The Rainbooms were still a bit wary about the decision to leave Novac behind, but they knew that if whatever Sunset had seen to make her… do that… was really that bad, they didn’t want to argue. And as friends, they knew it would be a while before she was willing to talk about it, so they just kept walking north up the ruined highway, which they wisely decided was the fastest way to New Vegas after leaving town.

It was a long hike through the desert and while the girls had left Novac well and truly far behind and Sunset had gotten at least somewhat past the trauma she’d felt and inflicted, she still had a look in her eye that would’ve made just about anyone thinking about messing with her turn around and walk the other way.

As they walked down the highway, Applejack decided to look through the equipment they’d received, apparently free of charge from the townsfolk. It was some pretty good stuff – more food, water, and medicine, a ton of ammo for their various weapons, and the weapons themselves, including another bolt-action rifle, but this one appeared to be in much better condition than the one Rainbow had at the moment and had some manner of flag wrapped around the stock. “Hey Dash, trade ya.” she pointed out, handing her the new rifle.

“Deal.” Rainbow smiled as she took the new rifle, handing Applejack the other. She looked it over and appeared surprised as she saw writing on the chamber. “Hm. ‘Paciencia’. Cool name.”

“I think it’s Spanish for ‘patience’.” Twilight pointed out.

“Not really my style,” Rainbow remarked. Unfortunately, it looked like she would have to change that as she checked the rifle’s magazine capacity. “Looks like this thing only gets three shots.”

“Hence the name, no doubt.” Rarity remarked with a flip of her hair.

“Well, we won’t have to worry about ammo for a while,” Applejack noted, making her point as she reloaded her revolver.

“How much farther to Vegas?” Sunset asked.

Twilight adjusted her glasses as she examined her tattered road map with marks on it made by the townsfolk. “Well, uh, lemme see; we just passed that gas station with the Vipers…” she noted, still a bit impressed Sunset had managed to intimidate the Viper raiders at the station into backing down with just an angry glance. Disregarding that for now (mostly so she wouldn’t anger Sunset with the reminder), she looked to the group’s left at the dry lakebed next to the highway. “The abandoned army convoy should be just up ahead at the lake’s northern beach. There should be a trading post at the interchange; we can resupply there if we have to.”

“We might have to.” Rarity assured as she put an empty bottle of water into the bag. “We’re running short of water again.”

“Well, maybe there’s somewhere between here and the trading post where we can find more,” Twilight suggested, but she doubted it – the map looked pretty well filled in and there wasn’t anywhere in the area.

Pinkie looked across the dry lakebed and perked up. “What about up there?” she asked, pointing to the mountain across the lake… at what looked like a small canyon.

Rainbow raised an eyebrow as she loaded her rifle. “I doubt we’re gonna find a freshwater spring out here, Pinkie. And as much as I love rock climbing, I don’t think we’re in the condition to climb up that.”

“Maybe we won’t have to,” Twilight remarked scientifically. “There might be a cave or something at the foot of the mountain and if we’re lucky, it could lead to an aquifer.”

“Somehow I doubt we’ll get that lucky, Twilight.” Sunset pointed out seriously.

“What happened to optimism?” Rainbow asked with a smirk.

Sunset’s answer was a single, blunt word: “Nipton.”

“Oh. Right.” The color left Rainbow’s face in embarrassed sorrow. “Sorry, I just meant that-”

“I know what you meant,” Sunset interrupted before she took a deep breath to calm her nerves. “Sorry, I just… I wanna get to Vegas and go home as soon as we can. And yeah, you’re right; we’re not going to make it if we don’t have water.”

“I suppose it’s worth checking the mountain. If for no other reason than to make sure there’s nothing there.” Rarity shrugged.

With that in mind, the group turned on a crossing road on the highway and followed the side of the mountain until they reached the canyon. It was a fairly narrow and short pass, and it led to a small wooden shack door in the rock face. “Looks like someone’s already been here,” Rainbow noted.

“Let’s check it out anyway. You never know.” Twilight pointed out.

Pinkie didn’t hesitate as she flung the door open wide and skipped into the tunnel. The others quickly followed her in… just in time to see several praying mantises the size of Spike scampering menacingly toward them. “Oh, that is just wrong!” Rainbow remarked and raised her rifle.

“Wait!” Fluttershy said quickly, stopping her as she stepped forward, activating her powers. She was shaking in worry as she looked at the approaching bugs, but as she quickly whispered something toward them, they appeared to stand down and skitter away back into the cavern wall.

“Whew. Thanks, that would’ve been bad.” Rainbow noted, holding Paciencia at her side.

“Uh, guys?” Pinkie noted as she looked further down the cave. The girls followed Pinkie’s gaze and were surprised; the natural cavern gave way to a massive concrete wall with what looked like an open doorway that looked like a massive gear.

“What the…?” Sunset asked breathlessly.

Twilight looked and saw a filthy control panel next to the door and quickly examined it, blowing some dust and sand from it before she found an apparent name for this structure. “‘Vault 11 Door Controls’. Huh. So this is one of those Vaults that Stepinac mentioned.” she noted – she remembered the NCR soldier they’d met outside Novac had mentioned the existence of these Vaults, but she didn’t think they would encounter one so soon.

“I can hardly see the appeal of living in a hole in the ground.” Rarity pointed out.

“I think I can. It’s a bomb shelter.” Rainbow saying that aloud frightened the others as they had somehow forgotten they were wandering a post-apocalyptic radioactive wasteland.

“Makes sense. Buried under a mountain surrounded by concrete – short of a direct shot, these vaults were probably havens.” Twilight noted breathlessly. “Especially if they had food stores, underground farming, water recycling, things like that.”

“Then why’s the door open?” Rainbow pointed out.

“They were probably designed to open once the radiation levels outside were within survivable levels.” Twilight theorized.

“Doesn’t look like these people had to worry about that.” Sunset pointed out as she walked into the Vault. The others followed her in and were more than a bit alarmed by what they saw – four human skeletons huddled at the foot of the stairs, and next to one was a blocky pistol.

“What happened here?” Rarity asked in disgust.

“I don’t know. But I think there’s only one way to find out.” Twilight remarked.

“HELLOOO…!!!” Pinkie’s voice suddenly screeched over the Vault’s p.a. system, forcing the others to cover their ears. “IS ANYBODY HOME…?!?”

“That’s not what I meant!” Twilight yelled at Pinkie as she approached her at the computer terminal on the table. “You might’ve just woken up some sort of security system deeper in the Vault.”

“Not to mention damaged our hearing.” Rarity pointed out as she pointed to her still-ringing ears.

“Sorry.” Pinkie shrugged jovially.

Twilight’s attention was suddenly brought back to the terminal which blinked with life. “Wait a minute. How did you access this?” she asked.

“I just pushed a button. Didn’t even ask me for a password.” Pinkie shrugged.

“What’re ya thinkin’, Twi?” Applejack asked.

“I’m thinking we might be able to find out what happened here by going through whatever records we find on the computer system,” Twilight noted as she looked through the terminal. “A place this big wouldn’t be able to operate properly without people keeping some sort of records.” Lo and behold, the first thing Twilight found on the terminal was an entry regarding a security recording of the Vault entrance. “Got it.” She clicked the option and the screen said it was downloading the data… before the terminal ejected a strange object that resembled a VHS tape.

Rainbow Dash just raised an eyebrow at the device. “What are we supposed to do with that?” she asked.

“I have an idea,” Twilight noted and pushed the tape back into the terminal, finding an option to play it.

Unfortunately, the tape was audio-only so the girls all listened as the first voice – who sounded like an older man – came on. “Are we really gonna do this? It’s open. We could just leave.”

“I couldn’t. Not after that.” The second voice was a woman, and she had a sense of defeat in her voice.

“We don’t deserve to leave.” a third voice noted – a young man, clearly more than melancholy.

“‘A shining example’. That’s what it called us.” a fourth voice – another man – said almost sarcastically.

“But we were! We did what we were supposed to.” the first voice argued.

“Not by a long shot.” the fifth voice – another man – countered.

“Anybody would’ve done what we did.” the first man pointed out.

“Ya ask me, that’s exactly the problem.” the second voice argued, the sound of a gun chambering in the background. “Now let’s get on with this.”

“I’ll go first.” the third voice volunteered.

“Wait. Wait. People should know what happened. They could learn from it.” the first voice argued.

“If there’s anyone out there at all, I hope they never have to find out.” the fifth voice countered. “Ready, Harry?”

“Yeah.” the third voice – now identified as Harry – nodded.

“No! No, no! Wait!” The first voice was suddenly cut off by the sounds of four gunshots in rapid succession that startled the girls into stepping back from the terminal. The voice let out a whimper as the gun clattered to the ground. That was where the tape ended.

The Rainbooms looked back at the skeletons – the apparent perpetrators of some terrible crime in this Vault who committed suicide for what they did – and immediately felt sick to their stomachs. “What happened here?” Rainbow asked hoarsely.

“I’m not sure I wanna know,” Applejack remarked as she took her hat off and raked her hair with her hand, holding her hat to her chest to pay her respects to the dead before them.

“We’ll probably find out anyway as we go through the Vault,” Twilight noted. “We’d better start looking.”

“Look at this,” Fluttershy muttered. The others saw she had moved over to a concrete column in the wall where there was an interesting political-style poster pasted.

Sunset walked over and examined it with a raised eyebrow. “‘Rumors about Haley are baseless. Vote Stone for Overseer’.” she read aloud.

“So they were electing the guy who ran the place,” Rainbow noted.

“Well, I suppose that’s one good thing; democracy survived the end of the world.” Applejack shrugged.

“But what ‘rumors’ are they talking about?” Pinkie asked in confusion.

“Here’s another one.” Rarity pointed to an adjacent column with another poster… but the message on this one was much darker than the other. “‘Don’t vote Glover… his family needs him’?”

That prompted some serious confusion from the Rainbooms as they looked at each other. “Why do I get the distinct feeling that Overseer wasn’t a very stable job in this Vault?” Applejack asked tentatively.

“Let’s fan out. Maybe we can find out more about these elections.” Sunset instructed. Doing so, the girls spread out around the Vault entryway and searched.

Sunset found a box of bullets under the table with the terminal… before she looked at the gun in the midst of the dead. She felt dirty taking a weapon that had been used for suicide, but she had a feeling she could use a sidearm, so – trying hard not to think about the skeleton clutching the gun who was presumably Harry – she picked it up by the stone-cold barrel and examined it. She saw from the writing on the side that it was chambered for 10mm bullets, ten of which were still in the box she’d found… with 12 empty slots, no doubt loaded into the gun for the suicide. She fiddled with the gun until the clip dropped out and indeed, there were only eight rounds left, which made a grim sort of sense considering the four gunshots on the tape.

She tried hard not to think about that as she snuck the gun under her jacket just in time to hear Rainbow let out an impressed whistle from the large pod on the eastern wall. “I think I found out what those rumors about Haley are,” she called out to the other girls, an impressed tone in her voice. “Listen to this; ‘Haley is a known adulterer & communist sympathizer. Elect Haley for Overseer’.”

“Yikes. That sounds a little harsh.” Applejack remarked.

“Sounds like propaganda.” Twilight pointed out. “Communism is a political philosophy where everything is public property and everyone only gets paid according to what they can do or need.”

“Doesn’t sound like the kind of society you’d want in a concrete box buried underground with maybe hundreds of other people for who knows how long,” Rainbow noted.

“Yes, this Haley certainly doesn’t sound like someone I’d want to have in charge.” Rarity agreed.

“That’s only if the rumors aren’t baseless.” Twilight pointed out. “Propaganda rarely has any real basis in reality, especially slander like this.”

“This one’s pretty succinct; ‘I hate Nate’.” Rainbow read another poster, confusion in her voice. “Who is Nate?”

“I have a feeling we’ll find out,” Sunset noted. “Any more posters in there?”

“Yeah, a few. Another of those ‘his family needs him’ ones and… huh; ‘Glover has done nothing wrong. Vote for Stone!’” Rainbow read.

“Well, it certainly sounds like Glover was loved.” Rarity noted. “Makes me wonder what these people did to their leadership.”

“Search the Vault; let’s find out,” Sunset instructed. Applejack quickly opened a rusty door that led out of the main entrance into a hallway junction. There was a large rat in the room that appeared to have lost nearly all its fur except for a head-to-tail mohawk, but it was still reasonable as Fluttershy was able to talk it into leaving.

With the rat gone, Sunset looked around. “Suggestions?” she asked.

Twilight pointed to the sign above one door first. “Let’s check the clinic first; you can never have enough medical supplies out here,” she suggested.

No one argued so they entered the clinic… after Fluttershy asked the giant mantises to leave. Upon entering the clinic, they were greeted by… dismembered skeletons on operating tables and dried blood splatter on the floor. “I’m kinda painting a bad-looking picture here, girls,” Twilight noted grimly. “I get the feeling something… catastrophic happened here.”

“Tell us something we don’t know,” Rainbow remarked as she looked around.

“The people were treated like in any normal society, but… then that society collapsed. Suddenly,” Twilight said nervously. The girls all looked at each other nervously, as if they didn’t want to know how this society collapsed, but there was nothing they could do except move on, emptying the contents of two small medical cases into their gear bags before they left the clinic.

They searched the restrooms but didn’t find anything of note… until Rainbow spotted a poster someone had apparently painted on after it was put up. “Huh. ‘I hate Kate’. Wonder if there’s a relation.” she said to herself.

The search yielded a staircase down, but Sunset insisted on scouring the first level first. The only room left was a classroom, which was mostly empty save for one active terminal. Twilight quickly booted it up, taking note of the text at the top. “‘RobCo Industries Unified Operating System. Copyright 2075-2077 RobCo Industries’.” she read, making sure to remember the name RobCo, in case it meant anything as the girls gathered around. “Okay, there are three entries.”

“First things first, I say.” Rarity noted.

“All right. First up, Vault 11 Election Guide.” Twilight nodded and opened the entry. “‘Dear Fellow Vault Dweller: Congratulations! Your dedication to the democratic process is the bedrock upon which the continued stability of Vault 11 is based. Now, to help you make your decision for this year’s election, the Coalition of Vault 11 Voting Blocs has put together this handy Dweller’s Official Guide to Obtaining Overseers Democratically, or D.O. G.O.O.D.’” Everyone cringed unanimously at that pun as Twilight kept reading. “…‘that contains a summary of the leading candidates for Overseer, as well as their statements, key positions, and most importantly, endorsements. Sincerely, Roy Gottlieb. Chairman, Coalition of Vault 11 Voting Blocs. President, Justice Bloc’.”

“Why would endorsements be more important than statements?” Rainbow asked.

“Politicians don’t get their power out of nowhere; they need support.” Sunset shrugged – she remembered hearing that from nobles in Canterlot when she was Celestia’s student. Of course, the way she saw it, Prince Blueblood mostly just bought all the support he ever got.

“We may as well see who’s up for the office no one seems to want.” Applejack shrugged.

Twilight clicked through and found a familiar name for the first of the candidates. “‘Candidate: Henry Glover’,” she noted as she looked at the first entry. “Endorsements from the Utilitarian Bloc, Divine Will Bloc, and Allied Service Workers Bloc.” The group raised their eyebrows at that second one, but Twilight moved on to read the statement. “‘I’m a devoted husband and father of six beautiful children. My oldest, Sam, was on the honor roll this quarter, and I couldn’t be prouder of him. My youngest, Henry Jr., just said his first word, and it was ‘Da-da’. We’ve got this bond already and he’s just a baby’.” The girls couldn’t help but find that absolutely adorable as Twilight read on. “‘Friends, when you go to the polls this election, I want you to think of your own children. Then I want you to think of Sam and Henry Jr. Picture their faces. Nate Stone should be overseer, not me’.”

“Huh. That makes sense with that poster I found; his family does seem to need him.” Rarity noted.

“Yeah, but six kids? Who does that?” Rainbow asked seriously.

“I got family who’ve done it.” Applejack shrugged, turning back to Twilight. “Who else is up?”

Twilight pulled up the next entry and found another familiar name. “‘Candidate: Donna Haley’. Endorsements from the Human Dignity Bloc and United Vault Technicians Bloc.” she read and read out the statement. “‘I’m aware of the rumors circulating about me. I want everyone to know that they are vicious lies being spread by the other candidates in a desperate smear campaign. I have never in my life done anything so depraved, let alone four such things’.” She had to stop as she read this. “‘Four’?”

“‘Depraved’ is an excellent choice of words in that regard.” Rarity agreed, her ladylike sensibilities winning through. “I mean, really…!”

“Seriously.” Rainbow nodded.

Twilight kept reading. “‘But even if I had, that still wouldn’t mean you should vote for me. Consider the fact that I am grossly underqualified for the position and that both of my opponents are far more deserving. I know nothing about governance. You would be hard-pressed to find a worse candidate than me. I can promise you my administration would be a disaster’.”

“Well, from the looks of things, I’d say she was right; some sort of disaster happened here,” Rainbow noted.

“Wh- What about the last candidate?” Fluttershy asked.

Twilight quickly pulled that page up. “Nathan Stone. Only one endorsement; from the Justice Bloc.” she read.

“Oh, Nate. What’s he got to say?” Rainbow asked and looked over Twilight’s shoulder… and seemed to regret it as she read the statement. “‘This is ridiculous. I shouldn’t even be a candidate. And I wouldn’t be if it weren’t for all the dirty backroom politics going on around here. It’s sickening. You should all be ashamed’.” She stood up with a raised eyebrow. “Man, no one wants to be overseer. Why?”

“Well, we’ve still got two more entries here; let’s see what they say.” Twilight shrugged and pulled up the second entry on the terminal, labeled as a notice of postponement. “‘Fellow citizens, Due to the tragic events of the past few days, the Coalition of Vault 11 Voting Blocs has unanimously decided to postpone the election for overseer pending further investigation into the… murders’?” This sent a chill down the girls’ spines – first there was this highly unusual political intrigue going on and now a murderer?

Twilight took a breath to try to calm down and kept reading. “‘Your security team wishes you to know that they are working tirelessly day and night to find the perpetrator and are already following up on a number of promising leads. God willing, if the killer is apprehended swiftly, we may have found… a promising new candidate for Overseer’- what is happening in this Vault?!”

“Who in their right minds would want a murderer in charge of their society?” Rarity agreed seriously.

“I have a bad feeling we’re going to find out. Who sent this message?” Sunset asked.

Twilight checked and nodded at the name. “Terry Hart, president of the Human Dignity Bloc.”

“Okay, hopefully, we’ll get some answers in the next entry,” Rainbow said seriously.

Twilight shared Sunset’s bad feeling – they would get answers, but they wouldn’t like them. “Last entry: Overseer Order 745,” she noted and opened the message, reading it. “‘Effective immediately, the traditional selection process for overseer is hereby ended. In lieu of a yearly election, a citizen will be chosen one month prior to the start of his or her term with our mainframe’s random number generator, ensuring complete impartiality and fairness. Katherine Stone, Overseer’.”

“That would be Kate. But a random number generator? That sounds stupid.” Rainbow noted as she walked out of the room.

“I’m sure she had good reason.” Rarity pointed out. “Perhaps – and I can’t believe I’m even going to suggest this – perhaps the rumors about Ms. Haley were simply… scapegoating and deflection?”

“So that would make Kate the communist?” Twilight rationalized. “No, I doubt it. There has to be more to it than that.”

“I’d say there is. If Katherine was made overseer, does that mean she was the murderer Hart mentioned?” Rarity asked. “The one he suggested they name Overseer?”

“If that’s the case, then becoming overseer must be… some sort of punishment,” Sunset noted, turning back to this third entry. “Or at least it was until Katherine made it into a lottery.”

“But what could’ve motivated her to become a murderer?” Rarity asked.

“Well, this Nathan guy is related to her in some way and he wasn’t exactly jazzed about the ‘dirty backroom politics’ going on here.” Pinkie pointed out. “Maybe Kate decided to do something about that.”

“Well, either way, I think I speak for all of us when I say we need to find out exactly what happened in this Vault.” Rarity nodded.

“No argument here. For one thing, I wanna know who made these places in the first place.” Applejack nodded.

Twilight pulled out the drawer of the desk and found a small pamphlet with a company name and logo emblazoned on the front. “Look no further; Vault-Tec.”

“My, what a clever name.” Rarity remarked sarcastically.

“Guess they weren’t on top of what was goin’ on in their Vaults if this was happenin’.” Applejack shrugged.

“Well, there probably was a nuclear war to worry about when they were building these places.” Sunset pointed out.

That was when Rainbow walked back in. “Nothing else on this floor except a lounge down the hall. Let’s get moving,” she reported.

With that in mind, the girls hiked down the stairs to the second level. Down the left hallway upon arrival, they found a room full of terminals, most of which were blasted out but two were still functional. Twilight accessed one but sighed. “Just the same three messages,” she reported.

Sunset accessed the other terminal… which started to violently spark. Rainbow’s reflexes kicked into overdrive as she zipped in and grabbed them both, pulling them out of the computer room right before the terminal exploded, suddenly making Rainbow double-over in pain. “Gah!” she yelled as she stumbled out the door.

“Rainbow! Are you okay?” Fluttershy asked in concern.

“Agh, I think something just caught me right in the butt.” Rainbow groaned in pain. Fluttershy looked and indeed saw a small scrap of shrapnel sticking out of her left butt cheek.

Sunset barely managed to suppress a snort at the sight of it. Applejack and Rarity, on the other hand, both failed miserably and started laughing tremendously. “I hate you both.” Rainbow scowled.

“I’m sorry, Darling.” Rarity tittered with laughter. “But be reasonable; if it had happened to one of us, you’d be laughing as well.”

“Yeah, I guess.” Rainbow shrugged, glancing back at the shrapnel in her butt, chuckling a bit at it. “It is kinda funny. But man, it hurts. Can we get it out?”

“I can’t guarantee it won’t hurt.” Twilight shrugged as she activated her power.

“You mean more than it already does?” Rainbow pointed out.

“Touché.” Twilight relented, surrounding the shrapnel with her telekinesis and giving a sharp yank.

“OW!” Rainbow gasped in pain as she shot a hand to her butt to hold back any blood, promptly followed by Fluttershy jabbing a Stimpak into her leg to heal it.

Twilight floated the shrapnel toward her hand and raised an impressed eyebrow. “Whew. Ouch,” she remarked.

“Guh. What happened to that computer?” Rainbow asked, now with a very distinct limp.

“If I had to guess? Must’ve been booby-trapped.” Applejack remarked. “I think I saw the back-plate of it stickin’ out a bit.”

“Someone must’ve jammed a grenade or something back there.” Sunset nodded. “Well, hopefully we won’t run into any more trouble while we’re here.” With that in mind, they kept searching – the only other terminal was in a chemistry lab and it had the same three entries as the other two, so they went down another flight of stairs to the third level.

The third level appeared to be living quarters for the residents, as they found doors to dormitory wings. Searching the men's dorm first, the girls found several blue jumpsuits with yellow trim and the vault number on the backs – which Rarity found quite garish – and in one room, they found another functional terminal. Twilight tried to open it but stopped when she saw the opening screen. “Password protected,” she said in annoyance.

“Can you hack it?” Sunset asked.

“Maybe, but I’ve probably only got a few tries before the computer locks me out,” Twilight theorized.

Rarity looked around at the posters and raised an eyebrow. “Well, no need to ask which faction called this area home.” She wasn’t wrong; the posters all said “Play for the winning team – enlist with the Justice Bloc” with a baseball player on them.

Below the posters on one wall, under a broken shelving unit, was a footlocker. “Hmm…” Rainbow lifted the shelf to access the footlocker and found a small scrap of paper. “Think I found the password.” She handed it to Twilight, who quickly punched it in.

“Got it.” she smiled before looking at the User ID in interest. “‘Welcome, Mr. Gottlieb’. So this was Gottlieb’s terminal.”

“The head of the Justice Bloc?” Fluttershy asked.

“Let’s see what he had to say.” Sunset smiled as Twilight pressed a button to deploy another tape from the computer.

“Must be a security recording,” Twilight noted, pushing the tape back into the terminal.

The tape started playing a man’s irate voice. “She can’t do this.” he scowled.

“It’s done. We’re done.” another voice said in defeat.

“Nothing’s done.”

“She’s got the authority. The only thing she can’t do is change her own fate. Nothing says she can’t change the selection process for future overseers.” The girls could clearly tell these voices were talking about Katherine.

“I say she can’t.” the first voice argued.

“You shouldn’t have toyed with her like that, Roy.” So the first voice was Roy Gottlieb, but… toy with her how?

“We still have the majority.”

“We don’t vote for anything anymore.”

“I’m not talking about voting.”

“What then? You want to have a sit-in? A hunger strike?”

“Not exactly.”

“Maybe march into her office with torches and pitchforks?”

“Yes.”

“Come on.”

“I mean it.”

“What, start a revolution?”

“Laws don’t outlast their governments.”

“Roy, all we have to do is wait until someone from Justice Bloc gets picked for overseer. Then we have them change the law back.”

“There won’t be any blocs after the new overseer is picked tomorrow. Everyone’s going to move on. By the time we’ve reformed, who knows if we’ll still be in the majority.”

“We can hold the bloc together.”

“You don’t know that. Besides what if the computer picks you? What if it picks me?”

“And your solution is to start shootin’?”

“Not if we don’t have to. Look, we arm up. We go to the lower floors, take some strategic targets. Power, food, water. Just until she turns authority over to us.”

“The other blocs won’t support it. They’re tired of us having the power.”

“We have the majority. We don’t need them.”

“This isn’t a vote, Roy. They’ll fight back.”

“They’ve never had the nerve.”

“Hell of a way to test it.” The tape timed out, leaving the girls with more questions.

“So the Justice Bloc nominated Nathan because they had the majority and felt like they could throw their weight around however they liked.” Applejack rationalized.

“Nominating whomever they liked to become overseer so none of their own would have to.” Rarity added. “Which included Katherine herself after her killing spree.”

“And they lost that power when Katherine turned the selection process for overseer over to the Vault’s computer,” Twilight finished. “But Roy’s friend is right: an armed coup? Just to win back power so they can choose who runs the Vault?”

“And how did Roy ‘toy’ with Katherine? What did they mean by that?” Fluttershy asked.

“And how did it turn her into a murderer?” asked Rainbow.

“We’ll have to hope we find out.” Sunset shrugged as they moved on, searching the adjoining women’s dorms. They didn’t find anything, so they went back upstairs and passed through the door to the admin section. They went down the left hallway to find the security section… and an arsenal of ammunition and grenades, all of which the girls knew they’d need.

On the counter was an open terminal, which Twilight accessed and found a new entry labeled as Deposition. As it was opened, the girls saw it was an excerpt of Katherine’s deposition to the Vault’s attorney. In it, the girls learned that Nathan was apparently Katherine’s husband and had only been endorsed as overseer because he’d been beating several members of the Justice Bloc – including Roy – in poker. And that Gottlieb had told Katherine that he was willing to prevent Nathan’s endorsement if she performed sexual favors for the leadership of the Justice Bloc for an entire month. This news disgusted the girls and Rarity had to choke down her vomit at the thought of such a suggestion – though Fluttershy wasn’t so steely in the stomach and had to puke in the nearest trash can – and the rage only boiled up within the girls further when they learned that Gottlieb had endorsed Nathan anyway. That was when Katherine had gone on a killing spree, wiping out the Justice Bloc’s leadership to eliminate their apparently slim majority in the hopes someone other than her husband would be elected.

And as it turned out, she had been planning for herself to be that someone, exclusively to become the overseer and abolish the elections. “But one thing doesn’t make sense.” Rainbow pointed out, still feeling sick to her stomach. “No one wants to be overseer, but they keep electing a new one every year. Why? What happens to the old ones?”

“Well, we’ve determined that being overseer is tantamount to a punishment here.” Rarity shrugged, still feeling her stomach turning. “I suppose the only thing left is to determine exactly what that punishment is and what purpose it serves.”

“At this point, I’m not sure how much more of this Vault I can take,” Sunset remarked in disgust as she moved on with the others.

It took some work to get the adjacent door open – which apparently led to an armory which the girls quickly looted for its ammo before heading down the hallway to the overseer’s office. They nearly entered but Rainbow Dash stopped them, pointing to a tripwire just through the door, leading to a rigged shotgun. Carefully – especially considering her wounded butt – she knelt down and disarmed the tripwire, removing the shell from the gun and giving it to Sunset before they entered the room properly.

Twilight quickly tried to access the terminal but stepped back just as quickly. “Locked. Looks like it needs some sort of key.” she shrugged.

“Looks like we ain’t spoilin’ for places to look.” Applejack wasn’t wrong – looking through the window in the office, the girls saw a massive atrium area outside.

“I’ll see if I can find a way down there.” Rainbow nodded and quickly zipped down the hall to the right, surprising the girls that she was still so fast with her butt wound… though she returned in short order. “So that way’s a dead end; must’ve been a cave-in or something. There’s another hall down here.”

The girls gladly followed Rainbow down the hall just around the corner from the Overseer’s office. The tunnel to the atrium was blocked in by what looked like another cave-in, so the girls journeyed down the adjacent stairs to the utility area.

The storage room looked unassuming enough… except for the massive iron door with a strange gear-like latch in the back of the room. “Where’s this lead?” Rainbow asked in curiosity.

“Only one way to find out.” Pinkie smiled and gave the latches a hearty twist. Twilight watched in curiosity as the red and white lines in the small panes next to the top latch rotated, exposing different panels that read Open on the left and “Stand Clear” on the right. She could see why the latter was important – the door swung pretty wide as it opened, revealing a long corridor.

After Fluttershy shooed the mantises out of the hall, the Rainbooms walked tentatively down the hall to open a similar door, leading to a simple room. There were a few ammo boxes in the corner and through one door in the northern wall, Rarity saw a small pile of sandbags. “Over here,” she said and called the girls over… but quickly stopped them with her arms across the doorway.

Rainbow could easily see why; there was a low level of water on the floor. “Really? We’re wandering through a forsaken bomb shelter and you’re worried about getting your shoes wet?” she asked in annoyance.

“That’s the least of our concerns right now,” Sunset noted as she stepped into the shallow water, finding the sensation of water up around her ankles rather pleasant… but that pleasantness rapidly deteriorated as she looked behind one of the sandbag piles in the room and found several skeletons in the water. “I think I just found a bigger one anyway.”

The other girls entered the room and looked around, quickly understanding what had happened here. “Looks like Roy did what he said he would: he went after the Vault’s power source,” Rainbow noted as she retrieved a handful of ammo from a box behind one of the barricades.

Twilight suddenly realized what this meant and retreated out of the water. “Rarity’s got the right idea here; we shouldn’t be in the water,” she said quickly.

“Why? Since when are you afraid to get wet?” Applejack asked as she grabbed a pile of shotgun-shell boxes off the top of a console.

“Since the water was irradiated – this Vault is powered by a nuclear reactor.” That was more than enough motivation for the other girls to follow Twilight’s lead and get out of the water as well, greatly worried.

“That wasn’t too much radiation, right?” Rainbow asked seriously.

“I don’t know. Probably won’t without a Gieger counter.” Twilight shrugged.

“Well, what do we do now? There’s nowhere else to go.” Applejack pointed out.

“We haven’t gone through there yet.” Pinkie pointed to another heavy reactor door on the western wall.

“Definitely worth checking,” Sunset noted. “Rarity, think you can bridge us over the water?”

“I can certainly try.” Rarity shrugged, summoning a platform of gems over the irradiated water. The girls stepped onto it and Rarity floated them over to the door, which Pinkie jiggled.

“Locked,” she noted. “Think you can force it, AJ?”

“A bomb bunker reactor door? Not sure I wanna try.” Applejack remarked.

Rainbow suddenly perked up and smiled. “I’ve got an idea. Rarity, you got any extra bobby pins on you?”

Rarity appeared confused by this question, even as she reached into her pocket, retrieving a few bobby pins. “W- Well yes, but-”

“Awesome.” Rainbow smiled and took the pins, unbending one of them a bit before she pulled a screwdriver out of her gear bag. “I read in a Daring Do book once that this works, and I’ve always wanted to try it.” She slid the pin into the lock and started twisting it, listening to the tumblers inside with every movement. Finally, she smiled and pushed the side of the lock with the screwdriver, turning the lock open. “Got it.”

“Shut up,” Sunset said in disbelief, watching as the door swung open. “You gotta teach us that trick.”

“Maybe once we’re out of here,” Applejack noted as Rarity floated the group to the stairwell, which led out of the water. The turn to the left at the top of the stairs led to the atrium, which the girls quickly raced towards the atrium – which was apparently used for assemblies and speeches, judging by all the chairs and posters, and the lectern at the front of the room – which they quickly scoured until they found a terminal on the upper floor.

Thankfully this one wasn’t locked and Twilight easily accessed it, finding only one entry. “‘Prepared Speech of Gus Olson, Ombudsman, for the Annual Overseer Election’.”

“Ombu-wha?” Rainbow asked.

“Public mediator.” Sunset translated. “Let’s hear the speech.”

Twilight didn’t hesitate and started reading the speech herself. “‘Good afternoon. Each year, it is the appointed task of the ombudsman not only to officiate the election but to chronicle it in hopes that after the last overseer has finished his term and… walked to his death in the chamber beneath his office’- WHAT?!?”

“They kill the overseer every year!?” Rainbow asked in fury – she knew this answered their questions about what happened to the past overseers and why the office was considered a punishment, but to kill them every year? “Why? Wh- What is the reasoning?!”

“I can only guess that when yer trapped in a sardine can like this, ya lose all yer sense for ‘reasoning’.” Applejack surmised.

“There has to be more to it than that – keep reading, Twilight,” Sunset instructed.

“R-Right.” Twilight wasn’t sure she wanted to, but she picked up where she left off anyway. “…‘and the Vault has become still, that one day some excavator from humanity or perhaps some yet-unknown race of super beings might find our records and incorporate them into historical canon. But lately it’s occurred to me that that’s not really why. I think the real reason we do it is because we want to believe that somewhere in the archives, there’s an answer to all of this, or perhaps there will be one when the historical records are completed and the whole story is told. We want it to make sense’.”

The girls wanted it to make sense as well, and when they found out in the next sentence Twilight read, they all went pale as sheets. “…‘To understand why the Vault’s mainframe will… kill us if we … do not offer one of our own as a yearly sacrifice. To fully comprehend why we continue to have these elections despite the unfettered corruption that has plagued it for what must be… decades by now’.”

The girls grew more and more disgusted with every sentence – especially with the knowledge that this sacrificial practice had apparently been going on for decades – but Twilight couldn’t stop; she was too morbidly intrigued. “‘There was a simpler time when elections meant shaking hands and kissing babies. But now with the rise of the voting blocs and this infestation of bribery, drug trafficking, smuggling, and God knows what else, we want to know why’.”

Rarity and Fluttershy had to sit down as they listened, also wanting to know why just as much as their friends but unsure if they could take it as Twilight kept going. “‘Well, I’ve been through the archives, and I can tell you you won’t find the answer there. You’ll find an account of the first overseer, who entered the Vault as the… only citizen aware of the sacrifices that would have to take place. But he didn’t have the answers either’.” More and more, the girls grew disgusted and stunned by what they were hearing and had to sit down one after the other – not even the first overseer knew why this was happening? “‘If he did, surely he would’ve foreseen the citizens’ anger when he broke the news. Surely he would’ve guessed that they would choose a sacrifice democratically, in the way that we citizens are accustomed to washing our hands of terrible deeds, and that his name would be at the top of the polls, and that the simultaneous vacancy of overseer and martyr would forever fuse the two positions here in Vault 11. But he didn’t. He had the answers no more than any of us, and the records state that after the citizens discovered that the sacrificial chamber’s password was his wife Betty’s first name, and its door was unsealed so he could be offered as the first sacrifice, he walked down into that room crying like a child’.”

None of the girls blamed the first overseer’s reaction, but that didn’t help – they were still in stunned silence, except for Twilight who kept reading as if she couldn’t stop herself and her thundering curiosity. “‘I can only wonder if there are no answers to be found, and we are just going along with this because we don’t see another choice. Nevertheless, I still hold onto hope that we can find one. I urge you all to take the journey I took – to remember that it wasn’t so long ago that we were ruled by our civility and our dignity, and that those were times when we didn’t have to be quite so ashamed. Thank you’.”

With that, Twilight numbly turned off the terminal and fell leaning against the computer, weak in the knees. Most of the questions that had followed them throughout their exploration of the Vault were answered, but none in ways that they had expected or were particularly happy to hear about – something within them… broke.

As they stood up and walked silently back up toward the Overseer’s office, they put the pieces together for what happened at the last – truly last – election for Overseer; Katherine allowed the Justice Bloc’s leadership to… use her… to keep her husband from being elected and thereby executed, but when he was chosen for election anyway, she went on a killing spree and was voted as a convenient Overseer, only for her to turn the selection process over to the Vault’s computer, stripping all the voting blocs of their power and painting targets on all their backs. Roy was enraged by this action and staged a revolt within the Vault to reinstate the voting process, which undoubtedly killed off most of the Vault’s population.

But there were still some unanswered questions – if the Vault’s computer would have killed off the entire population anyway if there was no sacrifice, why did they resort to a bloody coup just as a power grab? And why did those four people in the foyer choose suicide over leaving like their companion suggested?

Those questions were in their minds as they wandered back to the Overseer’s office and Twilight entered the password into the terminal, opening the terminal so she could press a control to open the sacrificial chamber. Just as they had heard from the speech, the desk in the office lifted up on large hydraulic cylinders and revealed a hidden stairway, which the Rainbooms numbly staggered down.

The heavy door at the bottom of the doorway was easily opened, and it revealed a dramatically long corridor. Rainbow almost made a crack about this never being a good sign, but after all she had learned with her friends about this Vault – this societal tomb – she wasn’t in the mood. And it only got worse as they walked down the hallway and a clearly automated voice played over the loudspeaker in the hallway. “Congratulations, martyr! Your fantastic journey is just beginning. Please proceed to the light.” Indeed, there was a bright light at the end of the long corridor which the girls couldn’t help but walk toward, only to find it came from a bank of bright construction light tripods set up just beyond the door.

Through the opposite door, there was an empty room with only a single chair and what looked like a slide projector. “Welcome. Please sit in the chair. The show is about to begin.”

None of the Rainbooms really wanted to do it, but Twilight’s morbid curiosity won ahead as she stepped forward and sat down, seemingly tripping a pressure plate under the cushion that started the projector, bringing up a compilation of cartoony slides, the first of which simply read Happy Trails, as happy, almost patriotic, music started playing.

“Greetings, martyr, and welcome! If you’re here now, it means you’ve been offered up as a sacrifice so that your Vault can continue to thrive.” the automated voice said simply. “Currently, you may be feeling sad or angry. Perhaps you never got to have grandkids, or to enjoy the pleasures of a fresh cigar. But march with your chin held high, soldier, and remember that each of us has an important role to play. For some people, their role might be to heal the sick. For others, it might mean they will drive a racecar or fly a rocket ship. And some of us are meant to forfeit our lives for the good of the people. Sure, it might not be as fun as driving a racecar, but it’s every bit as important.”

As the slide show continued and the voice droned on like this was nothing, the girls started growing angrier – even the typically timid Fluttershy had veins of rage popping from her forehead. “Let’s take a moment to reflect on the moments that made your life worth living. Think about that time you kissed your steady girl for the first time under the bleachers at the big game. Or when you snuck out after curfew to catch that new flick that your parents wouldn’t let you see because it was too scary. Boy, were they right! And who could forget when you met the love of your life? What a looker! These are just examples.”

“Do you feel that feeling stirring in your chest as you think of these things? Good. What you are feeling is peace.” If it were a real person saying all this, the girls would’ve contested that fact – they were all more than certain that what they were feeling was deathly rage. “You’ve led a great life. Living it has been its own reward. But it is only the beginning. Close your eyes now, and imagine what joys await you in the next life – the afterlife. Can you see them? Good.”

Immediately after that, the lights died in the chamber and the audio stopped, the door at the back of the chamber locking shut. “Oh, what now?!” Rainbow Dash’s angry question was immediately answered as the walls suddenly opened up to reveal two small chambers filled with robots and machine-gun turrets, which promptly opened fire on the girls.

Rarity had been quick enough to immediately put a barrier of diamonds around herself and her friends, the robots’ laser blasts and bullets ricocheting off the facets in every direction around the room. Overwhelmed by nothing more than rage, Rarity summoned another circle of diamonds which she launched outward on a spin, slashing and impaling several of the robots and turrets.

Those that remained were quickly dispatched by the other Rainbooms, who let loose their powers as they were running on nothing more than pure anger – Rainbow raced around the chamber in a rainbow-colored blur, dodging gunfire and knocking robots down with her momentum and slipstream as Pinkie – whose cotton candy-like hair had completely deflated and fallen straight to give her an almost sinister appearance – charged a whole box of cereal called Sugar Bombs they’d received in Novac with her powers before throwing them out in a wide arc, letting loose a storm of small pink explosions. Every robot those three missed was summarily crushed into scrap metal by Applejack’s super strength and Twilight’s telekinesis as Sunset and Fluttershy watched, numbed to the violence around them.

Finally, the robots and turrets in the chamber were all nothing more than twisted, crushed, charred, and skewered lumps of metal. The girls looked around at the carnage they had wrought… and the skeletons of what were undoubtedly past Vault 11 Overseers – past sacrifices – the robots had killed and dragged out of the way. “Only sixteen.” Rainbow counted.

That was a sobering thought in itself – assuming one of these corpses was Katherine Stone, that meant this vile ritual had only been in operation for sixteen years before she changed the law and brought about Gottlieb’s revolution. Meaning that this Vault had all but killed itself off almost 180 years before the Rainbooms landed in the Mojave in the first place.

“Over here,” Twilight called out halfheartedly – she had apparently found a door in the back wall of one of the two chambers. The others gathered around as Twilight opened it and they found themselves face-to-face with a massive computer bank. “This must be the mainframe.”

“The one that was supposed to kill everyone if they didn’t sacrifice someone to these junk piles every year?” Rainbow asked, gesturing to the robots.

“Yeah,” Twilight said simply.

“Can you access it? Find out why it did all this?” Sunset asked. “I think we all need the closure.”

“Yeah.” Twilight nodded and easily activated the computer screen on the side of the mainframe. There were only three notes on the screen, the first of which was labeled simply as Override Lockdown. Twilight assumed that referred to the locked door at the back of the room, so she clicked it and indeed the door opened.

The second one was labeled System Recording: Vault 11 Solution, which Twilight immediately clicked, playing back an audio recording. “All right, I know you can hear me, so listen up.” It was the first voice from that tape they’d heard in the foyer. “There’s five of us left. Five. Out of… I don’t know how many. So… it’s over. We’ve talked and it’s over. We’re not going to send anybody to die anymore. So shut off our water or gas us or do whatever it is you’re programmed to do. But we’re done listening to you.”

It was comforting to hear such defiant reason in the face of the odds, but the girls were still gruesomely impressed – the Vault was massive, and yet between Katherine’s killing spree, Gottlieb’s rebellion, and the yearly sacrifice, the fact that there were only five survivors remaining in all of Vault 11 was staggering. No one said it, of course, but they were all thinking it as Twilight looked at the third and final note on the screen, entitled Automated Response: Vault 11 Solution, and clicked it, starting a recording of the Vault’s pre-recorded p.a. voice. “Congratulations, citizens of Vault 11! You have made the decision not to sacrifice one of your own. You can walk with your head held high knowing that your commitment to human life is a shining example to us all. And to make that feeling of pride even sweeter, I have some exciting news. Despite what you were led to believe, the population of Vault 11 is not going to be exterminated for your disobedience. Instead, the mechanism to open the main Vault door has now been enabled, and you can come and go at your leisure. But not so fast! Be sure to check with your Overseer to find out if it’s safe to leave. Here at Vault-Tev, your safety is our number one priority.”

The Rainbooms just stood there, disgusted by what they had heard – all the mindlessness that went on in this Vault was for nothing. It was all just some diabolical social experiment to see what would happen. A social experiment that cost the lives of sixteen overseers – one of whom had lost her dignity in the face of it – a handful of vile politicians in a murder spree, and countless innocent bystanders in a civil war for power… and it was all based on a lie.

Numb to all the Vault had put its people through – the decades of voting, the political strife, corruption, drug abuse, scandals, murders, rebellion, murder after senseless murder – the Rainbooms simply walked out of the sacrifice chamber, their faces darkened by trauma that no one dared speak of as they staggered through the winding corridors of the Vault and past the four corpses of those four survivors who had heard this truth for themselves and chosen suicide… which almost seemed now, to Sunset, like the sensible choice.

She looked down at one corpse – Henry, if the tape was to be believed – and retrieved the pistol she’d taken from him out of her jacket, setting it back into his skeletal hand before she followed her friends out of the Vault and back out into the desert.

As they left the valley, they all cast one last look back at the wooden hatch to the tomb of lies under this mountain. Rarity’s quiet closing thought summed up the group’s thoughts very succinctly; “‘Shining example’ indeed.”

With that, and nothing more, the Rainbooms wandered out back to the highway toward New Vegas. Toward what they hoped would be some way out of this hell.

Author's Note

This is one thing I've always found kinda weird and messed up about Fallout New Vegas: on the road to Vegas, the first taste players - especially first-timers - ever get of Vault-Tec and its experiments is the absolute sickest one in existence.

And it's the first one the Rainbooms ever get to experience in the Wasteland.

Well, Talipedsnake780, in your words, you were

looking forward to seeing if/when someone reaches their breaking point.

Satisfied?