Fallout Equestria: Silverside

Chapter Two: In the Forests of the Night

Once her stable-adjusted eyes had finally ceased their blinking against the harsh light of an unknown world, she was able to contemplate her other senses. The wind was all around her now. That was the first thing she noticed. Gone was the stench of charred pony meat and burned hair, now she was smelling…what was it, fresh air?
The clicking from her pipbuck told her that the air was far from fresh, but she ignored it for now, choosing instead to look around, rather than at her foreleg.
Stable-126 had been dug into the side of a mountain, facing a city far off in the distance. It was massive, encompassing most of the horizon.
The horizon!
Sterling had to do a double take at the scene. Beyond the mangled corpses of once-tall trees and the burned out wrecks of pre-war carts, far past the weathered bones of a family of Ponies that had tried their very hardest to get to the Stable in time and a few dilapidated tin shacks was a magnificence she’d never known. She’d always been told the outside world was bigger, of course, but she’d had no way to comprehend the sheer size of Equestria beyond the stable door. It was breathtaking, and Sterling had a sudden realisation that nopony else in the stable had ever seen something like this. An ember of pride sparked in her chest.

But what now? Where would she go? Were there any settlements? Was anypony even alive out here?
She heard a ‘blip’ from her pip-buck and looked down at it to see a new map, a map of the Equestrian wasteland. Her position on the map was marked out by an arrow that currently situated her next to an icon that read ‘Stable-126’. Further along on the map, she saw the big city, and a number of other places, all of which were unmarked. On top of this new map, Sterling received a notification; ‘New radio frequencies received’.
Guess somepony was alive out here after all.
The nearby road drew her attention. She spread open her stiff wings again. Here goes nothing.

Sterling jumped, flapping her wings madly, feeling the lift they created made her feel more free than she’d ever been before. Her feathers caught the wind, the reason her breed had evolved so clear to her now. She yipped feebly as she felt herself pull a muscle in her wing, and crashed back down to the ground. She hadn’t been airborne for more than a few seconds.
Wincing, she sat up, her pip-buck notified her of muscle atrophy present in her wings.
How kind of you to let me know that. She thought, and the true weight of what the stable had done to her finally began to trickle in.
Not only had they tried to take away her free will, not only had they essentially enslaved her, not only had the ponies of Stable-126 drummed into her mind again and again that she was inferior to them.
They had even removed her ability to fly.

Sterling began to panic. Something she had never cared about much now became something she so desperately wanted. The pegasus had spent her whole life in that place, never having the space to use her wings, and when she had ever tried to, she had been scolded, told that she wasn’t allowed to. Now here she was, outside for the first time, and she couldn’t even use them. Sterling couldn’t fly.
What if I'll never be able to?

The thought echoed through her mind. What use was a flightless pegasus? How would she survive in this harsh wasteland without her single advantage? Suddenly she felt trapped again, as trapped and worthless as the ponies in the stable had made her seem, but this time, she was trapped in her own mind. The questions kept bouncing around, she realised that her hoof was nervously scraping at the ground, a habit she’d picked up sometime during her cruel life in the stable. She forced herself to keep it still.
No. she thought. It doesn’t matter. Stop panicking like a filly.
She took a deep breath, and stood up properly. It didn’t matter whether or not she could fly right now. If she practised, she’d surely be able to eventually. All it would take was a little time.
She switched to a random radio signal in the list, and tuned in, she needed something to take her mind off of her wings.

Sterling had never tuned in to a radio broadcast before. The only times she had ever heard music was through the radios other ponies had owned in the stable, and the few service announcements the Overmare had forced everypony’s pip-bucks to play when she needed to get a stable-wide message across. When she switched to the broadcast she was greeted with the sounds of a young sounding stallion, his charisma intrigued her almost immediately, and for the first time, she found herself listening to somepony that didn’t have it out for her.

“...kids, that’s right, it’s your old pal, DJ-Pon3, bringing you the hottest hits of two hundred years ago! In about an hour’s time, i’ll be giving you all the news from around the wasteland, but for now, here’s Sweetie Belle, here to tell us that sometimes, you just need somepony to treat you right.”

The dulcet tones of a young mare echoed around Sterling as she clip-clopped down the road, taking in her surroundings. To say the wasteland was a bleak picture would be an understatement, and when she looked up the sky was no better. The sky. Sterling had always been taught it was a bright blue colour during the day. Nopony in her stable had ever seen the sky of course, so maybe they were wrong. Or maybe something had happened to the sky itself, the clouds being dragged across to choke out the blue like the ash that choked the ground.
This place would be a whole lot less threatening if I could see past those clouds. The young mare mused, Although, it wouldn’t be very fitti-
“Hi there! I’m Mulberry Sweets, from the Mulberry Juice Company!”
She froze. Somepony was addressing her. Nervously, she began scraping her hoof along the ground again.
“Hi there! I’m- Hi there! I’m- Hi there! I’m-”
She realised that the sound was coming from underneath her. She scraped the ground again, this time deliberately.
“Hi there! I’m Mulberry Sweets, from the Mulberry Juice Company!”

She had stood on a button. An old Equestrian advertisement sign had fallen on to the road, the button barely hidden under some leaf litter. She swiped the pile away to reveal the stained, smiling face of a purple pegasus mare. She was quite good-looking. In fact, Sterling couldn’t remember the last time she had seen a pegasus portrayed in such a positive way. She broke off from her stare, realising that she was replicating the same, infectious smile worn by Mulberry Sweets on the advertisement. She relaxed her face and respectfully stepped off of the rotting sign of the long-dead mare.

Sterling had never walked this far before. She’d never done nothing but walk for a whole day. She’d done chores, of course, everything around the stable. And she was definitely fitter than most of the ponies that got to sit around and do nothing all day as their pegasi servants rushed around for them, but still, she was tired. As the sun began to set, or, well, she assumed that was what it was doing since she couldn’t see it anyway, the pegasus could make out more of the city. It still seemed so very far away.
Plodding along until she had to switch on her pip-buck’s light for guidance, Sterling had decided that enough was enough. She would have to sleep soon, and she was growing quite hungry too.
A run-down shack greeted her just off of the road. I suppose it’s as good a place as any. She mused. It had been a nice day, all things considered. She hadn’t seen a single living creature all day, and she wondered whether or not this was a good thing. It was difficult to be out of sight of somepony else in the stable. The only times she had really had to herself were during lunch times in the shower block and brig time. She had always welcomed the silence, the lack of other ponies around her in those moments. It gave her time to think.

Now she wasn’t so sure she wanted to be alone.
Sterling had never considered herself much fun to be around, nor had she wanted to be around the other ponies of the stable. But as she lay on the damp floor of the pre-war shack, idly listening to DJ-Pon3’s broadcast, she found herself wishing that the stallion was here in person-or rather, that anypony was here. She needed somepony else to converse with. No…not converse with… To give her purpose, to tell her what to do. She had always had that in the stable.
Not anymore. You don’t need that anymore Sterling, you don’t need them, or anyone to tell you what to do.
She had almost forgotten why she’d left in the first place. Those other ponies were awful, but they weren’t out here now-they couldn’t be. She had to remind herself that she was free.
This is my life. I will decide what I do.
Yes. yes that was it. That was her goal. She needed to find her own way out here, find out who she really was.
But what will happen then?
Not for the last time that night, Sterling wished again that she had somepony to tell her how to do that.

Sterling had always been a light sleeper, and a restless one at that. She had drifted off hungry, resigning herself to find something to eat in the morning. After about another hour, lost in her own thoughts, she had sunk into a shallow sleep. It wasn’t long before she woke to the sound of a ‘crack’ in the woods around her. There was something there.
Slowly and silently, Sterling began to rise from her resting spot. She dared not turn on her pip-buck’s lamp for fear of being spotted. After a few minutes of gazing out into the dark, she shivered, and began to lower her head. She was just unused to sleeping outside. Maybe snapping noises just happen in forests, maybe-

BLAM!
A ringing. Her right ear went completely numb. Slowly, Sterling raised a hoof to it, collecting a warm, sticky substance in the dark.
“Did I get her?” asked a gruff mare’s voice
She didn’t need to hear any more, the eagerness in her tone spoke of a delight that frightened her.
She turned tail and ran, colliding into something warm and fuzzy. She and the other pony-for that had to have been what it was-tumbled over each other in the blackness, she yelped as a hoof met her ribs, and the other pony started to shout.
“Ah’ have ‘er! She’s over here!” Came the voice of a young stallion. She bucked and kicked, earning a hearty ‘oof!’ as she drove her hoof into what she thought was his stomach, inadvertently throwing the two of them apart.
She fell out through the doorway to the shack, tumbling down the three concrete stairs that led to the patio.
Scrambling to her hooves and accidentally turning on her pip-buck’s lamp, Sterling turned but stopped when she heard a ‘click!’
Slowly turning back towards the doorway, she could see the faint glow of Unicorn magic, magic that was holding a revolver, pointed straight at Sterling’s muzzle.

“That’s enough, pegasus.” Sneered the mare. In the green glow of her pip-buck, Sterling could finally make out the face of one of her attackers.
She couldn’t quite believe what she was looking at. Here was a pony, her face completely covered in scars. She had covered herself in makeshift armour-a mess of scrap metal plates that had been crudely bolted together, how this mare wasn’t worried about getting tetanus, Sterling didn’t know.
“Wait!” Came a wheezing stallion’s voice from inside. He sounded as though he was thoroughly winded. “There ain’t no chems in here!”
The Mare grunted. “We want your stuff, where is it?”
Sterling blinked, they were robbers? So why did they just try to shoot me?
“I-I don’t-” She stammered. “I don’t have anything, please don’t kill me!”
This time, the Mare groaned. “Busko! This is the last time I let you pick who we’re gonna steal from!”
“Don’t say mah’ name!” Hissed the other pony. “Ah’ told you not ta’-”
“Alright, alright sorry! Looks like we’ve gotta take this little mare back to camp!” Said the Unicorn, a hint of irritation in her voice.

Sterling stood still for a moment, wondering if the mare was thoroughly distracted enough for her to try and make a break for it.
“Alright you, since you didn’t have anything worth stealing, you’re coming with us” The mare ordered, flicking the gun in the direction of the road. “Maybe we can make a pretty cap off of you.”
The pegasus had no idea what a cap was-probably a form of currency, judging by the mare’s bastardisation of the phrase ‘A pretty bit’.
“Wh-where are you gonna take me?” She coughed out, still not quite catching on to what was really happening.
“That’s for us to decide, now move it!” Snarled the Unicorn. Sterling slowly began to trot towards the road, the mare in tow…And a scowling Earth Pony stallion limping behind them.
In her pip-buck’s light, she felt her still-numb ear again, more gobbets of warmth appeared on her hoof, and she could finally make out the redness of her own blood.