a good show of it when you’re in the arena. Well that, and being able to survive. Anyway, I splattered him and won every tournament I’ve been in. Is this helpful?”
“I’ve got a better question. If you’re from the generation that destroyed the world, I mean, how could you let it happen? According to the histories, we had the six Heroes of Equestria and the Goddesses on our side.”
Sandy looked out the window at the grey walls and dark sky. “It took twenty years of bungling and profiteering. Ponies had no experience with war. We had to win at all cost. That was our conviction. Our mindset. The Heroes were separated into the six ministries and didn’t work together again. They lost their harmony. And the Goddesses, despite what they teach in the Stables, were just princesses with no real combat leadership experience.”
“Is that why we lost?”
“We lost just as much as the Zebra Nation lost. Neither land survived.”
“Allow me to continue with introductions. This is Impact and Bruxism, our fighters. Impact loves bad puns and good jokes. Bruxism is always spoiling for a fight. He’s destined for wonderful things. His words, not mine,” Apex said with a smile.
“Once I find my magic sword, you guys won’t be laughing,” Bruxism said through a frown.
“And our two smartie ponies. Dentin and Nsaid. Top in their class back in the Stable. Looks like we made a friend. So, let’s stop being gloomy and be more positive. Plus, if he has lots to teach us, he just might be the One,” Apex added enthusiastically.
The gang smiled and whispered back and forth. Sandy overheard them mention ‘oracle’.
“Let’s break out a can of dessert in celebration of our meeting. Your choice, new friend Sandy Shoals. Banana or watermelon?”
“Thank you, but I don’t eat. Please don’t let me stop you,” Sandy said. he watched intently as a pony stabbed the top of a can and worked the opener to remove the lid of a two hundred-year-old tin of watermelon. He gazed at a single drop of syrup as it fell from the lip to the dust on the floor, making a silent crater. “Please try to avoid any waist,” Sandy said as he tried to moisten his stone lips with his gritty tongue.
Right then. “We’ll save the can. What do you think it’s worth?”
“Check the PipBuck. Click next to inventory,” Sandy said looking away.
“One quarter bottle cap. It’s something.”
“I’d like to hear the story of your Stable and the Steel Rangers, if you don’t mind.”
“Well, legend has it that about a hundred years ago, and remember this is our point of view, the Rangers popped the great door open for us and our people returned to the surface. Ours was a specialised medical Stable…”
“Say it right Apex,” Interjected Bruxism.
“Huh, right. Our ancestors were dentists and we lost a lot of their knowledge. Our Unicorns only remember one spell that, when used in conjunction with a healing potion, will regrow lost teeth. The above Stable colony became a base for the local Steel Rangers until it became overpopulated. The Rangers taught this band of ponies right hear to set off on an expedition of adventure,” Apex said clopping the pony next to him on the shoulder.
The seams of Sandy’s joints glowed red. Wisps of smoke escaped his eyes and ears. “They kicked you out because your settlement was becoming too successful? There is little, to no triumph over the wasteland and then when the tin cans get some, they send it away.” His forelegs shimmered with heat and became molten. The right one flowed into a curve, cooling to reveal a glass sickle. The left into an approximation of the can opener the used by the gang. Sandy Shoal took a deep breath to calm himself. “I’m sorry. I have a bad temper when it comes to certain things.” The glass weapons fell off Sandy’s shoulders and new forelegs grew from dust and grit that twirled up from the floor. His PipBuck flashed its blue oval for a second, then faded. “Look, I wish to share something with you, my new friends. A vulnerability. It takes courage to become exposed, so please understand that my advice is from the heart. I don’t know what I am. I could be the result of a military experiment just as easily as I could be the result of a curse from the Everfree Forest. I don’t remember sleep or taste. My memory is a collage of scenes from another world where the sky is a distinct colour, not matte grey. The only thing I feel is a thirst so intense I can’t describe it. So, if you think I’m an oracle, prophet or not, I say with all conviction. Go home. Your settlement worked. It’s thriving in this land of death. Go home, make babies, be successful. The wasteland will chew you up. It will either kill you instantly, or it will grind you down into hideous shells of your former selves.”
“I am determined to find a magic sword. My magic sword. And when I do, I’m changing my name and taking the name of the sword,” Bruxism shouted. “Night Guard got the best name ever and all she does is wait on the Steel Rangers. I deserve a better name than Grinding Teeth.”
Sandy shook his head slowly. “It never changes,” He said to himself. Then aloud, “Who takes first watch?”
“Well, we usually sleep in a group around the fire. Its been fine, so far.”
“I’ll take the first watch then. As I said, I don’t require sleep.”
Just before the sun rose on the grey-clouded world making it slightly less gloomy, Apex walked up to the sand stone figure standing in front of the building.
“You’re very good at being a statue. You don’t blink or breath. Your eyes are flakes of blue porcelain, I think. Are you looking at something?”
“My PipBuck is showing me four red bars across the highway and two more in the hills. A sniper and his spotter for sure. It’s time for your people to move on. I’ll walk with you for a while, but I don’t want to stay with you.” He sighed, “I know how things go in the Wasteland. I’m sick to death of seeing it. I’ll teach your squad a few things like how to kill and cook Radhog.”
“Yah, but we’re herbivores. I don’t think we can do that.”
“Well, just wait until you’re woken up by the smell of Radhog bacon cooking on the skillet.”
“That’s part of what I want to talk to you about. I don’t think we can kill anypony let alone a nasty old Radhog. Request permission to network, sir. To speak freely.”
“You don’t need permission to speak your mind around me. Let’s hear it, soldier.”
“I don’t think my team is up for the challenge. We don’t know how to kill or defend ourselves. The Steel Rangers filled our heads with stories of hero quests and sent us on our way.”
“Well, like the good little mentor I am, I have a possible solution. Let’s go share it with your gang, shall we.”
Apex took the roll of statue as Sandy turned to go. “I see. You have the question all leaders ask themselves. The question that keeps all good commanders awake at night. You want to ask me…”
“Am I a good leader?” Apex sighed. “I mean I just volunteered for the job when no other pony would take it. I try to sound positive, but I have no training, and I really don’t know what I’m doing.”
“Here’s what I just heard. You took the job because you want your people safe. You never told me what you want except what’s best for your people. You worry about them. Yep, you’re their leader. Now I’m going to remind them of that in a little speech and send you on a safe quest. I’d also like to thank you for giving me a recovered memory. When you were all official just now, I was back in Canterlot standing on a spire with my friends. It was my turn to write the night poem. I wasn’t very good. Oh my Celestia, I might have been a bat pony.”
“With wings of sand?”
“I’m not sand, I’m ash. There is nothing as dead as ash. With Bruxism talking about swords, and you imitating the bureaucratic way the Steel Rangers interact, took me back to a time when we could see the stars and moon. The Princesses weren’t goddesses, but we did revere them as such, especially during the war.”
Our Goddess Moon
Our Goddess Moon awakens full,
Or the perfect crescent as the curve of the sword.
As a beacon from the East.
Her light will never burn us,
Her light will never blind us,
Her light will never parch us.
Our Goddess Moon wanders the night,
Sometimes high in the sky sometimes low.
She is not trapped by the seasonal path her sister must take,
Our Goddess Moon may even cross her sister’s course and eclipse her, as a tease.
The Goddess Sun cannot shine without darkness,
Just as Goddess Sun cannot make rainbows without involving Spirit Cloud,
Sky blue and white day obscure the night sky.
Bright points of starlight, meteor, aurora, comet, nova, nebula,
set in front of the silent velvet infinite.
“Dentists. Again,” Bruxism wailed. “We only have one healing spell, that’s it. How can we make a go of that?”
“You need money for weapons, real armour and healing potions.”
“I spent my life trying to get away from that, destiny of dentistry. I hate teeth. And by the looks of everypony in the wasteland, so do they. If I never have to look at a wastelanders’s diseased maw, it will be too soon. I sincerely doubt that anypony is going to pay us to regrow teeth that will just rot and ache in their sticky, stinky mouths again.”
“Ponies are still having babies. And they still love their children. That they will pay for. There is a place called Friendship City…”
“Where’s the adventure in that? I want action and my magic sword,” Groaned Bruxism.
“Megamart then. It’s an action-packed place.”
The top of Apex’s head blew apart a full second before the sniper rifle’s report echoed off the hills. Juniper screamed a long terrible wail only to inhale and continue screaming. Sandy Shoals knocked her down and pushed her against the wall. He had to physically move each pony to the wall and shove them down to the floor.
A blow-horn squelched from across the street, “What we got here, are some free-range slaves just ripe for the takin’. Now, I didn’t like blowin’ your leader’s head off any more than ya’ll, but it sets a tone.” The amplified voice said in his nasally voice. “Slaves serve slave masters and we all serve Master Red Eye. ‘Bout now ya’ll might be thinkin’ about sneaking out the back way, but ponder. This town is shaped like a funnel and I got my boys comin’ at ya through the narrow end. Let’s be nice and calm about this and let my boys put those bomb collars around yur necks.”
A sandstorm exploded out of the building the squad had taken shelter in. Sandy Shoals head and forelegs were visible in the front of the dust cloud charging at the slavers. The sand re-assembled itself in front of the slave master. “Well, ya know, Master Red Eye is willin’ to take dusty old ghouls into his fold.”
He struck the slaver across the face twice back and forth with his foreleg. The slaver knew how to stay calm in the face of adversity. He adjusted his too small white Stetson hat and used his magic to lift a healing potion from his saddle bag. He popped the cork and the opening clicked against his upper teeth. The strikes from Sandy’s legs had sandblasted away the slaver’s lips and lower jaw. Blood pored down his windpipe and he drowned in his own fluids.
The next slaver stepped up. “Finally, it’s promotion day. By Celestia’s white ass, that voice was annoying.” A rife shot knocked Sandy sideways a half a step. He scowled at the slaver. “You’re a tuff pile of dirt, ain’t ya?” Another shot passed through Sandy and struck a slaver in the neck. Sandy raised his foreleg as the slaver grabbed a large healing potion and sucked it down. Sandy punched the slaver in the muzzle and pushed his leg deeper into the slaver’s face and neck. The slaver retched to cough but his lungs were packed with sand. Purple fluid and sand escaped his mouth when Sandy dropped him. Dust and dirt levitated from the ground until he was his usual size. “Where is the bomb collar detonator?”
“Heh heh, they put it on me so you gots to treat me real nice, alright Mr. Ghoul. They call me Twitchy for a reason, heh heh. Slavers put it on me cuz I’m jittery and ya got to treat a bomb real gentle, right? Right?”
Sandy Shoals drew breath,” Give me the detonator, Twitchy.”
“Heh heh, ha, you see, I can’t. be nice. The slavers welded it to my leg. Treat me proper or me and your friends go boom. Understand, crazy ghoul?”
“I’m not a ghoul, Twitchy. Let’s save some lives together, shall we?”
“The slavers gots lots ‘n lots of bomb collars in that closed room. Everypony needs to calm down,” Twitchy said as he started to tremble. A red light appeared on Sandy’s side. It glowed hot then through him. A soft glass tube fell out of his chest. “No! It’s starting. I need my drugs. I need my chems!” Twitchy’s neck exploded in the same instant the corner of the building detonated.
“Alright Hot Spot, time to skedaddle. You’re my spotter and you saw as well as I did that ghoul just killed everypony. He’ll be commin’ this way next.”
“You can stop your worrien’ right now. Nothin’ but nothin’ can beat the Burner Boys. My fuel tank is full and ready to melt me some ghoul.”
The dusty tempest roared up the hills. Hot Spot leaned back in a trench and waited for it to appear over the ledge. When he did, Hot Spot let Sandy Shoals have it with his blowtorch rifle. Sandy reared back, his face melted then frozen in an expression of pure rage. “Ha! That’s what you get for messin’ with Burners, bitch!
Sandy’s face and body cooled, then cracked. The glass figure shattered and the dust that rose took Sandy’s form. “Stupid raider, I am not sand. I am the agony of the wasteland.” A dust devil surrounded Hot Spot and abraded his hide. Sandy cut Hot Spot’s legs off. He fell on to the stumps of his legs.
“This is what it feels like to be one hundred percent burned. Wait for it, it gets worse.”
Hot Spot felt incredible screaming pain throughout his brain. Then his senses were overridden with another stimulation, sound. The tick tick tick, click click click of the approaching Radroaches.
The sand squall easily caught up with the sniper.
“Now hold up, monster. It was my job to kill your friend. And I’m sorry. But turn around and see the carnage you have left in your wake.”
Sandy Shoals plodded back to the town. Dust falling off him with every step, then reforming on him again. He found the welcome sign and put it back together. He scooped the paint out of an old spray can and wrote the name of the town, intentionally misspelling it.
Welcome To Mourning Side
