Author's Note

I considered opening each of the first two vignettes with an appropriate paragraph directly from the original story for the purpose of placing the points where they diverge, but wasn't 100% sure if that would be allowed by the rules. It should hopefully still be clear enough as to approximately where they fit in given the context of what's happening, but if you do want more specific context, this first vignette diverges while the characters are trying to figure out how to save P-21 at the Lunar Palace.

I also want to preface this anthology by expressing that it's been written only for fun and maybe for a bit of catharsis for people who want it. It's not in any way intended to be any kind of replacement for or criticism of the original story (the "smarter ponies" thing is mostly just a reference to the original story), and I wouldn't change how these events played out in the original story.

Thank you to Somber for writing Project Horizons, and to Kkat for writing the original Fallout: Equestria!

Vignette 1: Chapter 74.5

“Wait,” Rampage said. There was an odd expression on her face. As all of us stared at her, her lips curled in a small smile. “There is one more thing you could try,” she said archly.

“Anything,” I pleaded. There was a pause, and I willed her to continue speaking. We were running out of time.

“You could kill me,” she said. “Or at least, you could let me die.”

“What?” said P-21, almost losing focus on the keyboard for a moment but repeating the keystrokes just in time. What was Rampage thinking? There wasn’t time for this! But as she continued…

“It wouldn’t be the first time the talisman has been transferred. You really think I wouldn’t have thought about it after Blackjack showed me that memory of Shujaa’s? Sure, my soul might still be in there afterward, but it was about the closest to death I could get, right? At least until now. I tried digging it out of myself and then killing myself with it outside my body, but I regenerated, anyway, so I put it back. It must need to latch onto another soul in order for the regeneration to disconnect,” she said. “I would have given it to somepony else months ago, but as much as I wanted to die, I still couldn’t bring myself to subject anypony else to…this.”

“Then why now?” asked P-21, a slight look of hope beginning to dawn on his face for a moment before being replaced by a hint of shame. While my mind reading seemed to have stopped upon switching back to my original body, I suspected that he was weighing the possibility of his own survival with the fact that it would mean a friend would die for him. One who wanted to die, sure, but that wouldn’t make it hurt much less.

“Do you see another option?” Rampage asked. “I’d rather fully die, soul and all, but not if it’s at your expense. Besides, we’ll both need to stay here either way. You stop typing, and Horizons goes off. I move, and there’s a good chance you get squished and Horizons goes off while Blackjack and Scotch are still here. At least you might be able to delay it a little longer, and maybe you can get out of the way whenever it hits its limit. We might even avoid the two-for-one sacrifice special.”

“But…but…” I said. “Would you really be okay with that?” I asked P-21.

He was silent for a moment. “I’ll let Rampage…make that choice,” he said, wincing. “But please hurry, one way or the other.”

“Daddy…” Scotch started. “Rampage…” She frowned, tears in her eyes and seeming unsure what to say.

Rampage just smiled. I just stood there, my mind racing, trying to come up with some other option. Any other option.

“If you won’t do it, then I will,” Bastard said. He stepped forward, then frowned. “Wait…what exactly are we doing?”

I closed my eyes and took a deep breath, tears in my own eyes as I stepped forward. I hated to admit it, but she was right. If she was determined to sacrifice herself either way, then at least this way, one of them might have a chance. I just hoped I could stay off the mattress after this was all over.

“Hello?” Bastard said. I took a piece of sharp debris and pressed it into Rampage’s chest.

Rampage grimaced, then the grimace slowly turned into a smirk. “Don’t forget to pull out my heart, too, so you’ll have a nice snack for your trip back,” she said.

Despite myself, I snorted and my tears dried a little. Bastard just watched with an expression of extreme shock and confusion as I began to tear a gash through Rampage’s hide. As blood started to run from the wound, she faltered, the debris she was holding up slipping slightly lower as she adjusted her stance, but it didn’t fall.

“Keep going,” she said through her teeth. I quickly tore a longer hole and inserted my hoof, the wound already beginning the process of healing. After a few moments of uncomfortable fumbling, I felt the talisman and tugged. I extracted my hoof from the wound and the gash slowly drew closed. She was right; even with the talisman outside her body, it was still healing her, albeit at perhaps a slightly reduced rate.

“You’re sure about this?” I asked. As much as I wanted to save P-21, there would be no taking it back once it was done. It wouldn’t be right without giving her one more chance to change her mind.

“Do it,” she said.

“And you’re ready?” I asked P-21.

P-21 nodded, but seemed barely lucid at this point. He was still typing on the keyboard, but he had lost a lot of blood. There was no time for finesse. No time for overthinking this. Rampage would still be alive at least until Horizons went off. I wasn’t technically killing her. Her soul would live on in the talisman if P-21 was able to get clear. So she would technically be alive, right? Sort of? So this wouldn’t make me an executioner, right? Right? Maybe she’d get clear, too! As my mind raced, trying to rationalize things as best I could, P-21 gasped.

I took one more deep breath, then with a blur of movement, as if I was trying to move too fast to change my own mind, I sliced P-21’s chest with the piece of levitated debris and inserted the talisman. He gasped again, his eyes closing and his head slumping for just a moment as he lost more blood from the new wound. I froze. No. No. NO!

Then he reopened his eyes, having never lost the necessary rhythm of typing. He looked at me with a strained smile as a pink glow closed the wound on his chest and lingered in all of the places where the debris had impaled him. I carefully pulled out the shafts one-by-one and each wound closed. He stood up, now fully healed.

The four of us - P-21, Rampage, Scotch, and me - all looked at each other in quiet contemplation for a moment. Bastard stood off to the side, looking from each one of us to the next, and finally asked again, “What the fuck is going on?” We ignored him.

“Thank you, Rampage,” P-21 choked, tears now running from his own eyes as he looked at her and continued to type on the keyboard. “I don’t deserve a gift like this, but…thank you. I might…I might be able to see my daughter grow up because of you.”

Scotch was bawling her little eyes out as she looked back and forth between her father and Rampage. Finally she walked over to Rampage and gave her a long hug that seemed to have no end in sight. That one act said all that there was to say.

“Well…tell me how much of a gift you still think it is once you’ve lived with it as long as I have,” Rampage said uneasily. “No, really, tell me. If I'm really Peppermint, then my soul’s probably still in there, and I’m sure you’ll see me again eventually in some form or another.”

P-21 didn’t seem to know how to respond to that. “You really need to get going,” he said to me after another long moment. “I can override this a little longer, but it’s going to hit the limit before long. I’ll do my best to get clear, but you need to get out of here.”

“Are you sure you can’t come?” I asked Rampage. Scotch Tape finally released her, turning toward P-21.

“Like I said, if I move, there’s a good chance he gets squished and none of us get out of here before Horizons goes off. The talisman would keep him alive, but there needs to be room for the body to reform properly, and it’d be kind of hard typing on a terminal or running away from a doomsday device if he’s a pancake,” Rampage said.

“Maybe you can get clear, too?” Scotch finally spoke up.

“Maybe, kid,” Rampage said, and Scotch gave a sad smile.

“Oh,” P-21 said. “Since you’ll need the rocket intact to come back for…” He paused for a moment and glanced at Rampage. “...us, make sure the automated systems don’t take you back to the space center. It’s probably a crater now. If you can change the heading, somewhere away from the Core would probably be best.”

“Thanks, Daddy!” Scotch said, walking over to him and giving him a hug. Though his hooves were still occupied with the terminal, he nuzzled her cheek with his own.

“I love you, Scotch Tape,” P-21 said. “I’m so proud of you. I know you’re going to do great things. I hope I’m there to see them.”

“You will be, Daddy.” Scotch Tape said. “I love you, too.”

I walked over to give him a hug of my own, then surprised him with a short kiss as well. “We’ll see you again soon,” I said. I noticed that the decal was peeling further from his cutie mark, but it still wasn't quite possible to discern yet.

He seemed to notice my look. “We'll find out what it is when you're back, alright? See you again soon,” he said. “And…maybe…Glory, too. I really hope you’re right, but one way or another, you can’t give up, Blackjack. Find a way to beat this. To win. You can. I know you can.”

“I will,” I said. After a moment, I walked over to Rampage, debating with myself for a moment and then giving her a hug, too.

“Hey, there’s no need for you to get all mushy,” she said. “In a few minutes or so, that’ll be my job. You know, because…”

“I get it,” I said, still preemptively mourning her loss but willing myself through the grief…for now. The fact that her soul probably was in the talisman was starting to sink in. Heck, even her mind might be connected somehow; after all, I had pulled memories out of the talisman’s past lives… After we came back for P-21, maybe Snails could do something…? Why didn’t I think of that earlier?

“Thank you, Rampage. For everything,” I said.

She just smiled.

Scotch, Bastard, and I began to head toward the exit to the tram. I took one last look back at the two standing in the field of debris and sighed. We all walked into the tram and it started to move up the track.

***

We finally reached the end of the track and disembarked. Suddenly, from outside the window on one side, there was a brilliant flash of luminescent white. I walked to the window to look down at the chasm and saw that the Lunar Palace had been almost completely destroyed. Massive rocks impacted the track for the tram, and the tram’s lights went out. If the timing had been a little different…if P-21 hadn't held out as long and we hadn’t gotten all the way up here yet…I didn’t want to think about it.

I didn’t want to think about the other implications of the destruction, either. I could only hope that P-21 had gotten out in time. In fact…was that him?! I saw something moving in the far distance, a tiny blue speck. For now, I would tell myself that it was him. I couldn’t lose another friend. It had to be him. Hopefully he’d make it to the Astrostable - walking for long in hard vacuum certainly couldn’t be pleasant - but one way or another we’d be back. We would save him. He and I and Glory would work things out, and Scotch would have her father. We’d even bring Rampage back somehow. We were going to win.