Fallout Equestria: Falling Ashes

Ash woke to the sound of knocking on the door, looking down she realized she had started cuddling Rose in her sleep again, shoving her away Ash jumped off the bed and onto her hooves. Rose landed on the floor with a thump and a yip.

Ash tried looking through the peephole as Rose sat up holding her head. Vortex stretched her hooves into the air before rolling to look at Ash. “Who is it?”

“Dunno, not a pony though.” Ash said before opening the door. “Hello?”

On the other side of the door was a griffon, female from her eye shape and thinner head. Her head and neck feathers almost glowed with how white they were making the blue speckling show brighter than the gray flecks in her fur. “Shine asked me to put the co ords into her Pipbuck for you. Said you already paid for it.” Her voice was soft with a slight edge hinting at her mercenary profession.

“Right, Rose c’mere.” Ash said before moving out of the griffon’s way.

Rose yawned and shuffled to the two, sitting in front of the griffon she held her Pipbuck up while rubbing her eyes with her other hoof.

Ash watched her put the details into the mini computer. After she finished the griffon looked over to Ash. “Blue’s still looking into her Ranger contacts. Should be set up by the time you’re done there.

“Thank you, what’s your name by the way?” Ash asked before giving her a small smile.

“Kamaria, let me know if ya need anything else down the road.” She returned the smile before leaving the group and closing the door behind her.

When Ash looked back at the group Rose was looking through her Pipbuck and she noticed Vortex giving her a smug smile.”What?”

Vortex just shrugged. “Nooooothing. We heading out now?”

“Yeah, Might as well.” Ash said before going to her Power Armor and entering it. While waiting for it to power up Vortex started putting her’s on as well.

Rose arched her back in a stretch before going to grab her gear as well. Ash left the room with Ava behind her to wait for the group. Stopping in the parking lot between the bar and hotel Ash sat down and looked up at the sickly blue sky. When she could hear Ava’s treads stop beside her Ash let out a sigh. “Kinda scared of when we meet the Rangers here. Like what if they heard what happened, or were told some fake version.”

Ava just looked at the sky as well and just listened to Ash talking, maily to herself. “I’m not even really sure if what I heard about this chapter is true. The one I’m from doesn’t help ponies, this one supposedly does.”

Before Ash could continue she heard the room’s door open behind her, getting back up she looked back at the group.”Ready?”

Vortex nodded and Rose just yawned again. “I copied the map from Rose, you should do the same before we go.”

Ash waved her hoof at her. “It’ll be fine, takes too long anyway. Let’s head out before it starts getting dark.” Ash started towards the road before Vortex could respond, the three then started following.

***

After an hour or walking, or what felt like three from Rose’s complaining. “How much longeeer, it’s starting to get dark.”

Ash sighed at the question, like she did the other times Rose asked. “Look at your map, we’re about halfway. We can sleep in the factory after we clear it out. It gets too cold in the desert to stop.”

Before Rose could reply, Vortex cut in. “She’s not used to walking a lot like we are, maybe she could ride on your back.”

Ash shook her head as much as the armor let her. “Absolutely not, that’s where my spark battery is. You do it, or ask if Ava will let her.”

Rose looked up at Ava who nodded and stopped moving. Rose stepped onto her tracks then onto her back, laying down with her legs on either side. Ava then went to catch back up, Rose hanging onto Ava’s neck.

Scrolling through her inventory for Med-X again she went back to complaining. “This is booooring.” Finding it again she pulled it from her bag and injected it.

Ash looked back at her, not seeing the syringe be flicked away. “Well I don’t know, sing or something.”

“Nah, you do it.” Rose stuck her tongue out at that.

Vortex looked over at Ash and said with a smile in her voice. “Yeah Ash, you do it.”

Ash turned her head from Rose to Vortex. “What? No, you do it Texy.”

“Oh it’s Texy now, huh?” She took her helmet off just so she could raise her eyebrow at Ash while Rose just started laughing.

“Oh shut up, it’s just.. Quicker to say, yeah.” Ash said with embarrassment in her voice.

Vortex winked at her. “Whatever you say Ashy.” She then put her helmet back on and turned to face where they were walking.

Ash looked away with a blush forming. “Sh-shut up.”

Vortex smiled back at Ash. “Make me~”

“I’ll yank your helmet speaker then weld it to your armo-” Ash started to say before Vortex cut her off with. “You’ll weld my speaker to my armor? That’s not going to do much.”

Ash just let out an exasperated yell that Rose and Vortex laughed at.

***

As the group neared the factory Ash started talking about a plan, ignoring it Rose started eyeing a large, garage door to the right of the main doors Ash was leading toward.

After getting to the entrance Vortex lined up to kick the door in for Ash enter. Ash spun up her minigun’s barrels. Rose left the three to sneak into the garage doors she spotted, behind her she heard the door bang as it was kicked, followed by a laser turret firing. Glancing behind her she watched laser refracting off Ash’s armor as she returned fire from her minigun, walking forward as she shot them.

Pulling her rifle from her back Rose laid down in front of the roller door and lifted it to peek under using her magic. After a minute she followed her Pipbuck markers to see five robots roaming and eight ceiling turrets scanning for the other three.

Sliding her rifle under and lifting the door more she fired into two of the turrets, they exploded and sent shrapnel down onto the floor. The remaining turrets started firing randomly into the room, hitting the robots on the floor and random crates. One of the stray lasers managed to hit Rose in the chest, melting her old stable barding, skin, and fur.

She screamed and the rest of the turrets started firing at her, diving for cover behind a stack of crates in the middle of the room she pulled a healing potion from her saddlebag and downed her. Checking where she was hit she watched the burn glaze over but the fur didn’t come back.

With a growl she peeked out and shot another turret, as it sent it’s internals over the floor she saw her cover being melted away by the remaining turrets, she glanced down at one of the robots advancing on her, she jumped back as it’s laser hit the corner her head was against.

Jumping out she fired into the robot’s chest, after it exploded like the turrets she dove behind another stack of crates, a second robot hit her rifle with one of its lasers knocking it into her. Laying on her back catching her breath she looked at where it hit. She rubbed the soot off the rifle and saw it hadn’t been damaged. Looking up she saw a robot standing over her raising a leg to hit her.

She spun the rifle around and shot it in the chest, it exploded showing her with circuitry and shards of it’s shell before falling on top of her. She let out a loud squeak as it forced the air from her lungs.

Panicking to wiggle out from under it’s heavy frame she saw another one of the robots come around the stack of crates and turn toward her. Pulling her rifle up she saw the thing get covered in green with numbers across it, it then started walking slowly toward her. She realized she could hardly move after it appeared on the robot, she started hitting her hoof on the robot pinning her as she started pushing against the ground with her other leg.

As she panicked the green disappeared, the robot then fired, hitting Rose in her face. She screamed as her cheek melted. She looked up at the robot with tears covering her vision. It turned back toward where it came before exploding then falling back as it was filled with bullets.

Rose looked around to see a green plasma ball hit one of the ceiling turrets, melting it instead of blowing it up. Catching her breath she just went limp, watching as Ash pulled the robot off of her and yelling down at her, something about not wandering off, she just closed her eyes and sighed as she pulled another potion to her lips.

She opened her eyes to see Ash and Vortex going through some boxes. Pulling a Med-X from her bag and using it she got up slowly and went to the other side of the room, crumpled on the floor was a rusted out robot similar to Ava. “AAAsh I found oooone!”

She stood beside it with a smug smile as the others went to her. “I found it before yooouuu.”

Ash just patted her on the head before sitting down and exiting her Power Armor. Going to the dead robot she started going over the mouth, the outside was heavily rusted. “Ava? I need to remove your jaw and see if these are the same model.” Ash said before pulling the tabs off the mouth of the old bot.

She pulled the mouth off it as Ava stopped in front of her. Ash set the old unit onto her back before pulling her mouth off as well. “Look the same, I’ll just attach this one for now, I can switch the internals when we get home so you don't have to be extra rusty.” Ash said while attaching the replacement. When connected there was a short pop.

There was a pause before a mare’s voice came from the brainbot. “He-hello?”

Ash smiled. “It works, is that your voice or that voice box?”

“Mine, the mouthpiece is just a speaker, my actual voice is saved to my memory. We would all sound the same otherwise.”

Ash replied as she checked the connections of the fake mouth. “Yeah that makes sense, but the ones that attack everyone all sound the same.”

Ava waited for Ash to finish checking before nodding. “Yes, their entire system is corrupted so they are essentially the same as each other.”

Ash heard a hiss and looked around, after hearing another she looked at Rose, who was trying to hide a small syringe. “How many of those have you had?”

Rose just shrugged. “Like fourish.”

“Rose that’s way too much, did you take anything else? Pony your size shouldn’t have more than one in eight hours.” Ash said as she went to her armor and started digging through her saddle box.

“A few things, I’ll be fine.” Rose said before flicking the syringe off to the side.

Rose watched Ash pull a plastic inhaler like what she used earlier out of her armor’s inventory. “Already used a few of those things.”

“Was it actually this? Or Dash?” Ash asked, holding it up.

“I dunno, just looked like that.” Rose said with a shrug.

“It was Dash then. Use this and don’t take anymore of that shit after.” Ash sat down in front of her and held it out for her.

“I like mine more.” Rose said before looking away.

Ash pulled her back to facer and held it near her mouth. “Take it. Before that shit kills you, you’ve had way too much of everything for your size.”

Rose just showed her fangs and tried to get away when Vortex spoke up. “She's right, just taking random drugs will kill you, that stuff Ash has will fix it.”

“Don’t care, don’t want it.” Rose said before trying to walk off.

Ash shoved it into her mouth before wrapping her hooves around Rose’s chest. “Inhale it. Now.”

Rose growled and spit it out before trying to wiggle free from the larger mare’s grasp. Vortex sighed and grabbed the canister and tried to put it back in Rose’s mouth. Rose responded by attempting to bite Vortex who in return bonked her on top of the head.

Rose lit her horn, picking up her rifle Ash grabbed Rose’s nose as Vortex got the inhaler back in her mouth, she pushed down on the canister and held it in her mouth. Seeing the rifle Ava smacked it out of Rose’s magic setting it off into the ceiling before falling to the floor. Getting startled, Rose inhaled the Addictol.

Ash set her down and started digging through her bag, gathering the rest of her drugs.

“Give those back right fucking now. “Rose growled before shaking her head enough to spit out the canister before biting into Ash’s hoof.

With a scream Ash shoved her away and held her hoof to her chest and screamed. “We’re trying to fucking help you!”

Rose stayed laying on her back and pointed up at Ash. “I don’t want your help. I don’t NEED your help! I only JUST started taking that stuff and it’s how I could keep up with you two.”

“How many have you even had?” Ash asked, still holding her bleeding hoof.

“Dunno, like five.” Rose just shrugged.

“The dose of one vial is too much for you with how small you a-” Ash started to say before Rose cut her off. “I don’t fuckin’ care. Give me them back. My dad was a doctor. I know what I’m doing.”

Vortex responded before Ash could. “Yeah, he was, not you. You don’t know what you’re doing.”

“So? They’re fucking mine, give them back.” Rose snapped her teeth at the air between herself and Vortex.

Ash shook her head at the little mare. “You’re not killing yourself with these. Now drop it.”

Rose got up and stepped back, glaring at the two. “First you won’t help me with the shithole I escaped from, now you steal my shit. Fuck you!” Rose yelled before running to the rolling doors she entered the factory from. Her AMR flying after her, held in her magic.

Ash started to follow before Vortex blocked her. “Let her go, she’ll be back after she cools off. Now let me see that hoof.”