Fallout Equestria: Broken Oaths

A fanfiction of Kkats Fallout Equestria

Chapter 2: The Wasteland

By Fallen Sentinel

“A long time ago you gave me a choice, now I give you a choice. Run or Die”

Emptiness. That was the only word I could think of looking at my surroundings. Sure there were things scattered here and there, a row of mountains on either side as we stood in the base of a valley, but there was nothing out here to look at. The mountains were scarred with what had to be damage from bombs, scattered plantlife struggling to grow and turning a very unhealthy black color.

I tore my eyes away from the barren landscape, turning towards Arkangel to ask him something. Only then did I notice he was already on the move, heading off to the left of where we’d stepped out. I broke into a gallop to follow him. “Where are we going?” I shouted, trying to pick up speed and catch up to his lead.

“Come on, keep up or get left behind,” he called back. “I really just need the overseer, I can do this alone if I have to.” I huffed as I managed to catch up with him, though Ark didn’t seem to notice. “Out of the mountain range first off,” he said with a gesture, though not at the mountain pass like I expected. I didn’t have time to ask what he was doing though, since the Pip Buck my captors had neglected to confiscate beeped at me. Surprised I’d forgotten about the device this long, I glanced down at it, seeing that the general topographic map now had a navigation beacon.

“How did you…” I started to ask, but Ark cut me off as though he hadn’t heard me.

“After that, we’re headed to Rock Point, then probably Manehattan ruins. And if you’re still alive by then,” he glanced back at me for a second, “I’ll tell you the rest.”

“What do you mean ‘still alive’?” I gulped.

Ark stared at me again, making me wither in the piercing look he shot me. “What, you thought this was going to be some kind of vacation?” I stared blankly at him in response, but he wasn’t waiting for me to actually say anything. “This is a wasteland. Everything out here’s going to try and kill you.”

This day just kept getting better. It seemed like every next event was trying to one-up the last one, from a random arrest to being out here in the wastelands, all alone save a pony I still wasn’t sure I could trust since he was so casual about killing his own. But by now, I didn’t have much choice, so I sighed and kept trotting, keeping up with Ark as best I could. It was going to be a long day still...

I spent a few minutes trying to talk to Ark, trying to get any more information out of him, but nothing I asked seemed to entice him to talk. Eventually I gave up and just tried to take in the surroundings. Nothing much had changed, we were still in the mountain pass, though I had noticed it was getting darker. Despite living in a Stable my whole life, I’d read enough old stories to know that Celestia was moving the sun down below the horizon, although glancing up I couldn’t see the fabled shining sphere through the dense cloud cover. I’d occasionally dreamed about what the surface had been like, wondered what it would feel like to fly free amongst the clouds...I’d just never imagined it as being so dour and depressing.

“Something’s not right.” Ark’s sudden vocalization snapped me back to reality. “The stable hasn’t sent anything after us,” he replied, glancing back from where we’d come.

“Well...that’s good, right?” I asked. Surely if we’d fought a bunch of soldiers by now, we’d be dead.

“Not really. I mean sure, we’re not fighting them to try and get anywhere. But it doesn’t make sense, they have plenty of soldiers trained to handle the wasteland.” Ark stopped abruptly, glancing around the valley. “They’re gonna ambush us. They have to be planning one, there’s no way they’re just letting us walk away with the overseer.” Ark kept walking forward, prompting me to follow.

It didn’t take too long for Ark to stop again and turn to me. “Take Siren,” he ordered.

“What is it now?” I asked, though I still listened to him as he moved to drop the overseer’s unconscious body on my back.

“My EFS is showing targets ahead,” was all he said, before turning off and running forward, before I could even ask what he meant by that. I wanted to call out to him, but before I could he simply vanished from sight. I blinked in surprise, trying to figure out where he’d gone. I glanced at my Pipbuck, but the civilian grade version I owned didn’t have nearly the tech whatever Ark was using available. I had no idea what was happening, all I could do was wait.

I didn’t need the Pipbuck, however, to hear hoofsteps behind me, simply waiting for the bigger threat to leave. Trying not to alert whatever was there to my hearing it, I glanced around quickly for anything I might use as a weapon. There wasn’t anything particularly dangerous, a few jagged rocks that might be my best bet, so I slowly moved closer to one and set Siren down. The hoofsteps came closer, and despite my hooves shaking I grabbed the most jagged rock I could see and turned slowly. Facing me were two earth ponies, both stallions and both wearing ragged leather armor. I didn’t know too much about leather armor designs, but it wasn’t hard to tell it was in very poor condition and barely defensive at all. They did, however, have much better weapons available, a hammer and a knife, and I was sure they at least knew how to use them.

The sound of gunfire erupted behind me, telling me Arkangel had found the ambush he’d been looking for and already engaged. There wasn’t going to be any help from him; I was on my own. “Stay back!” I shouted, trying to look more confident than I was. It didn’t seem to fool the earth ponies though, who just smirked at me as they approached. The one with the hammer charged at me, swinging his weapon at my skull, something I noticed with barely enough time to roll the other way to dodge his strike. Without thinking I swung the rock at the stallion, slamming it into his head and knocking him off his hooves. The hammer fell from his grip and landed, the handle tapping against my hoof as it fell. I grabbed it when I saw the original owner struggling to get back up. I swung the hammer at his head and knocked him back down to the ground, groaning in pain.

With the one stallion incapacitated, I turned towards his friend, who was already barrelling towards me. I tried to raise the hammer to swing at him, but I wasn’t going to swing fast enough to catch him, I could already tell. Thankfully, the stallion tripped and fell forward, though he still had enough sense on him to slash at my legs. I jumped backwards, wings reflexively shifting even when they caught against my lab coat and couldn’t help lift me.

The stallion tried to get up as I recovered, raising the hammer to strike at him if he got closer. But suddenly the stallion crashed back down on the ground, Siren landing on his back and forcing him down. I stared in shock at the overseer, as her gaze met mine. “Finish him you idiot!” she screamed, as the stallion under her struggled to throw her off. I snapped out of it and swung the hammer sideways at his face, accidentally smashing right into his eye. He screamed and writhed as Siren got up off him, grabbing the hammer from my hooves and smashing it into the stallion’s head again. He stopped moving.

“I thought you could have finished him yourself when I tripped him,” she snapped, thrusting the hammer back at me. “But you keep finding ways to disappoint me.”

“Well then,” a new voice startled me away from looking dejectedly at Siren. I saw a new face, a unicorn mare, moving slowly towards us. Her armor was in much better shape than the stallions, and she was holding a decent-looking rifle in her magic, hovering just behind her. “You know, these guys aren’t so easy to replace,” she sighed, glaring at me as she loaded a new bullet into her gun without even looking at it. I swallowed nervously. “So I’m going to give you one chance. Join up with me and replace those clowns you just killed.” She snapped her rifle shut and cocked it, the ominous click emphasizing her point.

“Sorry,” Siren said cooly, “but I’m not exactly yours to take.” I wanted to turn and look at Siren, but the armed unicorn was making me too nervous to turn my back. I tensed my body, ready to strike if I got the chance: while I didn’t like how blunt Siren was being, I had to admit I didn’t exactly want to end up shanghaied into a bandit group.

The unicorn leveled her rifle at Siren’s head, and before I could think otherwise I was lunging forwards, raising the hammer to bring down on the unicorn. But in one effortless motion she grabbed the hammer with her magic, ripped it from my grip, and swung it around to slam hard into my gut. The wind was knocked out of me as I collapsed on the ground, gasping for breath and clutching where the hammer had struck. “Last chance,” the unicorn said, keeping the gun trained on Siren. The overseer only stared back at the unicorn, her face dominated by an unamused expression. “Well fine then, I tried.”

A gunshot rang out, making me cover my ears and avert my eyes. I still heard a whump of a body hitting the ground, though to my shock when I opened my eyes, the unicorn was the one lying dead at my hooves, her rifle clattering to the ground beside her. Siren looked a bit rattled as she glanced at me, sharing my look of horror as we both glanced up, trying to find where the shot had come from.

“Thanks for distracting her!” we both heard a voice coming from somewhere up above. We looked up and quickly spotted a maroon coated sniper waving at us from up on a cliff. Before either of us could respond, he leapt forward and dove off the cliff, unfurling his wings and floating down towards the two of us. As he came closer, I could make out that his mane and tail were black, with just a hint of blue. He reminded me of what little I’d seen of Ark’s mane, but a bit less messy. As he touched down I watched his wings flap, and caught sight of the silver gear cutie mark on his haunch.

“What in Equestria took you so long?!” Siren snapped, stepping closer. “And where is your uniform?”

The stallion blinked at her for a second. “Well I was a little busy keeping an eye on that other fight,” he said, pointing in the direction where Ark’s gunfire was still ringing out. “Looking out for little miss reaver here,” he pointed at the dead unicorn at my hooves. I shied away from the body as the pegasus continued, feeling a little ill despite seeing many more corpses already. “Caught her walking on over here, and you guys just gave me a nice clean shot at her. As for a uniform...” he glanced down at his clothes for a second, before shrugging. “Don’t have one.”

Siren facehooved and groaned. “You are by far the worst soldier I’ve ever seen,” she grumbled, before looking back up at him, rather tired. “Look, I do thank you for performing your duties, but once we’re back at the stable I must insist we get you a new uniform.”

The pegasus only stared back at her, confused. “Stable? What stable?”

Siren huffed indignantly. “What stable indeed, are you really this stupid?”

I finally caught onto what Siren expected was happening and, wondering myself if it were true, tried to clarify with my own question. “Are you a soldier from the nearby stable?”

“Nope,” the pegasus smirked. “Name’s Gunrunner, most efficient merc of the wastelands.” He just grinned for a second, as Siren started to back away with her eyes wide. “Had a contract to get rid of that unicorn, nothing about two strangers here. So you could thank me for not letting her kill you before I took her out, you know.” He glared at Siren with an arched eyebrow.

Siren froze in place for a second, before suddenly turning tail and bolting away, screaming “you’re all traitors!” back at us.

“No, stop her!” I yelled, starting to run after her myself. I tried to unfurl my wings again and take off after her, but the labcoat still prevented it. Gunrunner’s wings however were unburdened, and he leapt forward to pounce in her. Siren saw his shadow approaching and spread her wings as well, but her awkward attempts to flap didn’t even push her forward. Gunrunner caught her quickly, slamming into her and knocking her on the ground.

“Get off me!” she shouted, squirming to break free, but Gunrunner had too good an advantage over her. “He and his little friend kidnapped me from the stable!”

Gun looked back up at me in confusion. “Wait...so who’s the good guy here?”

I sighed and shrugged; at this point, I wasn’t really sure anymore. “Kidnapping was Ark’s idea, I just didn’t want you,” I glared at Siren, “to get through executing me. Especially since you know I didn’t do anything!”

Gun let out an amused snort, but seemed convinced by my words. Still pinning Siren down, he reached into a saddlebag and produced some rope. Siren glanced back and saw it, her squirming redoubled, but it was no good. “So, execution huh? What for?” he asked me, as he began to wrap Siren’s wings with the rope.

“Publicly, for murder of my head researcher,” I muttered, “but really she thought I was a bad influence. And other various reasons, I think,” I turned my attention to Siren as I spoke, watching as Gun tied her wings down. “Not likely you’re going to tell me now though, huh?” Siren just glared at me, before turning her attention back to Gunrunner.

“Look...Gunrunner, was it?” she asked. “This is an internal issue between members of my Stable. If you untie my wings now and back off, then I think we can overlook this little ‘incident’.” Gunrunner, however, didn’t even pause, tightening the knots around her wings before producing a metal collar he slapped around her neck. “You will regret this,” she growled, as Gunrunner added a rope lead to the collar.

“Maybe I will,” he shrugged. “Maybe not. But killing someone unnecessarily like you were trying to just isn’t something I can approve of.”

At that, Gunrunner passed the rope lead to me, which I took before Siren could turn and bolt for it. She yanked at the rope to try and break my hold, but I held fast, causing her to glare at me with an expression full of hatred. “I’m still saying none of this was my idea,” I replied, as Gunrunner turned to head towards Ark’s fight. I turned to follow, having to yank at Siren’s leash when she tried to dig her hooves in and not move.

It turned out Arkangel wasn’t as far ahead as I’d thought. He was just wrapping up his fight with several bandits. He fired one more burst from his shotgun into a downed body, I couldn’t tell if they were dead already or not. But as he glanced up at us, he trained his gun on Gunrunner. “Ark no, he’s with us!” I cried, stepping in front of Gunrunner before he was shot.

Ark didn’t respond for a moment, glancing to the left of me and spotting Siren. “Well, I leave you alone for a couple minutes, and you’ve got a new pet,” he gestured to Siren, “and boyfriend,”he gestured at Gunrunner. His guns stayed focused on Gun though.

I stared back at Arkangel, keeping my face as stern as I could and ignoring his taunt. “He saved both of us, and kept Siren from getting away.”

“Well somepony’s feathers are ruffled,” Gun smirked, meeting Arkangel’s gaze. He seemed far too cool under pressure, did he not understand what that armor was capable of?

Ark stepped forward. “Storm, I’m only asking you this once. Stand aside,” he jerked his head to his right, trying to get me to move. “I’m not letting some raider follow us.”

I was about to object again, but I suddenly felt a hoof at my shoulder. Gun pushed me aside and stepped closer to Ark. His battle saddle aimed a heavily outdated beam weapon right at Ark, the end charging brighter and brighter. “I’m open to talking this out if you want,” he said dryly.

Ark opened fire, a single shot that Gun shifted just enough to make ricochet off his battle saddle. The beam weapon fired, the blast smashing into Ark’s chestplate. Ark stiffened in an instant, before falling onto his side, collapsing. I stared in horror as Gun’s saddle holstered the weapon. “You killed him!” I shouted, panic flooding my voice.

“Relax,” Gunrunner said calmly. “Didn’t kill him, just crashed his suit.” Gun trotted up casually to Arkangel’s collapsed armor and rapped on the helmet. “You’re lucky that was my first choice.” Ark yelled something from inside the armor, but without the voice amplifier I couldn’t make anything out besides the angry emotion in it. “Well, do you really need him that bad?” Gun glanced back at me.

“Wha...of course we need him!” I shouted. “He’s the one with the plan here!” Of course that was the main reason for keeping Ark around, but I couldn’t help but fear what might happen if we ditched him here and now. He was unstable, what would he do if he caught up with us?

Gunrunner shrugged, then cast his glance at the two raiders behind us. He then looked at my Pipbuck, and back to Ark’s armor. “You know how to restart it?” I shook my head in response; my speciality was robotics, power armor was a bit different from that.

“I know that robots tended to reboot a few hours later if they ran into trouble, or could be manually restarted by a charge from a spark battery. It might be the same with his armor,” I said.

Gunrunner glanced back at his battle saddle and shook his head. “Sorry, not giving up mine. Guess we’re gonna have to carry him til he resets.” There was a bemused snort from Gun’s nose as he leaned down, biting onto Ark’s armored wing to flip him over.

Suddenly, there was a sharp whistling sound coming at us, and before I could turn to face it I felt something very nearly clip the tip of my ear.

I ducked instinctively and glanced up, just in time to see a missile whiz straight over my head. It continued on its merry way, slamming into a rock further ahead of us and exploding on contact. My head snapped around to catch sight of what was shooting at us. It was a sentry bot, one of the ones I’d been working on before all this had happened. It’s guns were spraying wildly in our direction, making me silently thankful I hadn’t managed to calibrate their targeting software yet.

The sentry lumbered forward on four treads, probably trying to correct for the spread fire with close range. I dove for cover behind a rock, half dragging Siren with me as she had the same idea, but a different destination. Safe for the moment, I looked up to see Gun had dragged Ark behind some cover as well. I breathed a sigh of relief that we were all safe, only to feel Siren’s leash slip from my grasp. I lunged after it, just barely grabbing hold of her and stopping her escape attempt. At that second, the sentry’s guns stopped firing, giving me a second to glance up and see what we were dealing with.

I could tell it was an older model, something we’d gotten 200 years back to update. Its torso now had mounted shield projectors to disperse oncoming fire, a missile pod on its right shoulder that was currently reloading to fire another salvo. The twin gatling guns sprayed wildly in our direction, forcing me to duck back down as the rock I was trying to hide behind got pelted with hundreds of bullets, threatening to turn the whole thing into gravel.

But as Siren broke cover, the sentry stopped firing, programmed to rescue her probably, so with its wild spraying it wasn’t going to risk a stray shot hitting her. I decided to use that as an advantage and pulled her out between me and the sentry, throwing the two of us closer to Gunrunner’s cover. The sentry started tracking but refused to fire at me, at least until the two of us dove behind the second rock, Siren squirming to get away the entire time.

“Do you have any idea how big of a pain she is?” I snapped as the guns spun up again, spraying bullets and filling the air with rattling. Gun only shrugged, before glancing down at Ark again. I couldn’t help but smirk at the irony, how Ark’s tail was designed off the paralyzing scorpion, and now he was paralyzed himself. “Wait a minute...the tail!” I thought, thinking back to how easily Ark’s tail had split the metal back in the stable door room. “I have an idea, but I need that spark battery.” Gunrunner only glared at me, but I wasn’t in the mood for it. “Well, you got a better idea to take that thing out?”

Gun glanced back over the rock carefully to scope out the sentry, but was forced down by another burst of fire. He sighed heavily, before quickly removing his battery and giving it to me. “You owe me a fresh one,” he said bluntly, as he took Siren’s leash in response while I turned to look over Arkangel’s armor. But this was beyond my understanding, I couldn’t figure it out.

“Ark, where do I insert the battery?” I asked, leaning close to his head to hear his response. Thankfully the robot stopped firing just long enough for me to hear his reply.

“Spine panel!” I heard just clearly enough. I went back to look where he’d suggested and, with a bit more searching than I cared for while under fire, I managed to find a tiny break in the smooth texture near the back of Arkangel’s neck. Sure enough the second I pressed down on the rougher patch, a series plates along Ark’s spine started to shift and unfurl, revealing the under layers of the armor, as well as its operator, clad in some kind of underarmor in addition to the power frame. I stopped myself from pondering just how warm it might get in there long enough to find a socket with a spark battery installed, but when I went to remove it the battery was jammed in and refused to budge. I started to panic, blood racing in my ears as the bullets kept pounding against the rock and breaking our cover down inch by inch, pulling frantically at the battery until something caught my attention; another socket next to the installed battery. There wasn’t anything in there already, so with a mental shrug I inserted Gun’s battery into the slot and, to my relief, watched the charge transfer into Ark’s armor.

Instantly Ark’s armor closed around him again, and his legs began to move. Arkangel staggered onto his hooves, his eyes blue as he regained his footing. Then, without saying a word, Arkangel bolted out past the rock, keeping ahead of the sentry’s fire as it attempted to get a bead on him. I glanced over the rock to watch Ark zig-zagging closer, leaping the last few feet to try and smash into the robot. However the shields came up and blocked the impact. Ark just planted all four hooves sternly on the ground before leaping in the air, his wings flapping to carry him up and over the sentry as it turned to face him, leaving its back to us.

Gunrunner took the opportunity and raised his energy cannon at the sentry’s back, firing the instant he had a charge, but the beam was stopped before it could hit. Gun grunted in disappointment as the sentry returned its attention to us, blasting at our cover and forcing Gun to duck. But he wasn’t quite quick enough, and a rock smashed loose from the debris rushed forward and smacked him right in the face.

It took me another second to realize I was wrong again: a set of hooves had propelled that rock into Gun, as he fell sideways, still in the rock’s cover thankfully. I looked around just in time to see Siren swinging another chunk at my head. I fell backwards to avoid getting hit, but wasn’t quite as lucky with my landing: I crashed down on my back,right in the firing line of the sentry, who trained its guns and readied to fire. I shut my eyes and winced, fully expecting to be shredded. But nothing came.

I cracked an eyelid open to stare at my executioner, only to see Arkangel standing triumphantly on its back, a spark battery grasped in his tail. I sighed with relief, before glancing back over at Siren. She looked panicked, her cunning plan to get me killed having failed. “You really want me dead, huh? Twice in one day you put me in front of a robot,” I pointed at the sentry’s gatling gun, which was only now stopping its spinning. Siren didn’t respond, short of trying to turn and flee, but Gun yanked on her leash and forced her onto the ground. She didn’t try to get up again, sighing in defeat.

Arkangel flew over to us and tossed the spark battery at Gunrunner, a curt “debt’s been paid,” before turning back to me. “Storm, get Siren, we’re out of here.”

I moved to take Siren’s leash back from Gun, but the merc only shook his head. “Nuh uh, debt’s not paid,” he corrected. Arkangel stared at him, while I just looked confused. “First,” Gun said, raising a hoof in the air, “you try and kill me. Second, you drag me into your little inter-stable problem,” he gestured vaguely to the three of us, “third one of your robots tries to attack me.” He jerked his head at the collapsed sentry. “And last but certainly not least,” he said, pulling Siren’s leash taut, “she hit me in the face. With a rock.”

I couldn’t help but snicker at how indignant Gunrunner sounded at the last one, but Ark was far less amused. “Fine,” he sighed, “what else do you want?”

“First off, for number three, that,” he pointed at the sentry. “Gotta be some great salvage there. Then for the rest, you all help me carry it back to my place.”

I looked at Gunrunner in surprise. It felt odd that this was all he was going to ask for. But I didn’t object, and neither did Arkangel. “Alright fine. But make it quick,” he warned Gunrunner. “They might send something worse after us soon.

I’d watched for several minutes as Gunrunner had a field day stripping the bot down for scrap. Ark used his tail to help cut anything that he couldn’t tear apart easily, while I sat back with a silent Siren watching as the salvage pile just kept growing. Occasionally I tossed a question or two out at her, asking why she’d ordered my execution in the first place, but I was met by either silence or the same response I’d gotten before. I could just tell there was something more, but Siren refused to loosen her tongue.

Eventually Gun seemed finished, tossing a spare spark battery to Ark, which he stored away in a compartment in his armor. The only things left to transport were a missile, the bot’s untouched gatling guns, and a ton of scrap metal, more than I thought would have fit in the robot’s chassis. Gun glanced between me and the scrap pile for a second, before Ark said simply “just tie the rest to me, I’ll tow it.”

Gun shrugged and got to work, using a net trap to hold everything while tying it to Ark’s armor. Meanwhile I tied a blindfold over Siren’s eyes, something the three of us had decided was the best choice so she wouldn’t know where we were headed. I was finished by the time Gunrunner was finished setting up the tow line, the bots gatling guns slung over his back, allowing the three of us to set off after Gunrunner. Ark somehow managed to stay ahead of me despite the heavy load, forcing me to try and hurry up so as not to get left behind. It wasn’t as simple as speeding up, though, since I had to cope with Siren’s stumbling and wandering around all over. I kept glancing back at her to make sure she was at least alright, though every time all I could see was the fearful expression she was trying to hide.

We eventually made it out of the mountains and onto a flat stretch of plains, flatlands for miles wherever I could see. I glanced at my Pipbuck’s map to tell we were headed south, before trying again to convince Siren to trot a little faster despite her handicap. It worked, probably thanks to the more stable terrain, and I managed to catch up with Ark. “So Arkangel,” I asked, “what exactly do you want to accomplish out here?”

Ark’s he slowly turned to face me, causing me to wince. “I’ll tell you when I trust you,” he said curtly.

I decided to try and change the subject. “So, do you know Siren? Earlier you said she was an annoying individual” I figured it was a softball question he could answer easily, to get his focus off me for a second.

“She caused problems everyone and a while,” he replied after a prolonged silence, looking back up and forward. “Nothing more or less.” For a second the answer appeased me, in part because he wasn’t staring at me anymore, but I started thinking about what kind of problems she made.

My thoughts were interrupted by Gunrunner announcing “we might have to stop up here for the night.” I glanced at where Gun was indicating, a half-collapsed two story building that might have been a house at one point. It was hard to tell, considering the front wall had almost entirely fallen forward into the small, sickly yard in front of it. Scattered fruits grew in the deathly garden, the blackened remains of a wood fence trying its best to contain the corrupted plants.

As the four of us picked our way through the debris into the main house, Siren needing some extra help considering her blindness, I looked around to figure that this had once been a living room. Books, toys lay scattered under a thick layer of dust, beside a flipped couch and collapsed cabinet. I didn’t know the last time somepony had been in here.

Ark started to dump the salvage he was hauling and moved off into a different room, while Gunrunner carefully worked his way up the remains of the staircase. I didn’t feel like trying to drag Siren through any barriers or dangers in other rooms, so I heaved the couch back upright and helped Siren to sit down on it. “You know,” I muttered, trying to think of a different question to lighten the tension. “I don’t even know what you’re overseer of. What branch?”

Siren refused to speak for a moment, but as she settled into the seat she seemed a touch grateful for the rest, and eventually spoke. “Soldier development.”

“You said you put Arkangel in a project out of pity...was that the program? Soldier development?”

Siren only shrugged. “I don’t know.” I was dumbstruck by that response: how could she not know what program she put him in?

“What do you mean by that?” I asked, as Siren settled down on the couch. She completely ignored me, and after trying to get her attention for a few minutes I figured she’d fallen asleep.

I sighed and glanced around the room, only to jump in fright as I saw Ark standing in the door frame, his empty visor staring at me. After a second of staring, however, he looked away. “Want to tell me what that was about?” I asked, only to have Ark turn and trot back around the corner out of sight. I sighed; my curiosity was gnawing at me now. I wanted to know more about whatever project had happened, but if the overseer had no idea, and the testee himself was refusing to talk, what hope did I have to learn more?

Trying to get my mind off it, I started flipping through radio signals on my Pipbuck, trying to see if I could pick up anything. I found scrambled or repeated phrases on a few different bands, and only two proper radio stations: Rock Point News and Tenpony Tower. I tried listening to them both as I tied Siren’s forelegs together, in case she woke up unsupervised, but listening to either of them either bored me to tears or was so depressing I finally shut it off entirely. I next tried to just get some shut eye, but sleep didn’t come; I was too anxious, too unsafe in this crumbling ruin with a mercenary and an unstable murderous nutcase.

I kept trying to fall asleep for at least an hour, long enough for Gunrunner to come back into the room and turn in himself, curling up in a corner and falling asleep with the greatest of ease. I was a little envious, but also astonished at how easily he was sleeping considering he now had three strangers around who might just kill him. I eventually decided to get up and look around, spotting Ark standing stone still outside, staring off into the distance.

I decided not to provoke Arkangel further and tried to occupy my mind with exploring the house. The kitchen was littered with smashed plates, scattered utensils and rusted cooking supplies. But nothing held my interest long enough, so I decided instead to try and head upstairs. The first room I entered I guessed was once a foal’s bedroom, a single bed and a few toys, but the decorations were damaged and rotted away. The next was another bedroom, also with a single bed, though I felt sure that the adult of the house had lived here. And thankfully for my nerves, a terminal was sitting on the room’s desk.

I didn’t honestly expect the terminal to function, but I figured tinkering with something might calm my nerves. So it came as a surprise that the device clicked on almost instantly when I prodded it. I wasn’t that experienced dealing with this model, and terminal slicing wasn’t something I remembered too well from my old specialist training, but after testing a few words I felt appropriate to the building the password “Regret” unlocked it. I sighed, depressed that the word had actually worked, before I started poking around the files.

The only vaguely interesting thing on the terminal was a selection of messages; mostly outgoing to somepony, but a few responses as well.

Message sent

Heard you were being shipped out today, I hope that this will be a short war. I don’t see how it could of come to this we tried so hard to stop it from happening but it still did. Just try to stay alive and don’t do anything risky, I need you to come home when this is over.

Ps, I went for the test today, turns out you're going to be a father when you get back

I glanced over at the bed, imagining the mare sending this message out to her war-bound husband. I guess that explained why it was a single bed...though I didn’t like where it was going.
Message Received
That's great news, i’ll try and keep my head down. Besides from what i’ve heard both sides are trying to keep casualties low so I rate my chances as fairly high. To add more to my luck we’re being paired with a special forces group haven’t heard much about them though, they’re keeping us in the dark until we’re fully trained. Is it a mare or a colt?

I quickly scanned through the list of messages, back and forths numbering in the hundreds. I knew I’d never get through the whole list in one night, so I decided to copy all of them onto my Pipbuck’s memory. It felt odd saving these personal communications between two ponies, but I was confident they were both long gone, so it wasn’t exactly like I was invading somepony’s privacy. Plus, it would make a great material to keep me out of boredom wandering the wastelands. I then pulled myself away from the terminal, looking around for anything else of interest in the house. I didn’t find anything but some heavily aged boxes of canned food, which I kept a few of for an emergency, and a bathroom sink that to my surprise was still running. I wanted to wash some of the dirt and blood from my black fur, but when I reached closer to the water my Pipbuck’s Geiger counter started chirping, causing me to change my mind.

I finally went back downstairs to find nothing else had changed while I was exploring. Gunrunner was still curled up, his battle saddle not far from him, and Siren hadn’t moved an inch from the couch, hadn’t even disrupted her blindfold. But Arkangel had moved, headed towards the shed on the other side of the house. I thought that if he were separated from Siren, and now Gunrunner, he might feel a touch chattier. It was worth the risk to me, so I decided to follow him.

As Arkangel glanced around the shed, I carefully approached him. “Hey Ark,” I said quietly, trying not to startle him. Ark turned his head to face me. I breathed a restrained sigh of relief at the sight as I kept talking. “I...I know you and I aren’t really friends, but...well, I thought you might want to tell me a little more about you, now that nopony’s listening.”

“Somepony’s always listening,” Ark responded, turning away from me again as he took off his helmet and set it on the desk. He then pulled out his rifle and set it down, removing its cartridge.

“What are you doing?” I asked.

“Swapping out parts. I prefer ballistics, but since wastelanders are using laser weapons, I’m at a disadvantage.” I watched in silence for a bit as Ark started pulling components off his rifle, reassembling it with other bits he pulled from armor compartments until the weapon started to look more like a laser rifle.

“Look Ark, I...you saved me and all, and I’m really grateful for that,” I sighed, as Ark snapped a gem cartridge into the rifle and holstered it at his side. “But I really need to know what you’re getting me into. I don’t know what I’m doing out here, I don’t know why I’m following you…”

Arkangel turned his full attention to me, making me wince. I’d seen his left eye had been replaced with a cybernetic one before, but the difference between his real and his replacement eyes was unsettling to have both boring into me at once. “Look at me, can’t you tell?”

I stammered for a second. “Well, I can tell you’re a cyborg, but I want to know why. I work with robots all the time, they’re meant to replace soldiers...so why did anypony do this to you?”

Ark glanced down at the floor. “You can make a robot smart as you like, but there’s always going to be somepony who thinks it won’t be enough. That’s all that happened, a general decided he needed cyber soldiers. Nopony else was for it though, so I’m the only one they worked on. That enough for you?”

“No,” I muttered. “Did Siren approve of this? And what general are you talking about anyways?”

Arks robotic eye changed to red, and I backed up. “You should get back to watching Siren,” he said sternly, as his armours tail curled up behind him, “before I get annoyed.” I decided not to push my luck and left quick as I could, only to realise Ark had put his helmet back on and was following me. I galloped into the room and grabbed one of Gunrunners weapons, diving for the couch and trying to hide the gun beneath me. Ark entered a moment later, but he didn’t approach me like I feared. “Relax, I’m not going to kill you,” he muttered, moving to the opposite corner and settling in. “Give the merc his gun back. I still need you around.”

I listened to Ark as he fell silent, seemingly falling asleep while I returned the weapon to Gunrunner’s saddle. I then tried to settle in to sleep myself, but my mind was buzzing with questions. Ark was a supersoldier project, that was obvious, but what was with the eye changing colour like that? Was it something like a split personality? An AI? Why was this general involved protecting his identity?

I tried to distract myself with a few more of Shining Meadow’s messages, but I wasn’t focusing nearly well enough on it to understand anything in them. It did at least help me calm down a bit and I managed to finally pass out, getting at least a little sleep before I was disrupted again. There was something clunking against a wall, and when I looked around I spotted a small, winged metal ball bobbing silently in the air. The thing hovered a little closer to me, but when I reached out it ducked away, heading outside. I followed it as it hovered around to the shed and bumped gently against the door. I stood there, baffled, until to my surprise the thing spoke. “Open the door, please.” Too dazed to question how this thing was talking to me, even what it was, I did as it asked and opened the door.

The sphere hovered inside and came to rest above a few sheets draped over something. “Lift these, please.” For some reason I hesitated, as an acrid scent filled my nostrils. “Please. I need you to see what you’re traveling with.”

An image of Ark flashed in my mind, and though I was still hesitant I couldn’t deny my curiosity any longer. I lifted one of the sheets and pulled it away carefully, only for my heart to skip a beat at what I saw. It was a mare’s corpse, her skull crushed in around a bloody hole. This wasn’t an old body...this was new.

“Be careful with that thing,” the orb said, “I saw this happen. She tried to greet him, and she lost her life for it.” I glanced back at it, but that was all the orb said, its audio crackling and shifting to some old song as it floated away. I covered the mare up again and left before my stomach revolted, headed back into the house with a whole new set of questions rampaging through my skull. I tried to just focus on getting back to sleep after that, but I couldn’t help but steal a glance at Arkangel as he lay there.

“What are you?” I muttered to myself.

“I wish I knew,” Ark said softly, making me jump nearly out of my skin. I hadn’t expected him to respond at all. All I could think to do was pick Siren up, take her upstairs, and let her down on the bed in the terminal room. I locked the door behind us, feeling just a hair safer that we were at least in a different room than Ark, as I lay down next to the door and finally fell properly asleep.

Author's Note

Footnote: Level Up
Perk gained:They can't hurt what they can't hit! Get 25+ Damage Resistance and 25+ Energy Resistance when you're sprinting.

(thanks to Kkat for making fallout equestria and thus allowing us to make this story)

Project starter: Fantastic Storm
Story writer: Arkangel
Editor: Midnight Storm
Spelling/grammar checker: ERROR 1024
Supporting people: AkariFolf, Glitcher1987, Cobalt Hex, TBRAZ56