Fallout Equestria: Silverside

Chapter Three: Not like them.

“Friendship is magic, and magic is power. But if you take that power, you need neither…”

What in Celestia’s name is going on?
Sterling could hardly believe what was happening to her. Here she was, outside, free from her cage in the stable, and yet she was a prisoner once more.
They had walked to a makeshift camp that night, a camp where her wings were bound and a rope tied around her neck. The raiders had not brought chains with them-they had not expected to be bringing any survivors.

Busko the stallion was still limping from their short tussle. It turned out Sterling had not put all her force into a back hoof to his stomach, but to somewhere else, a far more tender spot.
He glowered at her, and would take every chance he could to try and hit her with a hoof before Stitches (the Unicorn mare) would scold him for ‘damaging the merchandise.’
Yeah, because losing that chunk of my ear wasn’t damaging at all.
As they trotted along, Sterling would gaze around in foal-like wonder-an action Stitches found to be a great source of amusement to her. Whenever something new appeared on the horizon, the raider-mare would condescendingly describe precisely what Sterling was looking at (even if she already knew what it was) as though she were teaching a filly. A filly with a gun to the back of her head.

Although the bleeding had long-ceased, the numbness in Sterling’s ear had dissipated, replaced with a throbbing pain. She could feel that a chunk had been taken out by the bullet Stitches had fired at her.
The pegasus didn’t like that they were travelling west now, moving in the opposite direction of her original goal-the big city. As they had walked, she had asked them where they were taking her a few times, but each time she had only received a “Shut it” from Busko in response.
Her pip-buck would give her a notification every now and then as they walked, and she would give it a sly glance when the raiders weren’t looking. A few markers had popped up on her map.
‘Hornton shacks’, ‘Phoenix junkyard’...
Their destination appeared to her as her pip-buck hit 12:02 pm. She had to look twice when she saw the name.
“Foal factory?!” Exclaimed Sterling as they approached the doors to a dark, grey building. Crested near the top of the wall was the face of a pink, smiling filly. A few of the teeth in her grin had fallen out, an eye was missing, and overall, she looked quite bleak. The fallout hadn’t done her any favours.
Below the image of the grinning filly were the words ‘Pinkie’s Foal Factory’, or rather, that’s what it used to say. Since the sign was last serviced (presumably a few centuries ago), many of the letters had fallen off, leaving only their backings and gaps as evidence of their existence; the factory sign now said ‘P-nk-Fac’.

What lay behind those doors? Sterling could only imagine a mess of pony body parts, trolleys of hooves and muzzles, drawers of manes and jars of eyes. She shuddered.
“Ah told ya to stop talking, now get yer ass in there ‘afore ah lose mah good mood!” Busko snapped, smacking her on the flank (not for the first time since they had met) and eliciting a gasp from her. Sterling quickly started forward, practically crashing through the heavy double doors. Cruelly, Stitches had let go of the rope, ensuring that she stumbled down, flailing in the dark. Slowly, her eyes began to adjust to the sight of the many campfires that dotted the factory floor.
The factory was not filled with the body parts of foals, something Sterling was very glad to see. Instead, it was filled with old machinery, bins of ruined stuffed toys and conveyors. Long-unplayable board games sat in one corner, a pipe in the ceiling dribbling an unknowable liquid over the two-centuries old paper and cardboard. That’s when the smell finally hit her.

To say that the factory stank would be an understatement. Something hadn’t just died in here, something had gotten sick, laid down in their own excrement, had breathed their last, raspy breath, finally died a few days later, had begun to rot and then had finally wasted away. This process must surely have then been repeated a hundred times, and had to be happening at this very moment.

Then, there, across the room, jeering at her as she was roughly hauled to her hooves by the Unicorn mare, was a group of ponies-well, a group of monsters, really. There were four of them, sitting by a campfire. Scrap iron plates had been bolted to their leather armour barding. A fifth was perched by a window, keeping a lookout, and the sixth, an Earth Pony Mare, was sitting atop some kind of…throne?
Celestia’s blood, it was made of bones. She knew raiders were supposed to be bad news, but literally sitting on a bone throne wasn’t exactly the level of ‘obviously evil’ Sterling had been hoping for.
The enthroned mare was a sight of her own. Matted, red and blue locks of her mane had little bones tied in them. Upon closer inspection, the pegasus realised that the red in the pony’s mane was a reddish-brown that betrayed dried blood. Why she willingly allowed another pony’s blood to stay caked all over her, Sterling couldn’t figure out. Her pip-buck had always warned her of infection risks whenever she’d been bleeding after a stable-brawl, and she’d always made sure to clean herself up as soon as she could. Hygiene is important when you’re stuck in a tin can with a bunch of other ponies, after all.
She had a scar that ran down the side of one cheek, until it stopped halfway down her neck. A severed hoof cutie mark caught Sterling’s attention, as the mare’s own hoof raised in silence, the other raiders immediately falling still, and quiet.

“I see your hunt went well.” The mare’s voice was oddly pleasant, a slight gravelly edge, but warm, and inviting. She was of course addressing the two raiders that had brought her in. Busko and Stitches didn’t look very pleased at their appraisal, in fact, they looked like they were about to bolt at any moment. It did not take long for Sterling to realise why.
“So. where’s the stuff?”
The stuff?
Stitches was able to keep her composure. Busko’s face, on the other hand, visibly fell.
“Oh dear, you don’t have my Dash, do you?”
The Stallion, once so strong, was visibly shaking. “We-We’re real sorry-like Bluebe-”
“Ah. I see. And I take it…this…” She gestured with a hoof towards the pegasus. “Is some form of…repayment for the fact that, because of your incompetence, i’m not going to be getting high tonight.”
Oh. Dash is a drug. That makes sense.

Even though they had tied her up, held a gun to her head, shot her, and had taken her back to their camp to be sold as a slave, Sterling couldn’t help but feel a little bad for them. Clearly what this mare was capable of was not something these two wanted to have done to them. Although considering how awfully charming this mare appeared (despite the whole bone-fixation she had), Sterling couldn’t imagine it could be that bad.

“So. Which of you had the idea to attack this poor pony?”
Well, Sterling knew the answer to that, but she wasn’t being spoken to, and so it wasn’t her place to speak. Wait. Poor pony? Since when did anypony feel sorry for me?
Reluctantly, Busko raised a shaking hoof, looking away.
“I should have expected. You three. Come here.”
Four heads began to track the raiders and their prisoner as they slowly shuffled towards the throne. Busko was visibly shaking now.
“Look at me, Busko.” The mare spoke, calmly. The stallion hesitated for a moment, then looked up. All of a sudden, his shaking stopped. The mare (whom Sterling could only assume was named Blueberry, or something along those lines) had Busko transfixed. She was emanating a level of warmth and protectiveness that the pegasus had never known. It was like magic, this motherly figure. Although they were not directed at her, looking into those eyes immediately calmed her, despite her predicament. She was right where she should be.
Maybe these raiders would accept me into their fold…

Suddenly, Busko was on the floor, screaming. His back leg was broken. Whilst she had been transfixed, Sterling hadn’t even noticed the leader stepping off her throne, walking towards the stallion, and swinging a sort of makeshift mace at him, held in her teeth. Apparently, Busko hadn’t noticed either.
Well, he certainly had now.
He tried to crawl away, but a Unicorn’s magical aura engulfed his tail, and dragged him back to the waiting mace. On his back, he took another blow that cracked his ribs and winded him. Gasping now, he tried to fend off the mace’s next swing with one of his hooves, but all that got him was another broken limb.
Sterling had seen beatings before-she had been the target of many herself, but never had she seen anything like the subtle anger and lack of compassion on show for her now. She longed to cry out, longed to try and save his life, to beg Blueberry to stop it, but when she started forward, Stitches held her back with a tug from the rope around her neck, a grief-stricken look on her face. Why wasn’t she doing anything about this? At this rate, the stallion would be dead. Stitches must care about him, maybe, if the two of them were to band together, they might have a chance to-
“You.”

Sterling froze in her tracks. Clearly, her slight forward step had not just been noticed by Stitches. She glanced back.
On the floor, lying in a pool of his own blood, still slowly gurgling, was the mess that had once been Busko. The mace had been dropped from the raider leader’s jaws, blood pooling off of its spiked end, and dripping off the muzzle of its wielder.
“What is your name?” Asked the mare. Somehow still calm and inviting, despite her newly bloodstained appearance. It took Sterling a moment to realise that it was her that was being addressed. Of course she’s talking to you…well? Say something!
“M-my name is S-Sterling, ma’am” she stammered out, shakily. Should I have come up with a fake name? Why did this mare care?
“Sterling, that’s a nice name. I’m Bluebear Rockthorn, leader of the Pnkfac renegades. Welcome to our home!”
She was cheerful, far too cheerful for what was going on right now. The raspy breaths of that Luna-damned stallion on the floor was all Sterling could hear in the silence. That was, until Bluebear spoke again.
“Kill him for me, will you?”

Sterling’s eyes widened, and her mouth dropped open. “I-I’m sorry, I think I may have misheard-”
“Kill Busko. Now please.” She cut her off, the mare’s smile grew a little stiffer. Impatient.
Sterling had never killed a pony before.
In fact, she had never really wanted to hurt anypony before. Even through all of the hate, and the bullying, the beatings, and incarcerations, she’d never really wanted to physically damage somepony. Sterling had always defended herself, that much was true, but she hadn’t ever actually chosen to be in a fight.
“...Sterling.”
She snapped back to her senses, and quickly scrambled over to the faintly breathing puddle that was Busko.
The mace was on the floor next to her, she gestured towards it, looking for Bluebear’s reaction. She nodded, reassuringly. A nod that said ‘Yes, you’re allowed to use it, just this once.’

She didn’t want to use it, of course. It had just been in the jaws of this mare, and that was quite unsanitary. Oh, and the entire thing was coated with Busko’s blood, including the handle. But she craned her neck down, and picked it up with her teeth anyway.
Sterling could taste the coppery tang of the stallion’s blood in her mouth as she raised it. She didn’t want to do this. She really didn’t want to do this. She couldn’t do this.
But why shouldn’t I?
What was that? Who said that?
He tried to kill you, beat you several times over the course of a night and half a day, tied you up and brought you to a raider camp. He’s the one that picked you to be Stiches’ target. If it weren’t for him, you wouldn’t be in this situation. In fact, he wouldn’t be here on the floor either.
The more Sterling thought about it, the more she realised she had no real reason not to kill him.
She gritted her teeth hard around the handle. Getting ready to strike. A few of the raider ponies began to laugh and jeer at Busko’s already dying form. It would just be so easy to let go of her stable-wrought sensibilities and truly give herself up to the wasteland. This had to be some kind of raider initiation ceremony, after all. All she had to do to pass was to just end the life of this awful raider. Maybe they would let her go, or maybe, she could even join them.

And yet, she still paused.
No. I’m not like them. I’m a good pony. And I won't take Busko’s life.
The mace clattered to the ground. Sterling was disgusted by the ponies around her as they began to boo her for sparing him, as if this were some heinous show they had paid to see. She was disgusted by Stitches’ lack of care for her comrade, she was disgusted by Bluebear’s blatant disregard for the life of one of the raiders she led. But more than anything, she was disgusted at herself for even considering killing him. For trying to come up with excuses to justify her actions, for picking up the mace and almost going through with it.

Bluebear tutted, and smiled sadly. “That’s a shame.” She murmured.
“Why is it a shame?” Sterling spat. Surprising herself and the raiders around her. “Why is it a shame that I didn’t end the life of this pony? Why is it a shame that I didn’t stoop to your level, and murder this defenceless…this…” She gestured towards the broken stallion. Her bristling mane catching the light of the fires around her. Sterling couldn’t help herself. She was too angry and needed to vent her frustrations-something she had not often had the chance to do to anypony who would listen.

The words kept tumbling out. “You disregard the lives of everything, even the ponies you lead, shame on you Bluebear! And shame on you all for-”
Sterling received a strike on the muzzle. Stunned, she wheeled around to find her attacker, only to be met with Stitches. The scarred Unicorn still bore an emotionless mask, but was now shaking her head.
“Nopony speaks to Bluebear like that.” She murmured after a moment.
With a nod from the leader, Stitches yanked on the rope, and Sterling was pulled away from the group. The only thing she could hear as she was slowly led towards a back room was the crackle of the campfires, and the rasping breaths of blood, spat out from Busko’s ruined face.
Stitches’ face was cast in shadow as she led her, but Sterling could make out a single tear trailing down her face, tracing the ragged lines of her old scars.

Behind them, a whoosh, followed by a sickening, wet crunch.
Then, only the crackling sound of the campfires filled the space of the still factory.