Fallout Equestria: Broken Oaths

Fallout Equestria: Broken Oaths

A fanfiction of Kkats Fallout Equestria

Chapter 9: Empty Shells

By Fallen Sentinel

“I’ve seen the end, the end of the world. It’s all because of you”

Pain

Everything came through a red haze. Flashes of things in armour darker than the night striking down terrified victims.

Screaming

The red flashing haze showed ponies strapped down in labs? Needles, knives, scalpels lead to bloody messes. It continued with flashes of green, red and purple burning it’s hosts.

End

A flash of light scorched all other colours, I could see two of the black armoured creatures staring at what seemed to be an explosion that consumed a city.

They turned to me and everything went black...

I groaned rather loudly as I started to come to. There was a hard, annoying stripe of pressure along my chest, where it felt like all my weight was laying on. I tried to shift a little but felt off balance, so I held still and opened my eyes despite their protest of the brighter light beyond my eyelids.

I quickly realized that I was on somepony’s back; more specifically, a golden, armored pony. Arkangel was carrying me, moving smoothly as the ground passed below his hooves. I tilted my head up to look at what was ahead of us and spotted both Gunrunner and Vlyka, trotting side by side and occasionally looking at each other. Vlyka must have been asking him questions, but my ears were still ringing and dull from my unconsciousness and I couldn’t even guess what was being said by either of them. Redwood was trailing behind Gunrunner, her leash still slack even though she was still pretty much as far from Gun as she could be.

I turned my head behind us and spotted what I expected: Siren’s lead, tied to Ark’s side. She was standing remarkably close to him, walking and casting a nervous glance at me. She saw me shift and gasped, hurrying closer. “Storm are you alright?” she asked, lowering her head towards mine.

I tried to speak but felt my voice wasn’t strong enough yet, so I only nodded as I glanced down at my dangling hind legs under Ark’s stomach. They were wrapped in so many bandages it looked like they’d been put into casts. I felt the ache in both of them, along with my stomach, telling me it probably deserved the mummy treatment…

“Storm, I’m so sorry…” Siren murmured, making me blink in surprise. I hadn’t expected her to be so gentle, so ashamed...she looked horrified as she spoke. “I left you to that pile of ghouls, I should have...I wish I’d done something. I guess if Ark and Gunrunner hadn’t heard me…”

I winced in irritation and pain as Siren trailed out. “Yeah, you should have,” I growled, clenching my teeth together as I refrained from snapping at her harder. “You just screamed your head off and went to save yourself! Just shoved your tail up your ass and watched me get eaten!” So I’d clearly failed to stop getting angry, groaning in pain as the tension in my body aggravated something in my stomach.

Siren had stopped cold as I snapped at her, only to get pulled forward when Ark refused to slow down. Her face turned sour in a hurry as she trotted back up to me. “You know what? I should have just run. I should have left you to die and run right back to the Stable!” I heard Ark’s head turn slightly behind me, but I was too angry at Siren, meeting her glare with equal intensity, to look at him. “I’m not a fighter Storm, at least I tried to keep you alive!” She continued to glare at me for a moment, until it became obvious to her I wasn’t intent on saying “thank you.” She huffed and turned her head away, stepping as far away as she could on her leash.

“And Vlyka’s the one who went for help!” I hissed at her, as she retreated. She glanced at me once before snapping her head away from us, prompting me to growl in pain and irritation. I’d certainly just lost whatever goodwill I’d gained with Siren with that little annoyance, but I hadn’t felt quite in the mood to deal with her right now…

After a moment of silence, trying to recover a little strength. I turned my head towards Ark, who cast a glance at me almost like he sensed me. “Uh….Ark? Or Pale?” I asked aloud, whispering as loud as I thought he would hear me.

The tone of Ark’s voice was different than I’d heard before...far calmer. “Neither,” he said, and I almost fell off his back from the start.

“Uh..” I stammered, “What? Then...who are you?” How many personalities did Ark have anyways?!

“Nocteal,” he replied, turning his head forwards again. “No more questions.” I stammered out a vague noise in reply, prompting Nocteal to turn back to me. “I can go get Ark if you want me to.”

“Nononononono that’s ok,” I stuttered, shaking my head frantically. But after a moment, I spoke up again, very quietly. “Do you think you could get Pale though?”

Nocturne seemed to think it over for a moment, before his body went rather slack. It only lasted a second, not even enough for Ark’s body to lose a step, as his head turned back to me. “Please, make it quick Storm,” Pale said, his voice tense with worry. “They really don’t like me being up here…”

I glanced ahead at the other group of our merry little band, back at Siren, before looking at Ark. “Sorry, I...I just needed to talk with someone. I kinda pissed Siren off.”

Pale turned to look at Siren at the end of her leash. “What’d you do? She was a mess when you passed out this morning…”

So I hadn’t been out quite that long, at least. That was a minor relief. “She tried to apologize about the...ghouls,” I said, trying to recall the word Siren had used earlier. “I just got angry and snapped at her for standing there and not helping me. I’m just an asshole, I guess…” I sighed.

But Pale didn’t seem to agree. “Trust me Storm, she already forgives you. She’s dealt with a lot worse than yelling like that.” I looked up at Pale, hopeful and smiling faintly, only to feel myself slipping slightly off his body. I shifted myself to keep on his back. “Storm…I know you hate each other,” Pale sighed, “but please. Please treat her better...she hates you because she’s afraid. She’s just looking for protection, so please...I can’t protect her, I know it. Please, protect her for me.”

I felt an acknowledgement work its way up my throat, but I chose to push it back. I was still a little mad, I didn’t want to just be a safe thing for Siren to cower behind. But, I had to admit I understood how she felt out here, and it would be something great to have that same sensation of safety. “Storm...if you swear to keep her safe, I’ll tell you everything you want to know. I know a lot of it, trust me.”

Pale’s bait had sunk deep and the mere offer of answers flooded my mind with questions. I nodded to Pale, who nodded back at me, waiting until I spoke again. “Who’s her mother?” I asked, nodding to Siren.

“High Overseer Wail Stone,” Pale said. “Try to avoid her if you ever get close...she’s pretty much Siren, but a thousand times worse.”

At least that explained where Siren’s attitude came from. “What was it like between you two? When you were together, how was it?”

I could see Pale tense, and I knew I’d gone a step too far. He shook his head immediately after, and I knew exactly what he meant. “Ok, most of what you want to know.”

“Fair,” I muttered, before saying the next thing that came to my mind. “Why don’t the others like you up here? And how many are there?”

“That’s something I don’t know really,” Pale said. “Nocteal is supposed to be the smart one, but he barely talks. Hellion’s a loose cannon and I can’t trust him to be serious, Frenzy is just weird...Mido is brave and there should be three more somewhere. But I barely hear any of them. And Ark...I don’t know. I just don’t know him.”

I felt bad for Pale, watching him struggle with this chaos in his head. I felt even worse with my next thought, however… “Pale, can I talk to Ark now?”

Pale almost stopped in his tracks to stare at me. “You know that’s an awful idea, right?” I nodded, but said nothing else. Pale sighed and rolled his eyes. “Fine, it’s your funeral.”

The body slackened again, before it started to stare directly forward and continue walking on. I waited for a moment, half expecting him to ask why I’d brought him out or something. I wanted to say something, but I remembered the last time with the barb to my neck and I fell silent. Though finally, Ark did in fact speak. “If you’re not going to say anything I’ll just go back.”

Ark’s voice was annoyed, not quite pissed as I’d heard him before but enough that I was nervous. So, trying to hide the quiver in my voice, I asked him. “What exactly is your endgame here?”

Ark paused, staring up into the sky. Then, abruptly, he kicked his backside up and knocked me clean off his back. I slammed into the ground, grunting in pain as I clutched my stomach. “What was that for?” I groaned.

Ark turned to speak, but not to me. “Carry him,” he said to Siren, who stared at both Ark and I with contempt.

“I’m an Overseer, not some labor horse!” she countered.

Ark’s response was about as measured as I’d expected after he’d just bucked me off his back. He raised his tail and stepped closer to Siren, pulling her leash so she was forced to step closer to him too. “And I’m the big buck that’s going to kill the both of you if you keep disobeying orders!” he shouted. I heard hooves grind in the dirt, glancing over to see that the rest of our party had come to a stop as Ark and Siren made a scene.

Siren stared at the tip of Arkangel’s tail for a moment, before slowly walking around Ark to avoid it and reach me. As she approached though, I tried to raise a hoof to her to let her stay back, straining to stand on my own. “I’m fine, I can walk,” I said as calmly as I could. I stood and took a shaky step, Siren watching carefully but smiling as I moved well enough to push my hooves forward. It hurt quite a bit, but I figured I could stomach it and kept walking.

Only Arkangel was not amused. “You’re limping,” he said matter of factly. I came to a stop as Ark glared at me, feeling my hooves ache. Ark loomed in front of me, drawing himself up to overshadow me as much as possible. “I will not have you as a hindrance to this operation, private!” I recoiled a bit from Ark’s suddenly snapping, but my mind got caught for a moment on what he’d called me: I’d never been a private, certainly since Ark had known me. He stared intently at Siren, who sighed and stood next to me. “From this point on your lives depend on each other. If one of you is hurt, I expect the other to take care of them. If one of you dies, then the other one does as well. You two are only, only useful to me together, and I am not going to be burdened by you two if I can help it.” I felt a shiver work its way up my back, glancing warily out of the corner of my eye as Siren looked about as worried as I felt.

I flinched again as Ark tossed Siren’s leash at me, barely catching it before he turned away to stop off. I looked sadly at Siren, who I couldn’t tell if she was just expectant or demanding something from me. “I don’t need you to carry me,” I said, trying to summon that comforting tone from before. But it wasn’t easy, even knowing I didn’t weigh as much as I would have if I were a unicorn or earth pony. I didn’t need her to do that much for me. “Just...can you try and help my left side? Just support a little weight while I walk.”

Without a word, Siren moved to my left side and helped me step, letting me press a wing to her cloak and keep the strain off my back leg just a little bit. We walked forward slightly faster than I could manage alone, catching up to Gunrunner, Redwood and Vlyka as they waited for us. Ark had gone ahead, but after glancing at me and the slight shake of my head I gave her, Vlyka was quick to hurry closer and keep us somewhat in a group. “Well, so much for help from the robot,” Siren muttered, glaring at Vlyka as she hurried forward.

I wanted to snap at Siren in irritation; Vlyka was far shorter than I was, she wasn’t going to do much to lift me, even if she didn’t tire out like any of the rest of us might have. But I didn’t want to test Siren right now, and she seemed content to ignore me for a little bit. But as we limped on for a little while longer, the silence grew uncomfortably between us. Eventually, I felt I couldn’t remain silent. “So...what do you think Manehattan will be like?” I asked. We had to be getting close by now.

Siren, for her part, barely spoke to me. “Crumbled buildings, blasted and scorched streets, ponies probably trying to kill us.”

I sighed from frustration, a mixture of annoyance with Siren and with the situation. I’d expected all that already, but it had been my silent hope that things would just have been better. “So the same thing as anywhere else, just bigger?” I asked, trying to joke. But Siren was dead silent. I looked away from Siren, only realizing that somepony had replaced my battlesaddle while I was out. My forelegs still bore both of my pipbucks, and I took a second to glance at the one with the busted screen on my right hoof. The clouded sunlight filtering through the clouds glinted off its surface, making me squint my eyes and wish I had a filter for some of this light.

“My helmet!” I thought, raising a hoof to my head. I could already feel it wasn’t on my face, but I didn’t know for sure if… I shifted and glanced in my saddlebag, finding it sitting comfortably with the rest of my things. I breathed a sigh of relief, before glancing at Siren. She was not keen on looking at me, or at least me knowing she was looking, as she turned her head away the moment I turned towards her. “Hey Siren?” I asked quietly. “Do you like me?”

“Nope,” she replied, without turning her head or giving a moment’s pause to think.

“You sure about that?” I asked, as Siren looked at me in confusion. “I seem to remember there were some tears when I was dying back there.”

Abruptly, Siren pushed me off of her, sending me to the ground. I wasn’t angry or hurt though; I stared smugly back up at her as she bent down to me. “Fine. ‘I prefer you to the rest of these idiots.’ That good enough for you?”

“So I guess if I asked you out on a date-” I began, joking, only for Siren to laugh before I delivered the punchline.

“Not even close. Just because I prefer you doesn’t mean I have to like you.” She had a point, but it still kind of hurt, even with what she said next. “But...you have made some progress since we first met.”

I’d take progress, for sure, standing back up and swaying a little on my hooves. “What do I have to do for you to like me anyways?” I asked, as Siren hesitantly came closer to me to let me lean again. She looked at me, her eyes a bit softer than before. I still had no idea if her niceness was a ploy of hers or not, but I had to admit it was hard not to fall for at least a little bit.

Siren looked at me, pausing for a moment as though she wasn’t sure what I’d just said. “Are...are you really asking that?” She looked a little lost for a second, before a smirk drew across her face. “Oh Storm, that’s precious. But I’m just not into you that way.” I couldn’t help but sigh and frown a bit, dejected by being shot down so hard. But after a second Siren sighed and, in a gentler voice, added “if you get me to the Stable though, that’d be a start.”

With that tiny scrap of hope in my heart, I felt my body lighten significantly. I kept thinking of what else I might do, asking Siren a few questions here and there about how I could make her like me. When she finally dropped me again, I decided it was best to drop the subject instead and stayed quiet for the rest of the trip.

Even in their ruined state, I couldn’t help but marvel at the aging glory of the Manehattan skyline. The skyscrapers were greying and crumbling, streets blackened and pockmarked with age. This had been a great city, and seeing how far it had fallen through the war was disturbingly breathtaking. As I glanced at the ruins before me, I wasn’t the only one thinking along those lines. “Manehattan...one of the largest cities in Equestrian history,” Siren said, almost in awe. “Now look at it; another monument to our sins.” I sighed a bit, Siren’s flair for the dramatic a bit overdone by this point, but as I looked at her I saw her squinting off into the distance. “Gunrunner,” she asked, “is there a building here where ponies still live?”

“Yep, Tenpony Tower,” he replied, and I sighed again. I could only hope they wouldn’t shoot us on sight, after the groups we’d been dealing with so far. “Been there a couple times,” Gunrunner continued, “at least until I got banned.”

“What did you do?” Siren asked him, and I turned to look at him with a wary eye. There went my hopes for a peaceful encounter, if one of our group was already banned.

Embarrassed, Gunrunner scratched the back of his head. “Well...I think it was because I committed a crime, what was...Oh yeah...no, not getting into that now,” he said quickly, turning his head away from us. I grumbled a little at his lack of opening up, but I could hardly force him and followed everypony else into the streets, headed for Tenpony Tower.

As we walked, the late afternoon sun began to set, something noticeable between the buildings as their massive shadows moved around us. I didn’t want to think about what would come for us in the darkness of an abandoned city, so I tried making haste for the tower. Arkangel, however, seemed...distracted, oddly. He turned suddenly from the most direct path to the tower and headed off down a side street. “Ark?” I called, but there was no reply. “Where are you going now?” There was still no answer, almost as though Ark was in a trance.

I glanced at Siren and Gunrunner, the latter of whom just shrugged, before we all turned to follow Ark down the side street. It was somehow better off than most of the streets we had passed before, probably because they looked like they had been fancier, better constructed buildings when they were erected. Arkangel was looking everywhere, glancing at numbers, for something. “Forty seven, forty eight, forty nine…” He was looking for a specific building, by number? Why would he know that information…? I was left wondering, as Ark finally stopped just after fifty eight, staring up at a two story brick house. The garden out front had rotted away, but the actual structure looked like it had survived the best out of the entire street.

I cast a glance at my EFS, registering enemies scattered all over the place, but Ark was too distracted to notice himself, as he approached the house with what seemed to me like a sense of awe. “You come back when you need us,” he whispered, only just loud enough for me to hear. I didn’t get a chance to respond though, before he continued. “We will wait for you.” Suddenly, he looked to his left, and his tone of voice changed a bit. “That’s not you, it’s a memory.” And again, his head snapped to the right. “You’re not him! You’re a fake!”

I bit my lip as I watched Arkangel struggling with himself, uncertain what exactly to say. He suddenly seemed to realize we were still behind him, staring at him have his episode, and he readjusted his posture before striding into the house without another word. Having not much else we could do, I started to follow him, Siren and the rest of the group following my lead as we stepped after Ark, who had cracked open the front door as its hinges groaned from lack of use. The room beyond was dark, so Siren, Redwood and I started to switch on the lights on our Pipbucks, despite the former being locked. Gunrunner reached into his bag for a torch, leaving only Vlyka remaining. She didn’t seem at all hindered by the darkness though, stepping inside and looking intently into the shadows where none of our lights were pointing, although curious at what she was seeing I shone my light in that direction.

The room we’d entered into was a decently-sized entryway with two main exits to the right and left, a staircase just ahead of us that Arkangel was already starting his way up. Gunrunner went to the room on the left, the cone of his torch showing me enough to suggest it was once a living room. Vlyka was looking into the room on the right, as was Siren, but I knew where I needed to go...I tapped Vlyka on the shoulder and hoofed her Siren’s leash. “Hang onto this, ok? Don’t let her go anywhere,” I asked, and Vlyka nodded in understanding. The two of them ventured off into the other room while I turned to limp up the stairs; at least the pain was subsiding by now.

I heard Siren grumble something about being left with the robot, and some kind of whirr from Vlyka’s body that made me wonder exactly what her reaction had been, but I didn’t want to waste time figuring out what was going on downstairs. Instead I hurried up the stairs and looked around to find a hallway stretching in both directions, five doors lining the walls. One of them was just closing behind Ark, drawing my attention as I moved quickly towards it. On the way though, I paused, glancing into a room with an already opened doorway.

Inside was a bedroom that looked surprisingly intact, and as I stepped in I opened the window to let in a little more light. The room itself was filled with dark blues and purples, which hadn’t helped my vision at all, and now that there was some light I could see exactly why: it was chocked full of images I thought I recognized as the old alicorn princess Luna, one of the Two Sisters. There were posters of her all over, a small statue of her with two foals on the dresser, next to a desk with a terminal. Just on the floor in front of the desk was a photo frame, the glass shattered from some impact. I stooped down to pick it up and look at the photo, only to let out a gasp at what I saw. It was clearly some family photo, a grey-coated stallion and a blueish coated mare standing besides a disturbingly familiar looking foal. It was the spitting image of Arkangel, although his eyes were red with black sclera...and the picture had to be centuries old. There was no way this was really him, right?

I took a closer look at the picture, trying to tell if there was something wrong with the photograph to change the foals eyes like that, but it didn’t seem like it was at all touched up. I shivered at the unnatural eyes staring back at me from this ancient photograph, my mind racing as thoughts of Ark’s red robotic eye drawn to the surface. “There’s no way they’re two hundred years apart, are they…?” I thought, mulling it over. Could the Arkangel personality really be that old? How had Pale Shroud gotten thrown into this mix...he’d known to come here, hadn’t he?

I slipped the photo out of the frame and into my bag before leaving the room without another thought. I went back out to the hallway and glanced at the door Ark had vanished into, blinking and turning my head a bit. I thought I heard...music? I crept closer, listening intently, before I couldn’t resist my curiosity any further and slowly started to open the door.

Beyond the doorframe, sitting on the floor in the middle of the room, Arkangel sat with his helmet off. I gasped in horror as I saw what else he had though: a revolver, barrel in his mouth. “Ark don’t!” I cried, causing him to look up in shock. His cybernetic eye was blue, so if I was getting the hang of his personalities this was Pale Shroud, intent on killing himself!

Pale stared at me for a moment before taking the pistol out of his mouth and staring at it instead. “He’s right about me,” he sighed, lowering the pistol to the ground. I wanted to approach, snatch it away before Pale did anything stupid, but I knew if I provoked him I’d just cause bigger issues. “I feel them, all clawing at my mind whenever I’m in control...they want me gone, but they can’t get rid of me.”

I came a bit closer, slowly and carefully, as I tried to figure out what he was saying. He must have been talking about the other personalities in his head, trying to wrest control of his body from him. I couldn’t for sure say what that felt like, but if he was willing to kill himself… “P-Pale?” I stammered, unsure what else to do.

Pale didn’t look at me, only glancing at the old vinyl player sitting next to him, still warbling its music from before. “Want to know his weakness?” he murmured, and I couldn’t tell if he was really trying to talk to me. “Put on some old music and he’s gone. Without him the rest I can fight off,” he muttered, looking almost hopeful for a moment, before his facade broke. Pale collapsed on the ground, tears streaming from his eyes as he struggled to not sob openly. “Why...why’d it have to be me…” he begged, shuddering as he tried to talk.

I came close and sat down next to Pale, almost reaching a hoof out to comfort him. I was worried though, if Ark would come back in the middle and attack me for it. “Pale, what did they do to you?” I asked gently as I could.

“I...they put something inside me,” he muttered, after pausing for a second to think. “Something under my skin. There wasn’t anything at first, but now...it’s just noise.” He struggled a bit to get his chestplate off, but made no further progress than he had before. “He was the first one to show up, then the rest...and with that came visions, memories or images of...something…” Ark closed his eyes and strained his face, making me worry about him even more: this looked painful for him to even recall. “The techs, they kept saying, I saw...notes...bringing ‘him’ back…”

Ark Paused and shuddered slightly, drawing my attention back from his words. The music box had paused, and as I glanced down at it, Ark turned his head towards me, robotic eye glowing red. A shiver ran up my spine as I realized what that probably meant. “Ark, I j-”

I couldn’t even finish my sentence before I was slammed on the ground, Arkangel’s plated hoof pressed to my windpipe. After my head slammed hard into the ground I got disoriented, and for a moment the metal against my neck made me flash back to the caves, Vlyka’s stranglehold that had knocked me out. Only I doubted very much that I’d be quite as lucky with Arkangel, particularly with the glare he shot my way as he stood over me, resisting my panicked struggles with ease.

“You just have to keep asking questions,” Arkangel muttered, shaking his head. “Questions that just aren’t meant to be answered. Ever hear the phrase 'curiosity killed the cat?’” he asked, as I heard the sound of his bladed tail whipping around somewhere above me. With limited air my vision was blurring, and for a second I failed to realize that the thud that emanated from the floorboards right next to my ear was Ark’s tail spike, slamming down to intimidate me. Gasping for air and out of fear, I stared at Ark’s blurring face, his red eye gleaming dangerously in the center of my vision, the last clear point of light I could see.

Desperation took hold and I tried to roll out from under Arkangel, but he simply picked me up with both hooves and threw me at the nearby wall. I had just enough time to suck in enough air for my head to clear suddenly as I was slammed hard against it, knocking the wind out of me. I’d have fallen forward, but Ark caught me, his tail swishing, anxious to strike. However as my focus was on the dangerous motion behind Arkangel, his focus got drawn downwards towards some motion from my pocket. I glanced down in time to see Ark’s tail swish down and snag the photo I had picked up earlier, fluttering to the floor; it must have shifted out of my pocket when I was thrown.

“Look at you…” he muttered, just long enough to make me fear he was even more pissed at me than before for taking it. But his grip on me softened, just a bit, as he kept staring at the photo, his other foreleg grazing it. “So young. So pure, so...like me. Before...her.” There was a pause, and a sudden shift in Ark’s posture as he stiffened. “Pathetic.”

His tail flicked, I thought to slash the photo in two, but he paused it again and stared, posture changning again. Suddenly, he dropped his grip on me as I fell to the floor, coughing and clutching my neck. “What happened to us? W...why did I…?”

As I struggled to stand up, Ark glared down at me, but as my head turned back and he saw the bruise starting to form on my neck, his stern glance dropped almost entirely. “You’re too curious, Storm. But I’ll give you one more question, in exchange for your silence on what you saw here today, and your continued duty.”

One question? I already had about a million demanding an answer...but glancing at the photo still speared on Ark’s tail, I thought on the effect it was having on him. It was decided. “Tell me who you are, the Arkangel, and what you have to do with that foal.”

There was an annoyed huff as a response, clearly some deep regret at letting me ask. But, Ark answered me. “This too you will not speak of,” he said warningly, and I nodded in agreement. “This is Arkangel. He was a soldier during the war; this was me, my first body. The Arkangel you know is a cluster of memories, just enough to have my old personality...along with the imprints of others who have been my body in the years between. Pale Shroud is just the latest.” He took a step closer to me, and though I shook violently I didn’t step back from him. He slipped the photo into a compartment on his armor and scooped up his helmet, turning for the door. He paused though, and glanced back at me.

“You know my goal, Storm. I intend to flee, hide where I can’t be used to cause more damage ever again. You should also know that the parts of me that survived have made me into little more than a killing machine. I will continue to strike at those around me, and I have no concern for the consequences of my actions. I will lash out again.” His helmet slid onto his head and sealed itself. “So stop digging, unless you’re looking to hit a landmine.”

With that, Arkangel left the room, leaving me to sit in stunned silence for a minute to process what in Equestria had just happened.

Footnote: Level up

New Perk: Nerves of Steel --- 20% faster AP regeneration.

(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
Proofreader:: Tobias