Derpy Deliveries - Act 2

"You get blue, like everyone,"

"But me and Mr Hooves"

"Blow away"

"There they go."

"Cheer up, Derpy"

Dinky the Fire Chief was able to survive the initial blast by being in one of the few emergency service facilities shielded by the blast. As it was on the outskirts of the city it held up slightly better than the shielded buildings closer to the blast itself, despite failing almost instantly. She managed to work her way to the bridge leading out of the city before the fire caught up to her and the truck succumbed to the heat.

The firetruck water talisman did a good job holding back the fire, yet it did nothing to stave off the radiation. In the minutes since fleeing the fire station, her mane had begun to fall out, her hooves felt itchy and burning after the short walk through the fallout, her migraine had only gotten worse, and her digestive tract had made apparent how bad her internal bleeding was.

She somehow managed to find a living pony in the smoking rubble, though they were worse off than she was. They were going to die, even if somehow something came to save them, she knew that. Faced with death, she didn't want to go alone.

"Give me a smile"

When exposed to high amounts of magical radiation, ponies and most magical creatures suffer a variety of symptoms, extreme exposure leading to a 100% fatality rate when left untreated. Thanks to modern medicine, and in response to magical residue becoming a normal part of militarized pony life, even fatal levels of radiation can be treated over the counter at local pharmacies and in supermarkets in the form of Rad-Away.

After the war, ghouls and other mutated creatures were found to benefit from the ambient radiation, ranging from increased strength to regeneration from all but death, Sometimes not even death can keep them down for long.

It is easy to see if a ghoul has been immersed in a radiation rich environment for an extended period of time, their bodies begin to glow with the same light as the balefire that keeps them alive. Ghouls like these tend to travel in groups, as they continually bleed off radiation to the weaker ghouls around them like a flame draws moths in the night. Glowing ones lose their sanity more often than not, which combined with their strength/regeneration/naturally poisonous aura makes for a bad combination. Even if they have their sanity, watch out, they might have an entourage of ghouls following behind them.

"What happened to that smile I used to know"

Balefire isn't a singular type of magical fire the Zebras used. Manehattan was unique in that 200 years later litter still blows through the streets, yet no skeletons or organic matter from that time period can be found outside buildings shielded from the initial blast. It stands to reason that fabrics woven from wool and other organic materials would have burned up in the fires, but plastics, paper, and processed materials would not, or would at least be resistant to the magical flame.

Given the number of ghouls created by balefire radiation, this may have been an intentional function of this particular bomb, so they might also have made it so the fire destroys pony constructs, to help reduce the number of hostiles. The plan may have been to use the bomb on a major city, then move in and set up a zebra stronghold from the remains. With all that the ponies were planning (and the Zebras likely drug-induced future sight) they might have moved their plans forward and hoped that these bombs would wipe the ponies out when used at once.

"Don't you know your grin has always been my sunshine"