Fall Out: Equestria By: Kkat

Chapter Thirty-Five: Cold Dawn Light

Chapter Thirty-Five: Cold Dawn Light

“I heard something about a town south of here being attacked, but details are sketchy.  All I know is there haven't been any refugees showing up here.  Which means either the attack wasn't too bad, or it was very, very bad.”

“Heroes…

“We all need heroes, children.  Now more than ever.  It’s a good fight that they’re fighting, and they’re doing it on behalf of all of us.  But the Equestrian Wasteland is hard on heroes.  No… it’s brutal to them.  It beats them down.  It tears them apart.  Eventually, every hero falls.  Inevitably, every hero fails.

“Now listen close children.  Heroes ain’t machines from some Equestrian Robotics factory.  Heroes are ponies, just like us.  Doing the things that we should be doing because there ain’t nopony else doing them.  The true mark of a hero is not that they never fail, never fall down.  I’ve said it a hundred times and I’ll say it again: the one great truth of the wasteland is that every pony has done something they regret.  

“No, you know a true hero by what they do after they fall.  By the way they pick themselves back up again, shake themselves off, and throw themselves back into that good fight.  Despite what they done, and despite the bleak prospects of a happy ending.

“Sad truth is most heroes don’t survive.  Or they become overwhelmed by the cruelty and despair and, disheartened, they give up.  

“But in the Stable Dweller, the Bringer of Light, I’ve seen a hero of an entirely new tier.  I was convinced… still am… that this heroine will never surrender to the wasteland, never give up.  

“There is, however, one other fate that may befall heroes.  When the horrors and the pain of the Equestrian Wasteland become too much for them, they can snap.  They can turn into the very monsters they choose to fight.  Sadly, children, it can happen to the very best of ponies.  Even Fluttershy had her Gardens of Canterlot.  

“Now we don’t know if that’s what happened to our Heroine of the Wasteland.  Or if  there’s more to this story than we’ve been told.  We just.  Don’t.  Know.  But I can tell you this:

“The pony who first reported the slaughter at Arbu was from Bucklyn Cross.  Now that’s a Steel Rangers stronghold, and I got my reasons to take a critical eye to what they have to say.  So I’ve started doing some digging.  And I started that digging by trying to contact a gal I know at Bucklyn Cross, Riverseed.  A trustworthy pony.

“Turns out she ain’t there anymore.  Nopony is.  Bucklyn Cross, where our witness of the Arbu massacre claimed t’ be from, is dead.  Completely wiped out.

“Now children, I know this looks bad.  Two communities in the vicinity of our Heroine wiped out.  I’m still holdling onto hope, but I’d be remiss if I didn’t send out a word of warning.  Just on the chance that the Equestrian Wasteland’s facing a whole new kind of dark.  

“So if you see a band of well armed ponies, including a pegasus and a zebra, headed your way.  Or a pegasus-pulled passenger wagon flying nearby… until we know better, maybe you best be someplace else.  

”But if the Stable Dweller should come to your door, don’t lock it.  Because if our hopes are true, then she’s more in need of our help and our support right now than ever before.  And if our fears are true, then… well, children… she just might see that locked door as a challenge.”

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“…How bad?” Calamity demanded, his snout pushed up against Grandpa Rattle as if the two bucks were going to kiss.  “Ah need t’ know.  Cuz Ah’m tryin’ real hard here t’ make this make sense, an’ it ain’t happenin’.  Ah love Li’lpip, and Ah want this t’ be right somehow.  But all Ah’m seein’ is a group o’ good folk who took us in, fed us, offered us shelter, and got slaughtered fer their kindness.”