Fallout Equestria

Chapter 1.

Grey.

The walls of the maintenance stalls were all a very monotonous, dull grey. The particular wall I was staring at had the merit of being a very clean grey. PipBucks were notoriously hardy and reliable, so being the Stable's PipBuck Technician meant that there were long periods of nothing to do. Being the PipBuck Technician's apprentice meant that I was assigned all the mundane daily chores while my trainer took extended naps in the back room. Chores like cleaning the walls.

"This wall needs a mural."

I let myself fantasize, picturing the Overmare agreeing and ordering Palette herself to turn our entire stall into one of her brightly colorful masterpieces. Palette was the greatest painter in Stable Two, and like every skilled artist, that made her a stable treasure. Life in Stable Two inevitably began to eat at your spirit -- you were born in the Stable, you lived your whole life in the Stable, you were going to die there, and the course of your life was largely laid out for you to see by your Cutie Mark Party. So the Overmare insisted that a new song be added to the Stable broadcast's repertoire each week, that public areas were brightly painted and adored with uplifting and motivational murals, that regular parties were planned in the atrium... all in an effort to distract and stave off depression.

Reality came crashing back as I stared at the eternally blank grey. Beautifying maintenance areas was tragically low priority already, and the PipBuck Technician stall was one of the least trafficked parts of maintenance. I felt my ears droop as I started to realize that I'd be staring at this same grey wall nearly every day for the rest of my life.

"Oh dear. Is it really that bad."

And there she was. Velvet Remedy, the gorgeous charcoal-coated unicorn with streaks of color in her white mane and with a voice as smooth as silk and rich as finest chocolate, was standing in the doorway of my stall. I felt immediately grateful that I had finished the cleaning and simultaneously ashamed that the room was so beneath her.

I couldn't believe she was standing there. I'd seen her on the stage above us at late parties; I'd listened to her songs incessantly, recording every new one on my PipBuck so that I didn't have to wait to hear it again. I'll admit it now, I'd had a crush on Velvet Remedy for years. Me and at least three hundred other ponies. My mother used to laugh at that. "LittlePip," she would say, chortling with her friends, "Velvet Remedy's barn door doesn't swing that way." It took me a couple years to understand what my mother had meant by that. And took me several seconds to process that Velvet Remedy had just asked me something.

"W-wha-huh?"

Wonderful response, LittlePip. So elegant. I wanted to dig my way through the concrete floor and pull the chunks over the top of me.

She smiled sweetly. She smiled at me! And in that amazing voice, "You looked so heartbroken when I came in. Is there anything I can do?"

Velvet Remedy offered. To help. Me.

I was shocked back to my senses. Velvet Remedy must have some reason to be down here. Some PipBuck reason. It wasn't like she would just go wandering around maintenance, after all. Looking around, I realized that I was the only pony on duty. My teacher was, as usual, asleep in his office.

"Oh... no, it was n-nothing." I tried to regain composure. "How may I be of assistance?"

Velvet Remedy's expression was both compassionate and unconvinced, but she lifted a forehoof, raising her PipBuck up to my gaze. A more elegant model than mine, with her initials and cutie mark (a beautiful bird with wings outstretched and beak opened in song) embellishing it tastefully. "I hate to be a bother, but it's begun to chafe. Could you replace the padding?"