Fallout: Equestria: Overdose

The small town of Cherrysburg lived for its orchard. The Stable built under the town had been provided with the standard apple orchard, and a separate stand of cherry trees. The stable ponies had built, and fortified, and learned, and expanded. When the second wall went up, they had used the space inside it to transplant saplings from the Stable.

The cherries had thrived under the diligent caretaking of the Stable ponies. Unicorn ingenuity had allowed them to purify the soil and concentrate the gloomy sun. Earth pony love had bolstered the infant trees against storms and poor nutrition, and before long there were cherries.

Fresh cherries, healthy and round. A rarity in the Wasteland, precious and delicious. Word spread, and the town of Cherrysburg grew and prospered along with the trees. Trade followed, and bushels of cherries left the city in caravans and on pony backs. Outsiders trickled in slowly, and the population of the town grew.

Bountiful Harvest her hooves up on a massive cherrywood desk, leaning back in the upholstered chair removed from her old office. “By all that’s delicious, youngster. I must be in heaven.” She crowed. “Loamy, did you ever imagine we could have gotten this far?”

The pony so addressed waved a hoof indulgently, concentrating on the paperwork spread over her much smaller scrap metal desk.

“I mean, who’d have thought such a town could have sprouted from just a few little cherry trees?”

“Two dozen trees of three varieties isn’t a ‘few’, mother.” Loamy grumbled. “And ‘little’ doesn’t fit either, the king tree was big enough to make your desk from just a few planks.”

“Fine, fine, don’t respect the Mayor. I’ll just have you thrown in the stockade, young lady!”

“Mother…”

“Oh, be that way. I’ll just go see my son on the wall, at least he’ll have time for his broken down old mother.” Bountiful Harvest made her lazy way out of her office. She paused to brush a nonexistent speck of dust off the sign on her door.

“Love you, momma.” Loamy said quietly from inside the small building. Bountiful Harvest smiled.

“Love you too, cherry pit.”

Cherrysburg hummed with activity, ponies dragging carts full of cherries from the orchard or hauling farming equipment to. A squad of ponies in dark red leather armor trotted by, singing a bawdy song about red curved flanks. Bountiful Harvest stepped smoothly through her town, stepping out of the way of a burly earth pony with a cart of early season Viva cherries. She snatched one out of a basket and munched on it contemplatively. Her legs carried her on a winding path out to the inner wall.

“Halt and identify yourself!” A voice thundered. Bountiful Harvest jumped back, laughing. A rough cut pony scampered through the gate, startled by the goings-on. With a clattering thump, a dark red earth pony leapt off the top of the wall. Landing in front of Bountiful, the pony whipped a short sword through a flourishing drill, ending with it levelled at Bountiful.

“Oh my blessed strudel, whatever shall I do against such a fierce protector!” Bountiful said, laughing. The pony negligently sheathed his sword and leaned forward to take her in a firm embrace.

“Hi, momma mayor,” he said. Bountiful Harvest leaned into his embrace, then took a step back to clop her son on a shoulder.

“You trying to scare the life out of your poor old mother, you rapscallion?” She asked querelously. The buck snorted laughter, laying his hoof over his mother’s.

“As if anything could take you away from us.”

Bountiful Harvest hugged her son again, then motioned at the gate. “I was heading to the big wall, walk with me?”

“Of course, of course.”

The two ponies made their way through the ring of orchards surrounding the inner town. The path was straight, but their route was not. The blossoms were just starting to bud on the trees nearest the path, and the pair meandered amongst them, spending time with each tree they passed. The outer wall soon lay before them, and Bountiful Harvest climbed the steep stairs inside of it. The land outside the wall was normally as busy as the city, but today it was nearly bare of ponies headed towards the gate.

“What’s this all about?” Bountiful Harvest asked as her son made it up the stairs behind her.

“I’m not sure, mom.”

The first person to reach Cherrysburg’s outer gate was familiar to the two ponies, a ghouled goat piled high and strapped thick with parcels. His normal shuffling gait was missing, replaced with a frantic pounding of his old cloven hooves.

“Buddy, what’s the hurry?” Bountiful shouted down. The old ghoul leaped straight into the air, recovering himself in an awkward clatter of legs and belongings.

“Bountiful Harvest, thank flank itself!” Buddy cried. Stumbling and clattering through the wide open gate, the ghoul practically stumbled up the stairs. Bountiful Harvest and her son stepped back as the smell of herbs and medicines overlaid with long dead flesh made it up the wall first.

“Buddy, Buddy, you smell even worse than normal, are you sweating? Can ghouls sweat? What’s wrong?!” Bountiful Harvest gasped, stretching out to pat the gasping ghoul through his almost palpable cloud of stench. Buddy flailed a cloven hoof at Bountiful, swatting away her reassurance.

“They’re coming, Bounty. More- *gasp* raiders than I’ve ever seen!” Buddy panted. “And they’re organized! They’ve got a leader, some freaky little mutant and her oversized son.” Buddy flattened himself against the narrow surface of the wall.

“What do you mean, coming, Buddy? Raider bands have tried these walls before, and my boys have always beaten them back.”

“Bounty, this isn’t a band, it’s an army.”

Silence was her only reply, and she paid more attention to the ponies streaming away from her town. They looked scared, and many of them were avoiding the beaten path, heading into the nearby hills.

“Boy, go rouse the Militia.”

“Mother, on the word of an old ghoul?”

“On the word of someone I’ve known since my first month out of the Stable. Now GIT!” Bounty said, shoving the stallion. Her son turned and bounded down the stairs. “On your hooves, Buddy.” Bounty helped the ghoul back upright, and Buddy leaned against the outer wall.

“I’ve been running for a day, literally. They cleaned me out, I don’t even have a brick of hash on me, Bounty.” Buddy moaned. Bounty rubbed his head with a friendly hoof.

“Well you’ve at least got a blunt to share with an old friend, I hope?”

“You know I do, sister.”

The two remained on the wall while the militia ponies ran around shouting and preparing. Buddy made his unsteady way down the stairs and headed for the Stable, hiding in the deepest hole he could find. Bounty stared out at the Wasteland as the day wore on. The final thud of the gate slamming closed startled her, and she stared at the smoldering butt laying on the ground outside the gate.

“Pits.”

The sun peeked below the clouds in the tiny space between gloom and nightfall, and still no raider army approached Cherrysburg. Bountiful Harvest had returned to her office, following up on her son’s distribution of the militia members and approving of them. The mare made her way downstairs to her quarters, and threw herself into bed.

“Oof!”

“Buddy!”

Bountiful Harvest was up before the sun. Her step was firm and confident as she trotted to the inner gate. Her son was below, sleeping. The lieutenant in charge overnight saluted gravely as she approached.

“Good morning, Miss Harvest.” The pony said quietly. Bountiful nodded, clambering to the inner wall’s platform.

“Good morning, Tricky.” She replied, turning to look over the orchards.

“All quiet so far, ma’am. The sentries haven’t reported-”

A sharp whistle cut the air, and both ponies whipped their heads around to look. At the outer gate, a sentry came running towards them on the path. Bountiful bounded down and through the inner gate, pelting out to meet the sentry halfway.

“Ma’am, they’re here!”

“Ok youngster, tell that Tricky what’s going on, then go roust my son. I’m headed for the gate.”

“Yes’m!” The sentry said, then ran off. Bountiful Harvest trotted to the outer gate, her steps heavy on the packed earth.

Mounting the stairs to the platform just inside the peak of the wall, Bountiful took a deep breath and peered out at a mass of ponies that justified Buddy’s descriptor of ‘army’. Loose ranks of ponies stretched out before her, spread widely and deeply around her town’s main gate. The path was open, the only straight lines in the horde were around the main drag into Cherrysburg.

Bountiful Harvest gasped as the sun peeked up on the horizon, grudgingly lending its meager light to the horde facing her. The ponies were raiders, fit to type and festooned with spikes and horrible weapons. Some of them were eye catching even in the mass, one there with pony skulls as shoulderpads, one with ponyhide armor made of flapping cutie marks. There an earth pony with one eye, picking his teeth with a unicorn horn. There an unmistakable shape of a pony corpse turning on a spit hung over a crackling fire.

And all quiet. Bountiful scanned the mass, picking out atrocity after atrocity. Her gaze kept returning to the carefully clear lane pointing right down the middle at the gate of Cherrysburg. The sun rose above the eternal cloud cover, and the normal gloom of the Wasteland hid the majority of the horrible herd from Bountiful’s sight. She heaved a sigh and slumped against the inside of the wall. Approaching hooves heralded her son, and she drug him the last few steps to the platform.

“We’re in it now, son. Look at them! Buddy was right, that’s an army!” She choked out, gesturing to the filled space in front of her town. Her son’s Wasteland born eyes pierced the gloom better than hers, and he gulped nervously as the array of raiders was revealed. Steadying himself from his initial rush of fear, the stallion began making an assessment of the horde.

“Mother, that’s a lot of ponies.” He said quietly. “But not enough to take Cherrysburg.”

Bountiful blinked at his statement, staring at him incredulously. “You mean to say your militia can defeat that horde of nasty out there?”

“My soliders,” He replied, putting a world’s worth of quiet emphasis on the term, “can defeat that mess of raider scum. Numbers aren’t the only important thing, momma.” He continued, his voice stronger and more confident as he went on. “We’ve got position, walls, and security. They can’t starve us out, we’ve got enough food and water from the Stable to keep us.”

“Barely!” Bountiful interrupted. Her son grinned fiercely at her.

“Barely, but it is enough!” He insisted. “They can’t starve us out, and They can’t take that gate down. We built it strong, mother. Strong just for this reason.” He paused to take a deep breath, then continued. “And we’ve got strong leadership. There’s no way that horde is disciplined enough to follow a leader. They’ll turn to sand when it comes down to it.”

Bountiful smiled thinly at her son, opening her mouth to comment. She was interrupted by a surge of noise from the Wasteland. The raider ponies howled, stomped, bashed their weapons against each other. The noise swelled and grew, then cut off into silence as a brace of lights crashed on. The lights were on a cart, sizable spark battery powered units that brazenly illuminated the massive throne on the cart, and the twisted caricature of a pony sprawled across this seat.

Bountiful and her son stared as the cart rolled down the empty path, drawn by a truly massive earth pony. His bulging muscles slammed each hoof into the ground like an attack, sending a puff of dust into the morning air. Instead of a conventional yoke or freighter saddle the cart was drawn behind him on a simple rope, clenched in his teeth.

The cart pulled to a halt just outside of easy gun range from Cherrysburg, and the wizened pony on the throne lurched to its hooves. It glared at the wall, then pulled a megaphone out of the cart on a sickly yellow magic.

“Citizens of Shitburg! Open your gates and your legs! Surrender yourselves and your posessions to your new rulers!”

Bountiful Harvest held a hoof to her face, hiding a giggle. Her son shot her a wide-eyed look.

“Mother!”

“I know, I know, it’s just.. so cliche!”

Bountiful’s son sighed before taking a megaphone off a hook. “Cherrysburg will never submit to the likes of you!” He shouted. The horde responded with a guttural laugh and a renewed howling.

The cart-riding pony waved a hoof and the howling cut off immediately. “That’s fine, that’s fine. Send out your finest warrior. If he can defeat my champion, we’ll just move on. If my boy wins, we’ll proceed to fuck your gate in half and take what we want! Sound like a deal?”

Bountiful set a hoof on her son’s upraised foreleg, gently pushing the megaphone down. The two shared a doubtful look. “Boy, you think you can whup their pony?”

“I’m sure of it. One piece of raider scum? No problem.”

“You be careful, son. Do your momma proud out there.”

Bountiful’s son nodded once, and turned to whistle into Cherrysburg. One of the guard ponies ran to the outer wall.

“Sir!”

“I’m going to go duel their champion. Have my lieutenant ready the troops, they may attack even after I win.”
“Sir!”

The pony ran back into town, and Bountiful’s son returned the megaphone to its hook. Sharing a quick embrace with his mother, he took a deep breath and leapt over the wall. He landed in front of the gate with a thud, brushing dust off his armor and flexing.

“Alright, you ravenous freak. Let’s do this!” He shouted. A low ripple of laughter bounced through the horde.

“Heh, you ain’t seen ravenous yet. Go kill the fucker, sonny.” The twisted unicorn stabbed a brace of chems into the scarred-over cutie mark of the massive earth pony, who dropped the rope and roared in fury. The colossal off-yellow stallion reared, screaming as he slammed his forehooves into the earth. His massive muscles bulged even further as the chems streamed into his system.

Bountiful’s son held his position as the enraged monster pounded towards him. He reached past his sword, and pulled out his pistol. Eleven pulls of the trigger dumped eleven rounds into the oncoming wall of flesh, and slowed it not at all.

The Cherrysburg soldier threw his empty pistol at his opponent and drew his sword. The short militia blade gleamed in the light from the cart, and he bravely attempted to parry the first hoofstrike of his yellow foe. The giant pony swatted his blade out of his grasp, sending it and several teeth spinning across the Wasteland.

Bountiful Harvest gasped, a hoof pressed to her chest. The colossus knocked a splash of blood out with his backhoof, and laughed. Lunging forward, he clutched Bountiful’s son to his chest and squeezed. The pony roared laughter as he crushed Cherryburg’s son to his chest, a splatter of blood marring his filthy coat.

Bountiful’s son flailed weakly, his strikes smearing his own blood around to no effect. The raider champion changed his grip, and twisted powerfully. The horrible crackling crunch drew a shriek from Bountiful Harvest, and she clung to the wall as her son’s limp body fell to the ground.

“Ha ha ha ha! I’m coming for you, next! If you open the gate, I’ll kill you before I fuck you!” The giant yelled. Bountiful staggered sideways, nearly falling off the wall. A stinky undead limb propped her up as Buddy mounted the stairs.

“That’s not good.” Buddy said quietly. “That’s not good at all, man.”

The ghoul clung to the wall and the suddenly sobbing Bountiful Harvest as everything shook. The massive raider pony slamming into the gate. The normal raiders pulled the cart closer under the exhortations of the spindly unicorn. As the cart closed into range, the unicorn floated out another bundle of chems and slammed it into the huge pony’s flank. Another roar answered this action, followed by an enraged slamming against the gate. Buddy narrowed his rheumy old eyes at this, then whirled and started shouting into the crowd of Cherrysburg militia milling about the space between the walls.

“Unicorn! Unicorn! I need a damn horn head right fucking now!”

A militia unicorn was shoved forwards, and clambered up the stairs to the platform. Bountiful Harvest slumped wailing to the platform, and Buddy dug frantically into his saddlebags. Syringes and pill bottles and baggies of drugs flew, and the goat came up with a thick bag of white powder in his mouth. He spat it out, wobbling as the wall shook under a fresh assault.

“Alright Pokey Pierce, do exactly what I say or we’re fucked, got it?”

“Uhhhh, yessir?”

“Good boy. Now, take that bag in your magic.” The unicorn complied, his eyes wide and his stance shakey. Buddy dived back into his bag, pulling out a package of empty syringes, the plastic caps still on their needle tips. Buddy grinned triumphantly and opened the package with swift hoofwork. “Ok, ok, ok. It’s OK. Take these, and when I’m finished with each one, mix a whole bunch of that coke into it, then put the plunger in.”

The unicorn nodded, taking the syringes in his magic field. Buddy snatched one back and bent, filling it from a water bottle. As he held up the filled syringe, the unicorn snatched it gently away, replacing it with an empty.

One two three four syringes, then five six seven eight before they were all full. Buddy cursed as one fell out of the unicorn’s magic field, spiralling off the platform into the orchard. “Seven will have to be enough. OK, hornhead - take those syringes, and stab ‘em into Ugly’s neck. All of ‘em. Give him the full dose.”

The unicorn nodded shakily, pale and sweaty under his cherry red leather armor. Buddy snatched the bag of cocaine out of the unicorn’s magic field. Darting a hoof inside, he wiped a thin smear of white under the unicorn’s nose and stuffed the closed bag back into his endless pockets. “That’ll steady you, laddy. Now, before he takes the gate down, make him a porcupone!”

The coke hit the unicorn’s system, just a tiny bump. His shakes faded, and he practically leaped forward to the edge of the wall. The seven syringes swirled out of his way as he sneezed violently, then hung before him for a split second before whipping into the colossal attacker.

In a flash of magic and a thump of impact, seven massive hits of cocaine slammed into the already stimulated system of the gigantic earth pony. His massive heart, greasy with fat and swelled from abuse, exploded. With a roar that sent Buddy and the two Cherrysburgh ponies tumbling off the wall, the colossus fell. His corpse shook the earth like a quake, and the Cherrysburg militia finally took to the wall. Disciplined bursts of gunfire and controlled barks of magical energy weapons filled the air with their warlike noise, and beneath it all Buddy huddled with the sobbing Bountiful Harvest and the militia unicorn.

The battle raged on throughout the day, the energized and ably led militia blunting the raider’s attacks until the gunfire tapered off as the sun peeked redly under the clouds. The battle for Cherrysburg was over, they had won.

In the aftermath, the militia unicorn and the rotting goat ghoul accompanied Bountiful Harvest into the clear area in front of the gate. Her son’s body lay untouched behind the mound of his killer’s corpse. The two ponies and the goat ghoul brought the body into town and laid it on a bier with the other fallen. After the ceremonies and the funeral pyre for the honored dead, they returned to the gate for the more grisly duty of handling the raider’s bodies.

They paused at the carcass of the huge earth pony. He lay on his side, clutching vainly at his chest. His cutie mark was blurred and made unreadable under dozens of old injection sites, the flesh infected and ruined. The three ponies stood staring at the dead hulk for long minutes. Overhead, the clouds grumbled and began to drizzle a cold rain.

“Buddy.” Bountiful Harvest said, her voice cracked and worn from crying. “How’d you kill him? What killed him?”

Buddy paused for a long moment, staring at the small stand of syringes sticking out of the corpse.

“Overdose.”