r/falloutequestria

Chapter 1 — Wake Without a World

Cold came first.

Not pain.

Not memory.

Just cold.

It sat inside his bones like something preserved too long.

Bloodred opened his eyes to darkness interrupted by flickering red light.

For several seconds he couldn’t move. Frost clung to his eyelashes. His lungs spasmed as stale air flooded into them, sharp enough to burn. Somewhere nearby, metal groaned like an old animal waking from sleep.

A warning siren pulsed weakly overhead.

“—CRYO FAILURE DETECTED—”

The voice crackled through static.

“—EMERGENCY REVIVAL PROTOCOL ACTIVE—”

Bloodred stared upward through a fogged glass lid inches from his face.

He didn’t know where he was.

Didn’t know how long he’d been here.

Didn’t know why his entire body felt carved out and replaced with ice.

But one thing floated through the emptiness with impossible certainty.

Bloodred.

That was his name.

Everything else was blank.

He shoved upward instinctively. The cryo pod resisted for one horrible second before hydraulic seals snapped apart with a hiss of freezing vapor. He collapsed forward onto metal flooring slick with thawing frost.

His legs failed immediately.

He hit the ground hard enough to rattle his teeth.

The room around him slowly came into focus through blinking emergency lights.

Rows of tall cryogenic chambers stretched into darkness. Most were dead. Some had shattered outward long ago. Others still contained shapes obscured behind frozen glass.

Ponies.

Or what used to be ponies.

The smell hit next.

Rot beneath antiseptic chemicals.

Bloodred gagged violently.

A distant electrical surge rolled through the structure. Lights flickered. Somewhere deep below, machinery screamed alive for a few seconds before dying again.

The facility sounded sick.

Like it had been trying to stay alive longer than it was meant to.

Bloodred forced himself upright against the side of the pod. His reflection stared back at him in cracked metal.

White coat.

Red mane.

Thin.

Older than he should’ve looked.

His eyes stopped him.

They looked exhausted.

Not physically.

Worn down in some deeper way he couldn’t explain.

“What happened to me…?”

His voice echoed weakly through the chamber.

No answer came.

Only static.

Then—

A sharp pulse slammed behind his eyes.

Bloodred staggered.

For a split second—

Fire.

Massive shadows moving through smoke.

A roar loud enough to shake the sky.

Then nothing.

He nearly fell again.

“What the hell…”

The pain vanished as quickly as it came, leaving only nausea behind.

Bloodred swallowed hard and looked around.

Most of the pods had identification plates attached beneath frosted glass. Many were unreadable from corrosion. Others had been clawed apart from the inside.

That realization settled badly in his stomach.

Clawed.

Not broken.

Clawed.

A soft metallic thunk echoed somewhere deeper in the hallway outside the chamber.

Bloodred froze.

Another thunk.

Slow.

Uneven.

Something moving.

His instincts screamed before his thoughts caught up.

Run.

He moved toward the chamber exit, wings twitching instinctively against his sides. The automatic doors halfway opened before grinding to a stop. He shoved through the gap sideways, scraping metal against his shoulder.

The hallway beyond was long and dimly lit by failing emergency strips.

Frost coated the walls.

Old posters hung peeling from rusted panels:

MINISTRY OF ARCANE SCIENCES

PROGRESS THROUGH DISCOVERY

Another metallic thunk echoed closer this time.

Bloodred looked down the corridor.

At first he thought it was a pony.

Then the thing stepped into the light.

Its skin was pale and stretched too tightly over bone. One side of its face had collapsed inward completely. Mechanical tubing protruded from its spine, dragging sparks across the floor behind it.

Its eyes locked onto him.

Still alive.

Still aware.

The creature opened its mouth.

A wet mechanical shriek erupted from it.

Bloodred ran.

His hooves slammed against frozen metal flooring as warning sirens wailed louder overhead. The creature lunged after him with jerking, broken movements that sounded half-machine, half-corpse.

He turned blindly through intersecting corridors.

Left.

Right.

Down a stairwell coated in ice.

His breathing became ragged almost immediately. His body felt weak from suspension, muscles trembling under strain.

Behind him came scraping metal.

Closer.

The stairwell ended at a sealed security door glowing faintly red.

ACCESS DENIED

“Come on—”

The creature shrieked again behind him.

Bloodred slammed his hoof against the control panel.

Nothing.

He hit it again.

Still nothing.

The thing reached the bottom of the stairs.

Up close it smelled like burned flesh.

Its ruined jaw twitched as if trying to form words.

Bloodred backed away—

Then something inside him reacted.

Heat surged violently through his chest.

Not warmth.

Heat.

Raw and sudden.

The security panel exploded in sparks.

The heavy door lurched sideways just enough to create a gap.

Bloodred stared at it in shock.

“I didn’t—”

The creature charged.

Instinct took over.

Bloodred threw himself through the opening as the thing collided with the doorway behind him. Metal screamed. He rolled across concrete flooring into darkness beyond.

The security door slammed shut.

For a moment only silence remained.

Then pounding.

Violent impacts rattled the door behind him.

Bloodred backed away breathing hard.

The room he’d entered was massive.

A maintenance hangar maybe.

Collapsed catwalks crossed high overhead. Ancient transport machinery hung frozen in place beneath layers of ice and dust. A massive crack split the far wall open to the outside world.

Snow drifted inward through it.

Real snow.

Wind howled through the gap with a sound almost like distant screaming.

Bloodred slowly approached the opening.

Each step felt unreal.

The pounding behind him continued.

The door wouldn’t hold forever.

He reached the breach in the wall and looked outside.

The world beyond was dead.

Mountains stretched beneath a sky choked gray with ash-colored clouds. Far below, twisted ruins disappeared into snow and fog. Rusted structures clawed upward from the wasteland like broken teeth.

No lights.

No movement.

No signs of civilization.

Only endless ruin.

Bloodred stared in silence.

Something inside him sank.

Not memory.

Not recognition.

Just instinctive understanding.

Whatever world he came from—

It was gone.

A violent crash echoed behind him.

The security door was beginning to buckle inward.

Bloodred looked back once.

Then toward the wasteland.

Cold wind tore through his mane.

He spread his wings experimentally. Pain shot through stiff muscles, but they moved.

Good enough.

“I really hope I know how to do this,” he muttered.

The door behind him split open.

The creature screamed.

Bloodred jumped.

For one horrifying second gravity swallowed him whole.

Then instinct ignited.

His wings snapped outward.

Air caught beneath them violently.

He nearly crashed against the mountainside before stabilizing into an uneven glide through the freezing storm.

Behind him, the black facility embedded in the mountain continued flashing red emergency lights into the snow.

A dying machine buried beneath ice.

Watching him leave.

Far below, the wasteland waited.

Chapter 2 — Teeth of the Wasteland

The landing hurt.

Bloodred slammed shoulder-first into a slope of frozen shale and rolled hard enough to knock the air from his lungs. Snow and loose rock followed him down the incline until he finally crashed into the rusted shell of an overturned wagon half-buried in ice.

For several seconds he just lay there gasping.

“…Okay,” he wheezed. “Definitely not a professional.”

Wind screamed across the mountainside above him.

The storm had worsened during the descent. Gray snow whipped through the air in violent spirals, reducing the world to shifting shapes and distant shadows. The facility up on Cryo Ridge was already nearly invisible behind the weather.

Good.

Something about that place felt wrong all the way down to the marrow.

Bloodred pushed himself upright slowly. Every muscle in his body protested. His wings especially felt like they’d been ripped from their sockets.

Still alive though.

That counted for something.

He looked around.

The overturned wagon beside him had once belonged to some kind of military convoy. Most of the metal frame had rusted through decades ago, leaving only skeletal supports and faded hazard markings visible beneath layers of frost.

A skeleton rested nearby.

Pony.

Still wrapped in pieces of old winter gear.

Bloodred stared at it silently for a moment.

No emotional reaction came.

Not because he didn’t care.

Because part of him already understood this world enough to know the dead were probably everywhere.

That realization unsettled him more than the skeleton itself.

A distant howl echoed through the storm.

Bloodred turned immediately.

Not wind.

Something alive.

Another howl answered from farther away.

Then another.

Predators.

His body reacted before his thoughts did. Muscles tightened. Wings flared slightly for balance. His breathing slowed instinctively.

He frowned.

Why do I know how to do that?

The answer never came.

Movement flickered through the storm below.

Four shapes.

Low to the ground.

Fast.

Bloodred backed away from the slope edge as the creatures emerged from the snow.

Wolves.

Sort of.

Their bodies were hairless in patches where diseased gray flesh showed beneath mangy fur. Bones protruded visibly through their hides. Their mouths glowed faint green between jagged teeth slick with saliva.

One of them had two heads.

“Oh, you’ve gotta be kidding me.”

The wolves spread outward slowly.

Hunting behavior.

Testing him.

Bloodred grabbed the nearest thing he could find: a broken metal pipe jutting from the wagon wreckage.

The wolves lunged simultaneously.

The first one hit him head-on.

Bloodred barely got the pipe between its jaws before impact knocked him backward into the snow. Rotting teeth snapped inches from his face. The smell nearly made him gag.

He jammed the pipe upward with both forelegs.

The creature shrieked.

Another wolf slammed into his side.

Pain exploded across his ribs.

Bloodred rolled instinctively before the second bite could close on his throat. He came up swinging the pipe wildly, connecting with something hard enough to crack bone.

The two-headed wolf circled behind him.

Smart.

Too smart.

Bloodred’s heart hammered violently now.

His vision sharpened strangely.

Every movement felt suddenly slower.

Clearer.

The wolves attacked again.

He ducked under one lunge and smashed the pipe downward into a skull hard enough to cave it inward. Before the body even hit the ground he spun and kicked another across the jaw with brutal force.

The impact startled him almost as much as the wolves.

That kick should not have been that strong.

The remaining two beasts hesitated now.

Bloodred’s breathing fogged heavily around him.

Something hot stirred beneath his skin again.

That same heat from the facility.

The wolves sensed it too.

Their ears flattened.

A low growl rumbled through the storm.

Not from them.

From him.

Bloodred froze.

The sound hadn’t come from his throat normally.

It had vibrated deeper.

Older.

The two-headed wolf charged anyway.

Bloodred moved on instinct.

Too fast.

One second the beast was mid-leap—

The next his pipe had punched completely through its throat.

Blood sprayed across the snow.

The creature collapsed twitching at his hooves.

Silence followed.

The last wolf backed away slowly.

Fear visible in its posture now.

Then it turned and vanished into the storm.

Bloodred stood motionless.

Panting.

The metal pipe slipped from numb hooves.

What the hell was that?

He looked down at the dead wolves surrounding him.

One crushed skull.

One broken jaw.

One impaled through the throat.

The injuries didn’t match how weak he’d felt moments earlier.

Adrenaline, maybe.

Except it didn’t feel like adrenaline.

It felt automatic.

Like something in his body already knew exactly how to kill.

That thought crawled unpleasantly through his stomach.

The wind shifted suddenly.

A new smell hit him.

Smoke.

Bloodred looked down the mountainside.

Far below, barely visible through the snowstorm, orange lights flickered in the distance.

Settlement.

Or camp.

Either way, civilization.

He should’ve felt relieved.

Instead, anxiety tightened in his chest.

Because he didn’t know what civilization looked like anymore.

Didn’t know who he was.

Didn’t know whether the thing that had just happened was normal.

Another strange sensation pulled at him then.

Sharp.

Subtle.

Like a hook behind his ribs tugging him somewhere southeast.

Bloodred frowned.

He looked toward a cluster of shattered train cars partially buried along the valley floor.

For just a second—

He could almost feel something there.

Warm.

Bright.

Calling.

Then the sensation vanished completely.

“What…?”

No answer.

Only wind.

Bloodred stared at the distant wreckage a moment longer before shaking it off.

Hallucinations probably ranked pretty low on his current list of problems.

The storm intensified again.

He needed shelter before nightfall.

With one last uneasy glance toward the mountain facility above, Bloodred began limping down toward the distant lights of the wasteland.

Chapter 3 — Blackout

Dusthaven looked like a junkyard pretending to be a town.

Bloodred saw it clearly only when the storm finally thinned near dusk.

The settlement sat beneath the collapsed remains of an elevated rail bridge, its buildings assembled from train cars, sheet metal, shipping containers, and anything else desperate ponies could weld together. Smoke rose from rusted exhaust pipes into the gray evening sky. Floodlights powered by sputtering generators illuminated walls made of scrap and old military plating.

At the front gate hung a sign crudely painted across warped steel:

DUSTHAVEN NO WATER, NO AMMO, NO ENTRY

“Charming.”

Bloodred adjusted the torn strap of the scavenged winter cloak he'd pulled from the dead pony near the mountain. It smelled faintly moldy, but it hid most of the blood on his coat.

Mostly.

The guards spotted him immediately.

Two unicorns behind sandbag barricades lowered rifles in his direction.

“Stop there,” one barked.

Bloodred raised his hooves slowly.

“Easy. Not looking for trouble.”

“That usually means trouble.”

Fair point.

The guards looked exhausted more than hostile. Thin. Dirty. One of them had burn scars across half his face. The other kept glancing nervously toward the darkening wasteland behind Bloodred like he expected something worse to emerge from it.

“Name?” the scarred one asked.

Bloodred opened his mouth.

Paused.

“...Bloodred.”

Saying it out loud felt strange. Like reading a label attached to someone else.

“From where?”

“No idea.”

That earned him a long stare.

“You drunk?”

“Not yet.”

The second guard snorted despite himself.

Scarface didn’t.

“You alone?”

“Far as I know.”

The guard’s eyes narrowed at that answer.

Before he could continue, another pony climbed down from the barricade tower overhead.

Older mare. Lean build. Caravan rifle slung across her back.

She took one look at Bloodred and grimaced.

“He’s from the Ridge.”

The other guards stiffened immediately.

Bloodred blinked. “The what?”

“The frozen hell up there.” She jerked her head toward the mountains. “You smell like cryo fluid and burnt circuits.”

That explained the looks.

“Right,” Bloodred said carefully. “Well. Good news. I’m leaving there permanently.”

Nobody laughed.

The mare approached slowly.

“Anypony else come down with you?”

Images flashed briefly through Bloodred’s mind.

Broken cryo pods.

The thing in the stairwell.

Clawed-open chambers.

“No.”

She studied him for another long second.

Then finally sighed.

“If he turns feral, shoot him outside the walls.”

“Comforting,” Bloodred muttered.

The gates creaked open.

Dusthaven smelled like rust, smoke, sweat, stale alcohol, and desperation.

Ponies moved through cramped alleyways between scrap-built structures carrying ammunition crates, water jugs, or salvaged machine parts. Small fires burned inside oil drums. Somewhere nearby, a radio played distorted swing music through static.

Everypony looked armed.

Even the children.

Bloodred noticed that immediately.

The wasteland didn’t seem to believe in harmless things.

As he walked deeper into town, eyes followed him constantly.

Stranger.

Outsider.

Potential threat.

He understood the looks instinctively even if he hated them.

A pair of scavengers passed nearby whispering:

“See the eyes on him?”

“Probably chem-sick.”

“Or Enclave.”

Bloodred had no idea what Enclave meant, but it apparently wasn’t complimentary.

His stomach twisted suddenly.

Hunger.

Violent and immediate.

He realized then he couldn’t remember the last time he’d eaten.

Or if he ever had before waking up.

That thought nearly stopped him in his tracks.

A neon sign flickered ahead:

THE LAST STOP

Bar.

Perfect.

Bloodred shoved through the crooked doorway into warmth and noise.

The interior was crowded with scavengers, caravan guards, wasteland drifters, and at least two ponies who looked like professional killers pretending not to be. Conversations dipped slightly when he entered.

He ignored it.

Mostly.

The bartender—a massive earth pony stallion with a mechanical eye—looked him over.

“You dying or just ugly?”

“Little of both.”

“Sit down then.”

Bloodred dropped onto a stool heavily.

“Strongest thing you’ve got.”

The bartender slid over a cloudy bottle without hesitation.

Bloodred took a long pull.

The liquid tasted like industrial solvent mixed with regret.

Perfect.

Warmth spread through his chest.

For the first time since waking up, the noise in his head dulled slightly.

Not silence.

But quieter.

He exhaled slowly.

The bartender leaned against the counter.

“You from the mountains?”

Bloodred glanced up. “Is it that obvious?”

“You look like something dug itself outta the grave.”

“Encouraging pattern around here.”

The bartender grunted.

Before he could reply, the bar doors slammed open.

Three raiders entered.

Every conversation in the room died instantly.

Bloodred recognized them immediately even without memory.

Violence had a look.

Patchwork armor.

Chem burns.

Weapons carried carelessly because they wanted ponies nervous.

The lead raider—a broad earth pony mare with sharpened metal teeth welded into her jaw—grinned at the room.

“Well,” she rasped, “good news everypony. We ain’t robbing the whole town tonight.”

Nobody relaxed.

“Just collecting overdue tolls.”

The bartender muttered a curse.

One of the raiders spotted Bloodred immediately.

Fresh prey.

“You.” Metal-Teeth pointed at him. “New guy pays double.”

Bloodred sighed into his drink.

“I just got here.”

“Then you ain’t contributed yet.”

The room watched silently.

No help coming.

Of course not.

Bloodred looked at the bottle in front of him.

Then at the raiders.

Something cold tightened in his chest.

Not fear.

Pressure.

The same sensation from the wolves.

“You really wanna do this?” he asked quietly.

Metal-Teeth grinned wider.

“Yes.”

The raider beside her moved first.

Fast.

Knife flashing toward Bloodred’s throat.

Then—

Darkness.

—

Sound returned first.

Screaming.

Bloodred blinked.

The bar looked different.

Broken.

One entire wall had collapsed inward.

Tables were overturned everywhere.

Smoke drifted through the room.

For a moment he couldn’t understand what he was seeing.

Then he noticed the bodies.

One raider lay crumpled against the far wall unnaturally twisted.

Another had been smashed through a support pillar hard enough to crack concrete.

Metal-Teeth herself lay motionless near the entrance.

Her throat looked burned.

Burned.

Bloodred stared at it.

Slowly.

His forelegs were covered in blood.

Not his.

The entire room was silent except for ragged breathing and the crackle of small fires.

Everypony was staring at him.

Horror.

Fear.

Confusion.

The bartender’s mechanical eye twitched slightly.

Bloodred’s pulse hammered.

“What…”

His voice came out weak.

“I…”

He didn’t remember.

Not even a second of it.

A terrified scavenger whispered from somewhere behind him:

“His eyes changed.”

Bloodred looked up sharply.

“What?”

No one answered.

Because suddenly everypony in the room looked very interested in not speaking to him at all.

And deep beneath the panic rising in his chest—

Something else stirred.

A distant voice.

Faint.

Confused.

Not his.

> “…fire…”

Chapter 4 — Ghosts in the Walls

The silence in The Last Stop lasted exactly eleven seconds.

Then everypony started talking at once.

“—saw him throw her through the wall—”

“—that wasn’t magic—”

“—his damn eyes—”

“Get him outta here!”

Bloodred stumbled backward off the stool as if distance alone could separate him from the bodies around him. His pulse thundered violently in his ears.

Burned.

Her throat had been burned.

How?

He looked down at his hooves again. Blood coated the white fur up to his knees. Tiny wisps of smoke still curled from the floorboards beneath him.

The bartender moved first.

Slowly.

Carefully.

Like approaching a live explosive.

“Kid,” he said quietly, “you remember any of that?”

Bloodred swallowed.

“No.”

That answer made the room even more afraid.

Metal-Teeth’s corpse lay near the doorway, eyes still wide open. The flesh around her neck looked blackened and split apart from intense heat. Not laser fire.

Closer to being cooked from the inside.

Bloodred stared at it with growing nausea.

I did that.

The thought felt unreal.

The bartender’s mechanical eye whirred softly as it focused on him.

“You some kinda unicorn?”

Bloodred snapped back. “What?”

“The fire.”

“I don’t know.”

That much, at least, was true.

A scavenger mare near the wall hissed nervously, “Maybe he’s one of those Ministry things.”

Another whispered back:

“Thought those were all dead.”

Bloodred didn’t know what that meant either, but judging by the fear in their voices, he probably didn’t want to.

Outside, sirens began blaring through Dusthaven.

Not alarms.

Warning whistles.

The bartender cursed under his breath.

“Raiders’ll have friends nearby. Town guard’s gonna lock the gates.”

Bloodred took another shaky step backward.

The faint voice returned.

Closer this time.

> “…cold…”

He froze.

Not sound.

Inside his head.

His breathing quickened immediately.

No.

No no no.

The room tilted slightly around him.

> “…where…?”

Bloodred squeezed his eyes shut hard.

“Stop.”

The bartender frowned. “Kid?”

> “…why can’t I move…?”

The voice sounded disoriented.

Afraid.

Bloodred grabbed the edge of the counter hard enough to splinter wood.

“I said stop.”

Now everypony looked ready to run.

The bartender slowly reached beneath the counter toward something hidden.

Weapon probably.

Smart move.

Bloodred backed toward the door before anypony decided he needed to die immediately.

“I’m leaving.”

“Good idea,” someone muttered.

No argument there.

The cold evening air hit him hard the second he stepped outside.

Dusthaven had changed already.

Ponies moved quickly through the streets carrying rifles and barricade supplies. Floodlights rotated toward the outer walls. Somewhere in the distance, automatic gunfire rattled briefly before falling silent again.

The wasteland adapted fast.

Bloodred pulled the scavenged cloak tighter around himself and started walking without direction.

He needed space.

Needed quiet.

Needed the voice to stop.

> “…hear me…”

“Shut up.”

A nearby scavenger gave him a deeply concerned look before hurrying away.

Bloodred pressed forward into the darker edge of the settlement until the lights and noise faded behind him.

Dusthaven’s outer district was little more than stacked scrap structures and abandoned rail cars built beneath the skeletal remains of the Black Rail Line overhead. Rusted train husks loomed like dead metal beasts in the snow.

Something about them pulled at him again.

That same strange sensation from earlier.

Warm.

Familiar.

He followed it instinctively through narrow alleys between ruined cargo cars until he found the source.

An overturned transport wagon half-buried beneath snow.

Its side had split open long ago.

Inside, among old crates and frozen debris—

Gemstones.

Small ones.

Mostly cracked or dirty.

But the moment Bloodred saw them, something inside him tightened violently.

Hunger.

Not normal hunger.

Deeper.

He approached slowly.

“What…”

The gems almost seemed brighter the closer he got.

Warmth spread beneath his skin again.

The voice in his head went silent instantly.

Bloodred reached down carefully and picked up a small red crystal between his hooves.

The effect was immediate.

Heat surged through his chest.

Comfort.

Relief.

Like breathing properly for the first time since waking up.

His eyes widened.

“What the hell…”

Without thinking, he slipped the gem into his pocket.

The warmth lingered.

Not enough.

He wanted another.

That realization hit him hard enough to break the trance immediately.

Bloodred stepped back from the wagon like it had tried to bite him.

“Nope.”

His pulse quickened uneasily.

That wasn’t normal.

None of this was normal.

The voice returned again, weaker now.

> “…hungry…”

Bloodred stared into the darkness between the train cars.

The word echoed unpleasantly inside him.

Hungry.

For a horrible second he wasn’t entirely sure whether the thought belonged to the voice—

Or him.

A metallic creak echoed overhead.

Bloodred looked up sharply.

Movement crossed the shattered rail bridge above.

Multiple figures.

Watching.

Raiders.

One carried a rifle already aimed downward.

“Found the psycho,” a voice called through the dark.

Bloodred’s stomach dropped.

Of course the night wasn’t over yet.

As the title says, looking for completed audio versions of FOE side fics (already listened to the OG and pink eyes though) thanks in advance :D

Wherein Pegascribe explores an abandoned theme park. What could possibly go wrong?