Bunker to Bunker
Have all the rations you need?

What's the judge say?

Armed to the teeth
Get a good sleep on the eve
Of your doomsday
- Doomsday Today! Big Business

A notice flashed across the upper edges of Amber’s visions as she stepped out of the front door of Bunny & Crown.

New Location discovered: Fillydelphia

The notice was displayed in bold green letters, the same color as the screen of the pipbuck itself. Strangely enough, however, the projected words weren’t the least bit obstructive to her overall vision.

If she focused her eyes on them, sure, they’d fade prominently into view, but if she focused her vision on something else, like the row of parking meters in front of her shop, the words faded and remained comfortably on the upper edges of her eyesight. The words reminded her of those augmented reality glasses that she wanted to buy a few years ago, the ones that beamed an image directly onto the retina to create a virtual HUD, but never purchased a pair because she didn’t want to be called a “glass-hole”. It certainly seemed to be the same technology, but there wasn’t anything projecting images into her retinas, they were already in her retinas.

Amber felt like she could almost reach out and grab the little green words right out of the air, if it weren’t for the fact that they disappeared every time she blinked or closed her eyes, and just as quickly as she cast her gaze across the street the notice faded from her vision entirely, leaving only a small transparent compass bar on the bottom of her periphery.

She was facing West.

“I don’t get it...” Amber said looking around “Unicorns make some of the most impressive shit sometimes…” She watched the compass track her head’s position from North to East to South. “… yet they come up with some of the most stupidest fucking names imaginable. What’s the deal?” She turned North and began to walk down the sidewalk.

Fillydelphia was quiet that morning. Calm and sunny.

The sun had just started its slow ascent, casting shafts of horizontal light that filtered through the buildings as the sun climbed into the sky. Amber’s shop wouldn’t see direct sunlight for several more hours though. The manufacturing district, where amber’s shop was located, sat in the shadows of Filydelphia’s skyscrapers for the first half of the day.

The entire city was built atop the coastal hills of the Celestial Sea. The manufacturing district, the first and oldest district of the city, was built out of brick on the flattest valley of the hills Northwest of Downtown Fillydelphia. Built so it could easily service the trainyards in the early days of Equestrian trade. As the years passed and construction technology evolved, large skyscrapers built out of steel and glass and insulated homes of wood and vinyl were constructed on the hills surrounding the valleys, overshadowing the manufacturing district and much of the foal mountain valley. What once was an unobstructed view of the rising ocean sun became a slowly forming shadow that covered the manufacturing district in cold shadows between the hours of 6 and 11 am.

Amber’s block specifically sat in the shadow of the Stable-Tech Skyscraper and wouldn’t see sunlight until at least late-morning when the sun would finally be able to crest its monolithic roof-top and become West-Fillydephia’s problem for the rest of the day.

The air was cool and crisp, and Amber shivered as she stepped through the pools of morning shade from the buildings that neighbored her shop; relishing in the warmth of the shafts of sunlight as she crossed the alleys between buildings.

She was the only pony on the street.

Most of the town’s population resided in the hills, where the shopping and residential districts were located. The manufacturing district didn’t usually see much hoof-traffic, a mailpony here or there, a police pony making their rounds, but that was about it. Most of the traffic in this part of town were either delivery-wagons, trains, or business-owners taking inventory back and forth.

She wouldn’t see another pony for at least another mile when she would cross into the more metropolitan areas of town, so until then she walked silently past brick buildings, garages, fenced-off lots, and construction equipment as the various carpenters, steamfitters, plumbers, masons, HVAC techs, and other trade-ponies conducted their daily operations.

Amber walked past a few of the newer buildings made from steel and glass, constructed to meet the necessities of the Equestrian war effort and stood out garishly amongst all the old brick buildings and their faded ghost-signs from decades past. One in particular, a large steel building that was constructed a few years prior, was built into the neighboring factories. Large pieces of manufacturing equipment and subterranean machinery were brought in on military transports and construction lasted for months. Nopony knew what the building was even designated for until the last days of construction when a sign was installed on the front yard that read “Ministry of wartime Technology: Now Hiring.”

The sidewalk came to a large hill and began to ascend, and Amber walked briskly up what felt like a near 45-degree angle until the sidewalk flattened out again at the top, bringing her to the intersection that marked edge of the manufacturing and recreation districts, divided by a large tree-lined boulevard that cut the road in half; an old windowless brick building with a renting HVAC company on one corner and a steel high-rise with large-paned windows enclosing a dance studio on the first floor on the other corner.

It was then, while waiting at the crosswalk did Amber finally see another pony, a mare and her friend exiting the dance studio and crossing the street towards a waiting cab on the other side. However it wasn’t any of the ponies themselves that caught her attention, rather the green blips of light that appeared on the compass in her bottom periphery were what had stolen her gaze..

Amber looked down at the compass and watched as two little dots crossed horizontally across the bar as the mares trotted across the street, joined by a third dot as the cab-pony rounded his carriage to let the two mares inside. She watched as all three blips moved together as the taxi took off into the street until eventually disappearing all together when they got far enough away.

Amber crossed the street and stopped dead in her tracks as she stepped in front of the dance studio window. Inside were about 10-15 mares, led by an instructor, and they were performing a simple foxtrot dance routine. Left hoof forward, right hoof back, step to the right and everypony move together.

It was a common dance routine, one that everypony already knew by highschool, more than anything they were most likely performing it as a warm-up to a more complicated routine they would practice later on, but Amber wasn’t watching the mares dance, she was staring at her compass. More specifically, she was watching their Pipbuck representations dance along the length of the compass bar ;Bobbing and swaying, back and forth, flitting around like fireflies inside a swamp.

Amber was entranced, watching the little green dots flit about her vision so intently that she hadn’t even noticed she was staring blankly at two mares, who were now staring back at her as she stood awkwardly in front of the windows, staring inside, her mouth agape in awe.

One of the mares waved aggressively at Amber, breaking her trance. She blushed hard, finally realizing how weird she must’ve looked, and hurried down the street, turning east onto a block of restaurants and joined the lunchtime crowd that was moving down the sidewalk.

Amber was less mystified this time, as the group of pedestrians appeared as a solid green rectangle in her compass. She was partly interested when the crowd in front of her had dispersed yet the crowd of dots in her vision did not. It took a few moments of looking around before she finally lifted her head to see they were coming from a group of ponies eating lunch on a roof-top cafe.

“Huh, interesting.” Amber mused to herself as looked down into the empty flower-shop on the ground floor yet still seeing the dots displayed on the compass. They were above her, but they moved irrespective of whether or not they were physically in front of her. “Seems like a glitch… Maybe I should let Bun know about it later.”

Quest Added: Tell Bunny about Pipbuck Glitch

Another notice flashed across her vision. There hadn’t even been any haptic feedback from the device. She looked down at the Pipbuck on her hoof and was shocked to discover that it had activated itself and was now displaying a small user-interface with a single line of fading text in the upper lefthand region of the screen. Quest Added: Tell Bunny about Pipbuck Glitch it said before it was replaced by another line of text: Username Undefined

This line of text was permanent. It was displayed underneath an icon of a generic looking male pony in the center of the screen, smiling as he walked in a looped three-quarter walking animation. Above the stallion was a menu that stretched along the top edge of the screen, reading STAT, INV, DATA, MAP, RADIO. The device was displaying the STAT menu, and beneath it was a submenu with the words Status, Special, and, Perks. Along the bottom, on both corners of the screen were lines of small text reading ‘HP Module: locked’ and AP Module: Locked” respectively.

The screen itself was set into garishly brown chassis, which was made of, judging by the weight on her outstretched hoof, some kind of hardened metal which curved at the angles; obviously pressed from some kind of mold. On the top right of the device was a dial wheel with its dial positioned to STAT, at the top of a list of words identical to those of the on-screen menu painted directly onto the chassis. Amber switched the dial to INV and the screen flashed to an empty screen, save for the top menu that remained the same. She switched back to STAT and the idly-walking stallion returned. Amber wondered aloud to herself why something so high-tech needed to have an archaic analog dial. Switching the dial to MAP and seeing a similar blank screen, the words ‘Map Module: matrix error’ sat alone in the middle of the screen.

“I guess because some ponies use their mouths to turn dials?”

She tried turning the dial back to DATA with her teeth and was met with a surprising amount of resistance. The dial clicked and the Pipbuck displayed a similar screen and message ‘Data Module: not installed’. She preferred using her hoof instead, the dial hurt her teeth. Flipping the dial to RADIO she was met with the same message yet again ‘Radio module: not installed.’

Amber fiddled with the analog radio dial, not at all interested in its durability. She’s been using horse-safe technology for years. What she really wanted to know was how that last notification came up. She turned her hoof around and looked at the device from every angle. The only thing of note she saw was a large retractable tape-deck on the top back end of the device.

She didn’t know anything about unicorn tech or how it worked. She’d heard of terms like ‘arcano technology’ or ‘spell matrix’ in conversations before but was never given any real explanation about what the fuck a spell matrix was, or how arcano technology worked compared to normal technology. Was it analyzing her blood? Was it casting a unicorn spell that read her mind? What the fuck was it doing? Bunny had said earlier that it was thought-reactive, but how was it reading her thoughts?

She shook her hoof in the air, as if shaking the device would produce any answers.

“Maybe I’ll ask Bunny if there’s a manual” Amber sighed when the notification popped up again, this time with an addendum.

Quest Added: Tell Bunny about Pipbuck Glitch
(Optional): Find Pipbuck Manual

Amber nickered. She was obviously not winning this one.

Amber finally decided to rejoin the crowd and returned to her previous task of heading to the supermarket. She had lost count of how many ponies had passed her on the sidewalk as she was looking through the Pipbuck, not like she was counting anyway, but she figured she outta move anyway. She was only halfway to the store after all, and if she spent any more time playing with the Pipbuck then she wouldn’t have much of a break left.

Amber shook her head.

“Shit, that’s really programmed.” She remarked quietly to herself. For a moment she had forgotten she owned her shop. She was the boss. She could take however long a break she wanted. Because who’s going to complain if she does? Bunny? She can do whatever the fuck she wants too. She doesn’t answer to anypony anymore either, and she had already completed her portion of work for the morning anyway. So who cared if she takes a long break?

Amber’s chest puffed as she walked and silently argued with herself. Determined to win her battle against some imaginary boss-pony from her past. But how could anypony blame her? After ten years of grueling labor jobs, being fired for working too hard, having her co-workers shun her for being too focused, giving more than 100% of herself to some corporation only to be paid less than 15 bits an hour while sitting through meetings where the company announces billions of bits of yearly revenue; it started taking a toll on her mentality.

Maybe it had something to do with coming home exhausted every day, never having enough energy to do any of the activities that actually interested her, let along even cook a meal for herself. Maybe it was the stress of her own financial troubles constantly hanging over her head while she worked. She didn’t know. All she knew was that over the years she had somehow slipped into this permanently aroused state. Hypervigilant for a boss that might be around the corner, or a co-worker that might be spying on her, over-focused on doing her jobs perfectly for the sake of not being criticized for her work, sometimes being so anal-retentive that she missed glaringly obvious small mistakes and was criticized anyway.

Sure she knows how to build with wood now. Sure she knows how to electrically wire a house. Sure she can work on small engines and figure out the repairs easily enough, but what did it gain her? Anger issues? Anxiety? A possible-personality disorder?

Amber hadn’t realized that the whole time she had been brooding, her outward appearance had slowly become more aggressive. Her chest was puffed out, her ears were flared back, her jaw was clenched, and she was breathing very heavily as she walked; so much so that the pony in front of her moved out of her way, looking back disgustedly as if Amber had been directing her emotions at him the entire time.

Something about this made Amber incredibly angry. She wasn’t angry at him before, she had been so focused on her angry daydream that she forgot the crowd even existed at all. But looking at him now, seeing his face twist into scornful scowl tweaked something inside of her, and in a heated second she wanted to slap that disgusted look off his face. Another second later, Amber realized she couldn’t move. Nopony was moving in fact. The entire world had come to a complete stop, and the stallion’s head was glowing yellow; [95%] displayed over his stupid scowling face.

In her rage, Amber had accidentally activated S.A.T.S. again, and despite not being able to move she had to strongly resist the impulse to actually strike the stallion She didn’t want a repeat of earlier that morning when she had accidentally vibe-checked Bunny across her face. Something told her he wouldn't be so forgiving if she did. He might even hit her back.

She looked around frantically. Frozen. Unable to move. The city around her stood equally still and slightly out of focus save for the stallion in front of her. Other ponies had similar percentages displayed across their bodies. The closest ones were in the 90s and decreased proportionally the farther away they stood from her. Amber was starting to panic.

She felt like she had to fight with herself to stop herself from hitting this station, as if her anger had frozen too, except frozen at the same emotional height it was at when she first entered into S.A.T.S., like the servomechanism that holds the throttle of an engine at a certain RPM to maintain a steady speed.

That’s what her anger felt like in that moment, the constant rev, the pinned needle of a motor placed in cruise control, unable to move, unable to fluctuate, unable to recede. Just the constant buzz in her head, constant churn in her stomach, constant tightness in her chest, constant hot flashing across her neck and back, constant tension in her hooves.

She felt stuck, but she could also feel her dominant hoof wanting to raise up and slap him, ready to strike,. Fighting the feeling gave her instant, major anxiety, like the adrenal response before the body goes into fight or flight mode. The queasy, twitchy, frantic feeling that builds up in the hoof-pits and compels the body to move. Amber wanted to scream, but she couldn’t move her jaw, it was frozen too, clenched tight from her previous angry thoughts that she couldn’t even remember now. All she could focus on was trying to stop her body from assaulting this stallion, the scowl on his face tightening her already tense muscles every time she looked at him. Every impulse in her body was screaming at her to punch him. To kick him. To grab his face and slam it into the pavement. To grab the flashlight out of the purse of the mare next to him and beat him over the head with it.

Amber’s mind was screaming. The world was frozen, her thoughts were racing. The dissonance between these two states made her feel lightheaded, she was becoming increasingly more anxious the more she became aware of her frozen body. She didn’t want to hit him, but she was losing the fight with her own body. Her hooves felt light, they felt twitchy, they felt ready to strike, and Amber didn’t know how to deactivate S.A.T.S.

She got out of it last time by striking Bunny across the face, and she was about to do the same thing again. She didn’t want to hit anypony. All she wanted to do was exit S.A.T.S…

And with that thought the world began moving again. Immediately. Amber stumbled forward, as she was mid-stride when S.A.T.S. had deactivated, and she had to fight with her own sense of balance to stop herself from falling completely forward. Several ponies in the crowd turned to look at her as she hobbled as disgracefully as a newborn deer trying to walk for the first time; and she slinked off embarrassed. Taking her final corner as she turned south again, crossed over a pedestrian bridge, and entered into Downtown Fillydeplhia; the heart of the city.

New Location discovered: Downtown Fillydelphia

The difference between downtown Fillydelphia and the manufacturing district was unparalleled. Where the latter was dusty, dry, and quiet throughout most of the day, the downtown area was the most advanced, modernized, and technologically developed part of Fillydelphia. ‘Where all the fancy stuff is’ Amber once heard one of her customers describe.

While ‘old town’, as Fillydelphians liked to refer to her part of town, still relied on Equestrian antiquities such as horse-drawn carts, hoof-delivered mail, and other facsimiles of early-modern Equestrian life, downtown had automatic carriages and industrial equipment powered by nuclear fusion. While old town was mostly squat and square brick buildings constructed during the foundation of the city, downtown was constructed entirely out of towering skyscrapers and retrofitted over the years with polished-silver steel and tempered glass.

Amber hated this part of town. It always felt wet, with a cold oceanic wind that ripped through the miles of straight-line streets and ignored all but the most insulated of clothing. The towering heights of the skyscrapers reflected the sunlight off of each other at every angle, so no matter where you looked the sun was always in her eyes. The alleys smelled like garbage, sewage, or dead animals. Worst of all though, it was loud. Too loud.

There was so much noise in this part of town, in fact, that Amber couldn't decipher one source from another, it all simply blended into one nonstop cacophony of discordant noises and random scraps of conversation:

The clopping of horseshoes on concrete.

“...this is a bistro!... salad and…. Half of the distrai...”

Several sirens from far-off police wagons.

The whooshing of rubber wheels on wet pavement.

“I...have to… s a gorgeous day tomorrow...”

Water steady falling from a skyscraper above onto the ground below

“no I don’t think… without them we’re gonna… get those down...”

Taxis and pedestrian carriages honking at each other in the streets

The straining whine of a hydraulic garbage cart in an alleyway

“It’s not supposed to be like this….. warm around yester...”

There were too many ponies here. The crowd Amber was in alone had already doubled in size as other smaller clusters joined in from crosswalks, neighboring shops, and some, for all Amber knew, had probably manifested out of thin air simply because they were downtown.

Feeling claustrophobic, like a fish in a can, Amber cut down an alley at her first chance to escape. She trotted hurriedly past piles of garbage and a leaking grease dumpster at the back of a restaurant, holding her breath as not to gag at the acrid foulness in the air, and emerged on another boulevard in full view of a large wall of the Fillydelphia Rec center, covered inch to inch in a woven patchwork of propaganda posters from the local equestrian ministries.

Every single Ministry had found representation along the lengths of this wall. Ministry of Morale on top of Ministry of Awesome, next to Ministry of Arcane Sciences on top of a sideways Ministry of Peace and a half torn Ministry of Wartime Technology. Even The Ministry of Image, as illusive and secretive as they were, featured themselves prominently on every poster with a "Created by the Ministry of Image" slogan in the corners of each poster.

The posters themselves weren’t anything new. They were never new. In fact, Amber had walked past several dozen of the same posters repeating the same messages so many times that she didn’t even notice a single one of them on the walk up from her shop alone. She had seen them so many times that they pretty much faded into the background of the city at this point, like the billboards nopony looks at anymore, and everypony pretty much stopped noticing them. Except for one pony, fed up with the posters, who had graffitied “This used to be a mural” in black spray paint with a thick arrow pointing to a section of torn-back layers of poster; revealing colorful swaths of painted brick underneath.

Amber laughed solemnly. Nopony liked looking at these posters. Amber herself always felt weird when looking at them. Their only purpose seemed to be to be telling her what to do, who to trust, or who to hate.

‘Wipe the Stripes’ one of them said, depicting a ragtag group of zebras shooting up at soldiers of the Equestrian army. ‘Join the Equestrian forces today’ it said along the bottom. ‘Your home is next’ another one said from the same Ministry, above the image of a burning town and a leering zebra in the middle.

“Learn! Knowledge is our future” The ones from the ministry of Arcane Sciences seemed innocent enough, simply saying ”Join the Ministry of Arcane Sciences” with a picture of a Twilight Sparkle reading from a large book.

“Mares of Equestria, come into the factories” Said the Ministry of Wartime technology

“REMEMBER: We are all in this together! Care for one another.” The Ministry of Peace preached.

“Look to the sky, where will they fall?” The Ministry of Wartime Technology warned

“Join the Ministry of Awesome” The Ministry of Awesome said.

By far the most prominent and infamous, of all, were the posters from the Ministry of Morale. “Pinkie Pie is watching you, forever” they said, with a picture of Pinkie Pie herself looking gleefully at you. Although some variants had different facial expressions, like angry, sad, or even disapproving. However, the one that was displayed the most was of Pinkie Pie’s giant exuberant beaming smile and a stare that seemed to follow you; which was easily why this poster was the most vandalized. Several of the posters on the rec-center wall had their eyes scratched out or were torn in half leaving only Pinkie’s smile. Absolutely nopony seemed to like this poster, and Amber disliked it greatly as well

Even though Equestria had been in a decades-long militarized conflict with the Zebra nation, ponies simply didn't like feeling like they were being watched. Nopony knew if it was supposed to make them feel safe of threatened. Nopony knew if they were trying to be kept in line. All they knew is they were always watched, and Amber knew was that it was weird as fuck that there was always a cluster of security cameras somewhere nearby Pinkie Pie’s posters, or there’d be a row of phone booths, or a fast-food drive-through; anywhere there was a microphone or camera, Pinkie Pie’s smiling face was never far away.

The Ministry of peace, ironically enough, made Amber feel the most confrontational.

Every time she read “War? Fear? Death? We must do better’ she felt her body stiffen up like a board. Like it was her fault Equestria went to war with the Zebras when she was a filly. Like it was her fault those four Wonderbolts were killed by those pirates. Like it was her fault coal-prices shot through the roof and those four strike workers at the Hippocampus Energy Plant got shot. She didn’t tell those guards to kill those Zebras outside Luna’s Academy. She didn’t tell that Zebra to bomb that school.

“What the fuck do you want me to do? I’m an electronic repair pony.” She swore at the poster, earning her some questioning stares from passing ponies. But she didn’t care. She hated this yellow mare on the posters. She hated her stupid sad face, looking at the viewer like some kind of late-night infomercial parading around a starving foal or an abused animal asking for donations. “It’s your fault!” Amber continued “You did this to us!”

Amber made a rude gesture to the poster, hoping the two zebras in the background would strangle the yellow mare to death with her own hair, and walked away with angry thoughts in her head.

Nopony really seemed to care that she had just yelled at a poster. On some level they probably agreed with her. Why else did they just walk past her without a second glance? Why else were the posters constantly vandalized? Everypony hated them. They made ponies uneasy. They put them on edge while they walked to work or just went out to get a fucking sandwich. The posters didn’t have to tell them things were bad, everypony already knew it.

There was an energy crisis, there was a war. Celestia abdicated her thrown after ruling for over a thousand years, and now there were six ministries telling everypony, everywhere, that things were bad. So bad that they needed to join the ministries. So bad that their homes weren’t safe. So bad that some zebra might be around the next corner, waiting to put a gun or a knife under their ribs, so everypony walked around mistrusting the ponies standing next to them. Are they a zebra sympathizer? Are they a spy?

Newspapers are telling the world that ponies are hungry for peace, yet the local news and radios report on this zebra’s violent crime, or that pony’s homicide, or the chaos that happened at that protest, and then next day The Ministry of Moral puts up new posters telling everypony they had to do better, and if somepony tore them down? Another poster appeared to replace it.

The world was going crazy, and the ministries of fear wouldn’t even let Equestrians take back what little control or agency they had left after covering every inch of their public spaces with their propaganda. So now everypony was seemingly one incident away from a psychotic break. The tension was always there, brewing just underneath the thin veneer of polite society and was never going away.

The incredible fear of the Zebras, whether real or manufactured by the Ministries, was ever-present in modern Equestrian society. Equestrians almost didn't see them as ponies anymore, almost like they had reverted back to some tribal pre-classical hatred of their Equestrian cousins. It was almost like they were aliens from another planet and their whole purpose was to destroy Equestria and the Equestrian way of life.

That’s what everypony was taught to believe. At the earliest age of five, fillies and colts were taught about The Wonderbolt Massacre, Shattered Hoof Ridge, The Littlehorn Massacre, The Manehattan Missile Crisis, the Zebra internment camps, The energy crisis...They were taught that Zebras were their enemy. That they needed to fear the Zebras. That Zebras wanted to kill them. Everypony believed it so strongly in fact, that when the Equestrian government commissioned Stable-Tech, a small Terminal start-up company, to start researching and constructing Stables to protect everypony from Zebra attack, they were flooded with residency applications less than twelve hours after they were announced to the public.

Amber didn’t apply for a shelter, despite her parents applying on her behalf without her permission. Something about the Equestrian government’s contract with Stable-Tec didn’t sit right with her. The Stables they were commissioned to build were originally intended to be simple underground storm shelters that a pony could build themselves with two to three rooms, a latrine, an air circulation system, and a water purifier. However, breakthroughs in construction techniques allowed for bigger and better Stables to be constructed and somewhere along the line they turned into these gargantuan underground bunkers designed to house hundreds of ponies, to be built exclusively by Stable-Tec, financed at the expense of the average every-day pony through the sale of high-yield junk bonds.

Even then only about a hundred Stables were constructed, allowing for less than 0.1% of the population to be saved from a possible apocalypse. All the same, the entire project seemed highly suspicious. Although everything the Stable-Tec corporation did seemed suspicious, from their work with the Ministries, down to their own press-releases. Everything they did was shrouded in some kind of corporate secrecy and presented in double and triple meanings woven into their corporate jargon.

“We here at Stable-Tec are committed to the mutually assured safety and longevity of the Equestrian nation and blah blah blah” Amber mimicked one of their latest press releases to herself. “Yeah? Well what are you going to do about the waste-products your company produces that leeched into Baltimare’s ground water?”

Amber waited for a crosswalk signal and took some time to think about other things. She wondered if she was either highly perceptive or just highly paranoid, and then wondered what the difference was as she stepped into the road. What is paranoia but perception going into overdrive? Like prescription pills when you’re misusing them. Sure you can take a couple allergy pills to treat your seasonal sniffles, but take ten to twenty of them and you find yourself talking politics to a dog-sized spider with a baby’s head while you wait at the bus stop. Or at least that’s what’s she’s been told, it sounded insane but also who the fuck would mainline allergy medication like that?

Amber’s mind was wandering, what was she thinking about? Stables? Ministries? How the hell did she go from survival shelters to substance abuse? She shook her head silently in an attempt to re-shuffle her thoughts, like somepony slamming down a game of boggle, and when her thoughts resettled, they landed on one of the field-trips she took during highschool to one of Stable-Tec’s stables.

It was one of Stable-Tec’s earliest vaults. Vault 0, built in the basement of their HQ building in Fillydelphia as a demonstration, and she was part of a guided tour to show what life would be like underground in the event of a catastrophe.

They were taken room to room. Shown the atrium, sleeping quarters, common rooms, and were even given little crackers and ration pouches and told ‘These are what you would be eating down here’. The entire trip felt very contrived, and more of a publicity stunt to investors than anything educational. The entire group was made to stay behind blue and yellow velvet ropes, guiding her class around the vault as if they were in a museum. Beyond the ropes she could see other rooms with computers and lab equipment, and doors leading to areas like maintenance, Electrical, and Mainframe that the tour group weren’t being shown. Every time she tried to sneak away, walked into any room not part of the tour, or would touch anything beyond the ropes like the Terminals on the outside of the pneumatic doors she would be scolded; eventually being forced to sit by herself on the bus outside for “hacking” into a terminal, even though all se did was reboot the terminal into recovery mode and used a default admin password to reveal a list of maintenance logs.

Thinking about it now though, there wasn’t a whole lot of thought about the Stables back them, at least not to her. There wasn’t the great big deal of fear like there was today, There wasn’t the anger that was always present, or the open hostilities that made a pony learn to hate the zebras from the earliest points of their lives.

As a filly, Amber at most thought the zebras were just bad ponies, but of course, that’s probably the same impression they would have of her and her kind as well. Celestia only knows what thoughts the Zebras had to be harboring about pony kind. Did they make their own propaganda of Ponies burning down their jungles, huts, and villages? Did they take their school-children to bomb shelters instead of zoos or museums on school field trips as well? Instead of tornado or fire drills did they have Duck and Cover drills and learned to hide under their desks in the event of an attack? Did the Zebra empire cover every inch of their collective thought spaces with imagery telling everyzebra ‘this is your enemy, this is who is going to attack you, be afraid!’

For all Equines knew, maybe the Zebras thought the same thing. Maybe they were afraid that ponies were the ones who were going to attack them.

New Location discovered: MoWT Surplus

Amber finally emerged from her thoughts to find that she had managed to walk an extra three blocks past the grocery store and found herself standing in front of the Ministry of Wartime Technology’s surplus store. A lone single-story building at the base of a larger skyscraper which served as the logistical headquarters for the ministry’s Fillydelphia branch.

Surrounding the store was a palisade of cardboard standees of Ministry soldiers in mechanical suits of armor, standing battle ready next to advertisements of the store’s wares; guns, ammo, belts, bags, hoofwear. The one closest to the open door had its advertisement taped over with a hastily scrawled sign reading ‘Join the Ministry of Wartime Technology today and receive a free pistol!”

Out of nothing more than morbid curiosity, Amber stepped into the store and was immediately greeted by another round or propaganda posters, albeit these ones were more on-the-muzzle with their violent depictions of Zebrakind. ‘Better wiped than striped’ one said, showing a power-suited soldier making his last stand against a pack of zebras with nothing more than a sledgehammer in his hooves. ‘Negotiating with savages’ another said, showing a pony tied upside down to a spit, roasting alive over a roaring fire amid an audience of hunger-crazed zebras.

“Welcome to the Ministry of Wartime Technology” said a gruff looking grey stallion behind a glass firearm counter, boredly practicing a rehearsed greeting. “Are you here about the promotion?”

“I guess so.” Amber said, walking up to the counter, standing in his shadow.

“Now what does a little filly such as y’erself need to be getting a gun fer?”

“Well you’re offering aren’t you?” Amber said rather sarcastically, earning a raised eyebrow from the stallion behind the counter. “Why are you just giving them away?”

“Orders from corporate” The stallion stiffened, seemingly irritated with Amber’s nonchalance. “In response to this morning’s riot in Canterlot and the escalation of Pony-Zebra conflicts, our Ministry Mare felt that common folk were ‘itchin to protect themselves.’”

“I don’t even know why those striped bastards are even still allowed in Equestria” a voice rose up from across there store, belonging to another stallion stacking ammunition containers on a back wall.

“Not while there’s customers in the store, Fallstripe.” The grey stallion reproached.

“All I’m saying Folsom is that they’re nothing but trouble.” Fallstripe returned. “I got a friend who has a cousin that works for the sheriff of Trottingham, says just last week they found a stallion half-dead down by the train-tracks. Said a buncha Zeebs ‘napped ‘im, beat em, took his horseshoes, and left ‘im by the tracks to freeze to death.”

“That didn’t actually happen!” Amber interjected. “Did it?”

“It mays as well have,” Folsom answered. “The way things are going as of late, I suspect it’s only going to get worse.”

“They crippled that cop in Canterlot this morning” Fallstripe said. “Drove a wagon over ‘is backhooves during their little demonstration”

“That’s brutal!” Amber said aghast.

“So it goes.” Folsom shrugged, shooing his coworker away before pulling out a sign-up sheet. “I’ll need yer signature, then we can run yer background check, and we’ll be done here.” He wasn’t even attempting to hide his disinterest.

Amber roughly scrawled her name and associated information on the signup sheet and Folsom disappeared into a backroom with it. She heard the clacking of Terminal keys and the screeching of a dot-matrix printer and shortly after Folsom returned with a stack of paper.

“H-allright” He said through a sigh. “Looks like yer background check was approved. Just gotta run you thorough the standard on-boarding paperwork we do for every new member, and you can git yer gun.”

Folsom began to drone out his Ministry’s corporatized on-boarding rhetoric to Amber with a total lack of interest in either the bureaucratic process, Amber herself, or a combination of the two. He gave a spiel about the Equestrian government, the war with the zebras, the creation of the Ministry of Wartime Technology, it’s dedication to overseeing the manufacturing of weaponry and technology for the war against the zebras; sounding like a living, breathing propaganda poster. Amber wanted to roll her eyes until he started describing how the Ministry created a system of sorts, a network of business lending materials and services to contribute to the war effort for the good of the Equestrian forces.

He slid a packet of papers across the counter to her, said it was her copy of the paperwork, a page detailing what her duties would be as a ministry member, a bunch of wartime propaganda fliers, and began to talk about the free gun she’d be getting, reading from another rehearsed disclaimer that the one she would be receiving would be of low quality since it’s coming from the Ministry’s surplus reserves

“Since production is better put to supplying weapons to the front lines,” Folsom said. ”any weapons available to the public are either obsolete or a phased out model that is no longer in service due to better alternatives becoming available. After that the weapons get recycled to the rear-lines, homefronts, and training units. Blah blah. Now for the exciting part” he said, dipping his head below the counter and producing an open container of weapons “Which one do you want?”

He was beaming with pride, seemingly the first time in the entire conversation he had shown any other emotion besides marked disinterest. In the container was an assortment of laser, plasma, and ballistic weaponry, all tossed in with general disregard. Folsom pulled out one of each, describing their perks and downsides.

“In general, it comes down to personal preference.” Folsom explained. “Laser weapons have higher fire rates but have lower damage per shot. Plasma weapons pack more of a punch with each trigger pull bur the shots have a noticeable travel time which makes them harder to use at long ranges.” He began explaining how each one of them worked at a fundamental level, down to how each component worked in relation to another but paused when he saw Amber’s eyes swimming in confusion at all the techno-jargon “I think you’d be better suited for a standard ballistic” he said with a chuckle.

“I think so too” amber said.

He fished an inferior quality 10 mm pistol out of the container and set it down on the counter, “these things are crafty, lightweight, and easy to repair.” He said after putting the container away. “For basic defense it’s all you really need, although I’m privy to Plasma myself. Lastly, here is your ID card that’ll allow you to get ammo from any of the Ammo vending machines. Should you need it” he said the last but with a dark tinge to his tone “Limit one transaction per day.”

He produced a small saddlepack, with the Ministry’s emblem, a set of gears and sparks, bisected with a blade, embossed into the leather. He tucked the pistol inside, followed by all of her documents and hoofed it over the counter to her. When Amber slung the pack over her torso and tightened the strap under her tummy, a flurry of notices appeared in her vision.

[Item added to inventory] 10 mm pistol

[Item added to inventory] Ministry of Wartime Technology ID card: initiate

[note added] MoWT onboarding paperwork

Amber paused to read each notice as they appeared in her vision and Folsom followed her gaze to the wall behind him, upon which hung a large fully modulated AER9 laser rifle, complete with a full stock, sniper barrel, and an electronic recon scope

“That’s not for initiates” he chuckled.

As the notices faded away, an idea had formed in their stead.

“Can I sign up a business with the Ministry as well? I run an electronic repair shop and we might be very interested in joining in and helping the warfront, repairing the electronic weaponry and whatnot”

Folsom perked up a little at the mention of Amber’s business.

“I saw on your form that your employer was Amber & Crown, I didn’t know you were one of the owners!” His entire tone seemed to change. like he suddenly saw her differently, like he s might’ve been impressed by her.

“like you didn’t see my name on the form” Amber said under her breath

“To officially join the war effort, you’d have to formally register your business at the MoWT headquarters in Manehattan.” He wrote down a note and he gave it to her. “They handle all the bureaucratic stuff like onboarding and whatnot.”

[note added] Ministry of wartime technology Manehattan address

“It takes a couple weeks for the registration to be processed,” He continued “After that they’ll start you off with small jobs here and there until eventually you start getting bigger contracts and start making real money.” Folsom sang her praise about how awesome it is for her to be joining the war effort and wished her luck on getting her business registered.

Footnote:

New Perk: Instilled Work-Ethic-- Learning and work comes easy at the expense of your mental health. Perception +5, Intelligence +6, Increased chance developing a stress-related mental illness (depression, anxiety, etc)

Author's Note

Cool references in this chapter:

Network [Screenplay] by Paddy Chayefsky | II - We Made God

Slaughterhous Five by Kurt Vonnegut | So it goes - Nebula