The door to Craterside Supply flew open loudly, crashing into the wall next to it and crushing a mole rat inside a cage. The guard that was usually there was most likely in the next room sleeping, so Carter opted to sit against the counter and rest for awhile. Looking at the door with a quizzical expression on his face, he sat quietly as Rainbow walked in, mane wet and clinging to her forehead in a limp manner.

The man rested both arms behind his head as the rest of his body reclined back, hours of tensed muscles slowly releasing their tormenting pressure as the Lone Wanderer caught his breath. He couldn't help but thank whoever sent Dashie here; she was so far a great comrade, and could keep up with him far easier than a lot of his other companions. In fact, he remembered why he came here in the first place as his closed eyes snapped open in obvious annoyance. Staring up at the mare who was giving him an expression that almost yelled really?, he got up to his feet, and with one final stretch, he walked into the next room and upstairs, where the local trader was asleep....

Wait, actually, scratch that. What she was doing was most definitely not sleeping.

The scientist had out a large number of mines, which added up to a total of 20 as Carter sucked in his breath, flinching ever so slightly as he noticed the old woman tinkering with them. Fidgeting with a screwdriver, she threw it over the railing behind her in a huff, eliciting a moan of pain as it hit the mare below it. Sucking on his teeth as he looked over and saw Rainbow rubbing a bump on her head, the Wanderer stared back up at the woman.

Flushing her cheeks and thinking, she bent over and picked up a large toolbox, easily half the size of herself, and reached inside, her tongue stuck out as she searched for a tool. Yelling, "Eureka!" and waking up her guards, she grabbed out a sawed-off shotgun, and with a low heave, opened up a nearby window and threw the mine out. As it sailed through the air, she put a single shell in the left barrel, aimed with one eye shut, with one-hand, backwards, and with the gun underneath the fork in her legs, she fired, scoring a direct hit on the flying mine, exploding into a display of shrapnel, fire, and gunpowder.

Carter just stared blankly at the red-haired badass, who calmly ejected the shell, caught it with clenched teeth, and spit it into a nearby garbage can. Rainbow Dash, who heard the loud exclamation as well, was hovering in the air with her mouth wide open. As the woman placed the shotgun back into the toolbox, she wiped her hands clean, blinked twice, and stared back at the pair of visitors, obviously caught off guard.

"Oh hey Carter! Just fixing up the landmines you gave me!"

"Moira, you do realize I gave you those about twenty years ago, right?"

Unfazed, Moira stated, "And there still as clean as the day you put 'em in!"

Confused, the man replied, "But I didn't...put them in anything...."

Waving her hand like a rag doll, Moira blew a raspberry and said, "Sure ya did Carty! Don't you remember?"

Finger pointed at her as if to talk, Carter found he couldn't voice another fact, and with a look of both defeat and confusion, he quickly flinched as he saw Moira look behind him. Shutting his eyes tightly, he knew what was coming-

"Ohmygod! IsthatapegasusorisitaponyIcan'ttellcanyoutellmepleasepleasepleasepleaseplease?!"

Wiping the spit off his face in disgust, he looked at Moira, who quickly voiced an apology for "invading his bubble".

Presenting her with his right hand, he said, "Her name's Rainbow Dash, though I just call her Dashie-"

"Please don't call me that."

"Never, Dashie."

"Gaah..."

"As I was saying, yes, she is a pegasus and a pony, like a pegasus-pony deal," putting his hand up to his chin, he muttered a hmm and continued," Y'know, I always pictured pegasi as horses, but I guess whatever helps you sleep at night; they're basically the same thing."

"No they're no-"

Interrupting the mare, Rainbow found her right foreleg grasped by Moira, who swiftly brought her downstairs and put her on a pedestal in the corner of the main room. Decsending the staircase quickly, Carter found Rainbow on top of a type of fashion pedestal, where she was currently being fitted with a vault suit, the numbers 2 and 0 still slightly visible against the faded background of the worn fabric.

The mare mouthed a weak Help me..., but to no avail as Carter just studied her new armor that was being custom fit just for her, and as she watched the scientist-turned fashionista strap on layers of hardened leather, she couldn't help but smile at her new ensemble, striking a cocky pose and laughing lightly as she was dressed from head to foreleg in a sized down Vault 20 armored jumpsuit, complete with a strapped on combat knife to the shoulder pad, a built in leather holster, and a small satchel bag on the left side of her body.

Making a rectangle with her fingers, Moira looked the newly armored mare over, who stood defiantly as she studied her new apparel, eyes gleaming brightly as she gazed at her polished knife. Moira placed both hands on her hips, announced that she was done, and then stopped mid-sentence, remembering one last thing.

"Wait! Hold on, lemme see if I can find one last thing you'll need...." she said, turning around and searching through a cardboard box, throwing little things such as fabric, leather, and ammo out as she rummaged through the confinements that were the only thing keeping her customer from being fully happy. As she reached the bottom, she cracked an ear-to-ear grin as she brought out a small metal box, the size of Rainbow's foreleg.

Confused, Rainbow leaned in as the woman opened it...

..and she gasped in awe as she stared at a small Pip-Boy 3000, the perfect modification to her already growing arsenal. Holding her left foreleg in front of her mouth, wide magenta irises stared blankly into the Wasteland wonder. She couldn't believe her eyes.

Carter whistled as he looked at the polished Pip-Boy, and with a glance at his own dusty tool, he pulled out a stool and grabbed a nearby rag off a coat hanger, wiping the dirt and grime from his old friend carefully. Meanwhile, Rainbow could barely contain her excitement at having a device on her left foreleg, which Moira placed considerately carefully, her left eye twitching ever so slightly if the device was not parallel with her leg.

"So why's it gotta be so perfectly on there anyways?"

Looking up at her and smiling, Moira answered, "Because, I don't want it to be even a liiiitle off on you, 'cause if it is, you might get a bad neck cramp because you have to turn your head more than you need to."

Giving a not bad look, Rainbow stared down at the Pip-Boy as it hissed, tightening itself only slightly to better fit her foreleg. After it was done, Rainbow brought her arm up to eye level, and with the edge of her hoof, she clicked the button onscreen that read Turn On.

Her vision was automatically filled with numbers and words as she felt a tingle crawl up her spine and course through her entire body, reaching every single nerve inside the mare and leaving them vigorous with more strength. Breathing a little heavier than usual, she looked at Moira and Carter, who looked back at her with a look of concern. Flailing her hoof, she scoffed, "Don't worry. I'm okay."

"Hmm, that doesn't usually happen when you get your Pip-Boy..."

"It's her body," Carter examined, looking over the mare, "It must be due to her not being human, it was built for us, not them. It could've been a little much for her small body to handle-"

"Hay, don't talk about me like I'm not here. I'm not weak at all!"

"I wasn't calling you weak, it's just that your body is noticeably smaller than a humans, and the waves it sent through your body to get your status and S.P.E.C.I.A.L. is built for humans, so it was more than what you should have normally."

"Oh, I knew that," Rainbow said, turning around with a crimson hue touching her cheeks. Giving herself an excuse to be about-faced, she cycled through the Pip-Boy's features, first looking at her weapon slot, which displayed two weapons, her .44 magnum revolver, and a combat knife. A small blue man held said weapons as she looked at each slide, and with a grin of curiousity, she switched to her Stats.

She was treated to yet another treatment of numbers and words, and her vision blurred for half a split-second as she looked at something called the S.P.E.C.I.A.L. She read it in her mind curiously:

Strength: 6
Perception: 5
Endurance: 6
Charisma: 4
Intelligence: 6
Agility: 10
Luck: 7

With a look of suspicion, she looked at it yet again. Still, the same numbers remained. Low Car-isthmus? Bitch.

As Rainbow continued scouring through her new tech, Moira resumed her studies, but not before Carter questioned her, "Where the hell did you even get that Pip-Boy anyways?"

A grin on her face, she replied, "A trader brought it in, said a little boy gave it to him as payment for protecting him. He also said the boy stated it was his own, so that's why it's almost the right size for her."

As she wandered off to go upstairs, Carter stopped her yet again, "Hey, how much caps do you want?"

"I don't need any, helping her survive in the Wasteland is enough payment for me."

"I can't just rob you of supplies, Moira."

"Consider this a reward for giving me all these mines, alright?" she asked, holding up a disarmed frag mine.

Laughing, Carter let her walk up the stairs as she went to tend to her experiments. Turning around, he watched as the newly armored pegasus fiddled with her Pip-Boy's functions. After a minute of this, she turned her head and branished her new knife, trotting over to the nearby workbench to begin modifying it for her use.

"Hey Dashie."

Sighing through clenched teeth, she asked, "Whud?"

"Maybe you should get some sleep now, save that for later. I have a workbench in my house anyways. Come on, now. Let's go," he walked over to the door and pulled it open for her, the light of the dusk flooding the room as he waved a hand to the outside.

Rolling her eyes, she sheathed her knife with an audible shing and trotted past him and into the rain. Before leaving fully, however, she turned her head and yelled, "Thanks Moira!"

A, "No Problem!" from upstairs answering her, she trotted out of the store, Carter following suit after repeating Rainbow's words to the scientist on the top.

As the two walked toward Carter's house, the man in front, Rainbow continued to look over her new device's various functions, ranging from looking at the amount of ammo she carried, how much weight she was pulling, and her personal stats. The walk was short-lived, and Carter walked in first, the door opening with a crash as it hit the wall next to it yet again. Throwing his arms out, he yelled, "It feels so good to be back home!" and with a defiant look, he walked over to a locker on the far side of the room, opening the rusted handle with his right hand as he reached inside for quite possibly his third tied-for-first favorite weapon of all time: his Homemade Crossbow he had created from an old hunting rifle, a destroyed set of Tesla armor, and sticks, feathers, and sharp blades he had just lying around.

As he examined his crossbow, he didn't even look back at the mare who stood awkwardly behind him, "Go upstairs and take the bed, I'll sleep on the couch."

Smiling sincerely, the mare walked up the stairs with her eyes shut, not expecting to run into a metallic object as she reached the top floor. Shaking her struck head, she audibly gulped as she panickingly gazed upon the large robotic octopus thing that stood in her way. Her mouth drooped and her eyes widened in fear, she looked up at the robo-ctipus with dread.

"How do you do madam-"

"AHHHHHHHHHHHH, THERE'S A ROBOTIC OCTOPUS IN THIS HOUSE!!!!!"

Author's Note

And there you go, my favorite Fallout mod in history ever: the Homemade Crossbow, featured in Fallout: New Vegas. Look it up on YouTube, I can't put in the Author's Notes.