Fallout Equestria: ShadowFall

Chapter Three: Places to Go, Ponies to See

“I need something....new”

Agh! My head hurt like hell! And I was sitting in....I don’t know what but it smelled like crap! Then I heard some yelling outside, more like arguing. It sounded like Ramrod. I moved my hoof around in the darkness, finally pushing up. Once my eyes adjusted, I realized I was in a garbage bin, then looked over at a giant hole in the wall of the....crap, I must have screwed up really bad last night. I caught a glimpse of the bar through the hole, and even through that small glimpse I could tell it was a wreck. I climbed out of the--well more like fell out of the garbage bin, and got back up, seeing Ramrod and the bar owner arguing. Then Ramrod saw me...and I really wish he didn’t.

He then turned away from the bar owner, and jumped out of the hole in the wall, trotting towards me with a “you’re fucking dead” look on his face.

I started to speak up, when suddenly he turned and bucked me in the face, slamming me against the wall of the building behind me.

“Gah!! What the hell Ramrod?! What’s your-”

“Do you realize what you’ve done to me Skyline?! You’re little fiasco last night caused a breakout, basically destroying that bar! You wondering how that’s connected to me? I have to pay for repairs! And do you know how much that costs? 2,000 fucking caps!! You just put my caravan back three months pay, and now I have no choice but to fire you!”

“Well fine! I only hung out with your little caravan to explore and get free food! I think I can manage on my own! Oh yeah, and I always thought you were tight up little fuck too!! You’re just pathetic, I bet you couldn’t even kill a radroach!”

I think I pushed too far on the last comment, because he then pulled out his bowie knife, and clenched it hard in his mouth, staring at me with his dark red eyes.

“Ha!! Bring it on!! I’ll kill you the second you try something!” I said, pulling out my specialized combat shotgun.

We stood there, looking at each other with angry eyes. I was waiting for him to try something, and he was....I really have no idea what he was thinking on doing. He brought a big knife to a big gun fight, he really didn’t have the upper hoof here, and although I really wanted to at least blast a limb off, I never shoot first...well when I’m not facing raiders of course. Just then, the bar owner came over to us.

“Alright lower your weapons! My bar already has enough damage to it, blood ain’t gonna help it look any better. Now you fellas have a problem, take it outside of the town. Now you,” he pointed a hoof at Ramrod, “you are gonna pay me the 2,000 caps to repair the place. And you,” then he pointed his hoof to me, “I don’t want to see you in this town again! We got ponies hurt because of you, and finding health potions an’ such ain’t easy. So get!”

Ramrod looked at me with hatred in his eyes, then said in a lowered voice to me, “I will kill you for this.”

Angered and shocked at his statement, I flew off and away from New Appleloosa, not sure what to do next.

*** *** ***

What am supposed to do now? I mean I can continue traveling the wasteland and stuff, but that just isn’t going to be fun anymore. Ramrod may have been a total ass, but at least he provided food and some other merchants as company. It just isn’t fun when you’re alone in the wasteland. So now I have to actually worry about food supplies, a safe place to sleep, and watch my back the whole time. And to top it all off, I now have a guy who is out to kill me! Well I don’t really see him as a tracker type of pony, I mean he always groomed his mane, so I’m not afraid of the guy himself...I’m afraid of the people he knows.

Traveling in the caravan didn’t really restrain me from exploring, so I usually ignored all the major trading Ramrod did with the Talon mercs, which was the main group he dealt in trading with, weapons and ammunition, that sort of thing . But one thing’s for sure, there was a lot of trading with that group, so much that Ramrod was able to get major protection when in a big settlement, such as Friendship City.

I never really noticed how big of a threat he was until now. I got three choices then. One, I can kill Ramrod off, but I’m no murderer and I’m not aloud back in New Appleloosa, plus it’s probably going to take awhile to pay back the caps he owes and I’m not going to wait around in the wasteland.

My second choice would be to go somewhere his mercenaries wouldn’t, like Fillydelphia, but that would be suicide for me too. Ever since that Red Eye guy started going wacko against the Enclave that place is a deathtrap. Of course there’s Canterlot, I hear there’s a bunch of treasures there, that and some type of pink poisonous cloud. Yeeeah that’s probably a no go. Even though I’m a pegasus I wasn’t born in the clouds, so that could be a good place to go...although I’ve heard rumors that anything from the ground that comes near the clouds not wearing anything Enclavey, is in for some deep shit.

Final choice is to find someplace new. Equestria is big and all, but when you’re in a caravan it kinda shrinks in size, plus a ton of places are so hyped on radiation it’s impossible to get in without dying of radiation poisoning. A lot of megaspells fell ya know. And surprisingly I actually learned a lot while traveling, lots of ruins have a ton of data and info on the days before the war. I found out that Equestria isn’t the only big country around, there’s places like Saddle Arabia, Germane, and even some place in the arctic north...the Crystal Empire I think?

Well...choice three sounds the best to me, although I’m going to need a lot more info about these places outside Equestria, for all I know they could be in even worse condition. But I think I know the place to find out...

Footnote: Level up
New Perk: Saddle Up level 1--you can now carry 10 pounds more in your inventory. Anything with a weight of four or less now weigh half as much for you.