Same Shit, Different Wasteland

Painless

Saltwater Taffy, the mare who had been in charge of Dodge’s water purifier, looked at the Courier. “I’m still not sure about this,” she said as she led them through the camp.

“Don’t worry. It won’t go wrong,” Thomas answered reassuringly.

“You do realise that now you’ve said that, it will?” she asked angrily. “Besides, who’s to say the purifier won’t just filter out what you put in?”

“We add it after the water’s been purified,” the man said like it was the most obvious thing in the world.

“I can’t remember if the purifier will allow that,” the mare argued. “If we have to dismantle the damned thing to do this, then it’s not happening. No-one here knows to how do that.”

“Really?” Thomas asked, sounding a little surprised.

“All the instructions are back in Dodge,” Taffy explained. “If I had those, and a few more Scribes, then I’d consider trying.”

Thomas nodded. “Fair enough. No point in doing this if you have to abandon the town afterwards.”

“Exactly.” The unicorn nodded. “If we’re lucky, they don’t even know about it.”

The next minute passed in silence. “Tonight,” the masked man said suddenly.

“What?”

“We do it tonight. We leave it any longer, we lose any chance we might have to get in there without attracting attention.” He turned to look at her. “I’m gonna need some Rangers as well, just in case the place is guarded.”

“Right. Umm… Do you want a sharpshooter?” she asked.

“Yeah. If we don’t take them out before they can contact their friends, then the whole thing becomes a waste of time. Still, it wouldn’t be a complete lost cause,” he mused.

“The more we kill now, the less we fight later?” Taffy questioned.

“More like another warning,” Thomas said darkly. “I’m gonna need some grenades and some sensor modules.”

“Why am I here again?” Moonbeam asked, looking between the Scribe, Thomas and the three Steel Rangers. One of the power-armoured ponies had a large anti-machine rifle rigged to her battle saddle, a large metal box at the end of the barrel indicating that it was suppressed. The other Rangers simply had a pair of miniguns.

“I trust you. And another pair of eyes is always a good thing. And why did no-one tell me you guys had an anti-materiel rifle?” Thomas asked.

“The Elder’s under a lot of stress, of course she’d forget something. Now come on,” Taffy said, nervously checking the laser pistol she’d been given. Draped over her robes was a set of saddlebags, the contents clinking as she moved. “The sooner we get this over with the sooner we can get back to bed.”

“Just tell me where to shoot,” Knight Tomato Salsa, the sniper they’d been assigned, said.

“Hopefully we won’t need to,” one of the other Rangers said. “We’re just here as a precaution.”

“Stop talking, you’ll give us away.”

“We haven’t even left yet,” Moonbeam pointed out, gesturing with her hoof to Cherry Hill Ranch, ten feet behind her.

“What did I just say?” Thomas countered. “Taffy, lead the way.”

The six-strong group crossed the desert in silence for an hour, the lights of the refugee camp disappearing into the darkness. Moonbeam was the first to break the silence. “Courier?” she whispered.

“What?” he whispered back.

“I don’t like being out here. It’s too… open.”

“It’s not that bad,” the man replied calmly.

“I grew up in Manehattan,” Moonbeam explained. “Buildings everywhere, y’know? I was taught to always look up for snipers and to watch for shadows. I can tell where a pony is just from a shout three blocks away, even after it gets echoed around like crazy, but here?” she asked. “I don’t have a clue. I’m practically useless.”

“Just stick close to me, then,” Thomas said. “I’ll keep you safe. And you’re not useless.”

“Thanks.”

“I thought you said something about no talking?” Tomato Salsa asked pointedly.

“Shut up,” Taffy replied. “We’re getting close. Salsa, get your scope out, you should be able to see it.”

“A’ight.” The scope’s mechanism whirred, positioning it over the left half of her visor. “Turn the low-light optics on and… Yep, they’re there. I can see three of them.”

“Fuck,” Taffy muttered.

Thomas put his hand into his duster and rummaged around for a moment before pulling out the scope of his sniper rifle. Flicking the switch on the side of his helmet, he put the scope to his eye, using it as a makeshift telescope. “Easy enough. Which one you gonna take out first?”

“All three,” the Ranger answered.

“Oh?”

“Just gotta wait for the right moment…”

The group waited in silence as Salsa tracked her targets. After several minutes, Moonbeam decided that she would be the first to break it. “What is she waiting for?”

PAFF! went the suppressed anti-machine rifle, the spent casing shooting out of the side. “Wow,” Thomas muttered.

“Thanks,” the markspony replied smugly.

“What just happened?” Taffy hissed.

“One bullet, three kills. I would’ve tried taking them down in three shots, hoping they wouldn’t notice until it was too late,” Thomas explained.

“Patience is a virtue. You always have to strike when you can do the most damage.” Salsa’s scope retracted back so it was no longer obscuring her view.

“Salsa, get your scope out again and keep an eye on things. Mousse, stay here and cover her. Salt, you’re with us.” As the sniper’s equipment came to life, Taffy turned to the Courier. “Now we get to find out if we can pull this off,” she said. “Oh Goddesses I hope we can,” she added under breath.

“At the very least, we’re thinning them out,” Rock Salt pointed out as he stepped forward. “That’s gotta count for something, right?”

The man nodded. “Let’s get moving, the longer we wait the more time somepony inside has to figure out that something’s wrong,” Thomas muttered, sticking the scope back into its pocket. He pulled his shotgun from its sling on his back and made sure a shell was chambered.

“I really need some armour-piercing ammo,” Moonbeam mumbled to herself.

It took another ten minutes to get to the purifier at a quick trot. It was housed in a small concrete hut about a hundred yards from the shore of a lake. The lake seemed to glow a little in the dark, a sign of its irradiated state.

“How… fucking... far... were… we?” Moonbeam panted.

“Not that far,” Salt responded.

“You’ve got… your fucking power armour,” the unicorn pointed out. “You could gallop for hours and not feel a thing.”

“Moonbeam’s… right,” Taffy panted in response. “Oh Celestia… I’m... out of shape.”

“Yeah, you are,” the scavenger said. “I’m wearing barding, ammo boxes and… and a battle saddle. At least I have an excuse.”

“Shut up… okay?” the Scribe managed to wheeze. “Courier… Salt… take point.”

“Fine. How are we gonna do this?”

“I open the door, and if anyone comes I’ll take a little off the top,” Thomas answered. “After that, you go in and clean up the rest.”

“Good thing I packed my FMJs,” Salt replied, an obvious smile in his voice. “Okay,” he whispered as they got near, “do it.”

Thomas counted down from three in his head before pushing the door open with the Assistant. When nothing else happened, he motioned for Rock Salt to go in.

The Ranger’s miniguns spun up as he charged in. “SURPRISE, MOTHERFUCKERS!” he yelled, his helmet’s speakers amplifying the volume to eardrum-bursting levels.

The two unicorns in the building were on the ground, covering their ears as they screamed in pain from the sonic assault. Rock Salt’s room-sweepers quickly put them out of their misery. “Not what I was expecting,” Thomas admitted as he looked around the stallion and saw the bloody mess he had made. “Still, not gonna argue with results like that.”

“Thanks.”

“What the fuck was that noise!?” they heard a voice say. They quickly found the source, a two-way radio in one of the corners. “Dammit, I think we just lost contact!”

“Ah shit. Salsa, Mousse, get ready, we’ve got a major problem coming our way,” he said into his helmet’s radio. “Yeah, reinforcements. No, haven’t got a number. Or an ETA. All right.”

“Taffy?” Thomas asked as he poked his out the door.

“I heard,” the Scribe said unhappily. “Fuck it. We’re here, I’ll see what I can do.” She pushed past the Courier and went to the very back of the shack, to one of two large… Thomas took a good look at it. To him, it resembled a large generator, a large half-cylinder that seemed to be built into the ground. Attached to it was a terminal, and behind that were what seemed like nozzles where someone could attach things, like bottles. They were both attached to pipes that went under the walls.

“Okay, let’s see…” Taffy muttered as she turned the terminal of the left machine on. “Good, they didn’t change the password. Need to open the secondary input valves and…” The mare swore. “Of course, the mechanism’s jammed. Why wouldn’t it be!? Rock Salt, find me a toolbox!” she yelled. “Now!”

As Salt scrambled to do as she asked, Thomas ducked back outside. “Moonbeam?” he asked.

“I think I see something coming,” the unicorn muttered uneasily.

“Here they come!” Rock Salt shouted as he charged outside. “Salsa’s gonna provide support, but we gotta take care of most of them ourselves,” he explained.

“Moonbeam, get inside,” Thomas commanded.

“What?”

He looked down at the confused unicorn. “You don’t have anything that can punch through their armour. We do,” he explained. “If Taffy asks for help, give it to her, all right?”

“R-right.” Moonbeam rushed as fast as she could to the shack.

“You think that’s gonna do any good?” the Ranger asked.

“One less thing to worry about,” the man replied. “We need to get some cover.”

“Salsa’s opened fire,” Salt said. “Taken out five already.”

“How many are there?”

“Salsa, how many?” the stallion asked into his radio. “Shit. At least twenty left.” He paused for a moment. “Now it’s less than twenty,” he corrected himself.

“And how far away are they?”

“Salsa, give us an ETA,” he said into his radio. “Three minutes.”

“Then we might not need to worry about them,” the man said hopefully.

“Half the group just peeled off, heading for her,” Salt said, shattering the man’s optimistic thoughts. “We’re on our own now.”

Thomas put the Assistant’s stock against his shoulder. “That helmet’s got a light attached to it, right?”

“Yeah, why?”

“When they get close enough, turn it on,” he suggested. “You might blind a few.”

“And make myself a nice big target,” the stallion muttered unhappily.

“I dunno about you, but I’d say that green fire is gonna be a bit more tempting to shoot at,” the man argued.

“All right, I’ll do it,” Salt replied, sounding reluctant about the prospect of making himself a target.

“Your armour can take a few hits, right?”

“Yeah, but I’d rather not have to explain to the Scribes that they need to feed what little scrap we have into this to repair it,” the Ranger countered angrily.

Moonbeam closed the door to the shack behind her, muffling the argument going on outside. “What are you doing here?” Taffy asked.

“Staying safe. Protecting you. Or something,” she added. “Need help?” she asked, not liking feeling useless.

“Pass me that wrench,” the Scribe said as she wrestled with the purifier, pointing aimlessly with a hoof at the toolbox. “If I can just loosen this fucking thing then… I should be able to…” Gunfire and screaming drowned out the rest of what she was going to say.

“Oh shit, it’s the Courier!” they heard one of the unicorns shout. “What’s he doing here!?”

“MY DICK! HE KICKED ME IN THE DICK!”

“I don’t wanna know,” Moonbeam muttered as she tried to find the wrench.

“Thanks,” Taffy said as she snatched the tool out of the other mare’s magic. “Come on, come on,” she muttered.

“WHY WOULD YOU SHOOT HER THERE?!”

“Yes!” Taffy shouted triumphantly as she jumped down off the purifier. “Okay, opening secondary input valves… Moonbeam! My saddlebags!”

“CRY SOME MORE!” roared Rock Salt, having turned on his helmet’s loudspeaker again.

Moonbeam looked around for a moment before finding them, lying discarded under a bench. She pulled out the contents and looked at them briefly. “Isn’t this overkill?”

“Better safe than sorry,” the Scribe said. She unscrewed one of the large bottles, each one roughly the size of an anti-vehicle rocket and slotted it into one of the valves. “One down…”

“MY OVARIES!” they heard a stallion scream.

“WHAT DO YOU HAVE AGAINST OUR-”

BOOM

“Done!” Taffy hammered away on the terminal’s keyboard. “Okay, now we just need to let the machine do its job.”

“And how long will that take?”

“I hope you guys are done,” Thomas said as he opened the door before limping through it, “because we are.” The fighting had done a lot of damage to his duster, the lasers leaving great big holes in it. Everything below the waist had been disintegrated, leaving a disgusting smell that made Moonbeam gag. His body armour had suffered as well, now covered in ugly welts.

“Whether we’re done or not won’t mean anything if this doesn’t actually work,” Taffy pointed out. “We just used up some really important medical supplies for this scheme of yours.”

“Three huge bottles of Med-X just feels like overkill to me,” Moonbeam muttered.

“Better safe than sorry. Besides, won’t it be easier to just walk into town and haul away the dead instead of fighting?” Thomas asked.

“On paper, maybe. A Med-X overdose doesn’t seem like much fun to clean up,” the scavenger mare replied.

“Taffy!” Rock Salt shouted as he barreled his way into the purifier shack, some of his armour plating melted in places. “We need to get back to the Ranch, now!”

“What? Why?” the Scribe asked.

“It’s under attack!”

“What!?” Moonbeam looked at the Ranger in shock. “Who?”

“Who do you think?” Thomas asked. “How bad is it?”

“I-I dunno. I’m not getting anything from the Ranch. Salsa saw the lasers and explosions,” Salt explained nervously. “Shit shit shit! We need to get back!”

“Calm down!” Taffy yelled, not sounding very calm herself. “Calm down!” It wasn’t clear if she was telling that to the Ranger or herself.

“Rock Salt, tell Salsa and the other guy to move,” Thomas ordered, taking charge of the situation. “Have them attack the unicorns from behind.”

“R-right.” Salt quickly repeated the instructions to his radio.

“We need to move,” Taffy suggested, pointing out the obvious..

Elder Cherry Blossom let out a frustrated scream as he battle saddle unleashed another barrage of missiles. “These are my ponies! I will not let you fuckers take any more from me!”

All around her were the screams of falling unicorns and Rangers, explosions and zaps and gunfire as weapons fired into the night. To her left were Paladins Jacket Potato and Baked Potato, each one letting loose into the attackers.

“We got the civvies and Scribes to safety!” the Elder heard somepony say in her earpiece. “They’re holed up in one of the old warehouses!”

“Stay there and keep them safe!” she ordered.

The Rangers were doing an admirable job for having been caught on the back hoof again. Unfortunately, the attackers had numerical superiority, and the Rangers were getting beaten back.

“Elder, Knight Danger Close is asking for authorisation to use the B.E.L!” she heard.

She paused for a moment as her saddle reloaded. If something wasn’t done quickly then the unicorns would win. Of course, there was something she actually wanted to know. “And where the fuck did he get his hooves on a balefire egg!?”

“He said he had it hidden!”

“Where!?”

“Uhh… you do not wanna know,” came the uneasy reply.

It took all of her willpower to not facehoof. “Just… Let him do it. Rangers!” she yelled out. “Fall back! Get to cover!”

As the Rangers did that, she saw the unicorns look behind to their comrades and motion them forward. “We have the upper hoof!” she heard.

“No you don’t,” she muttered as she ran past Danger Close.

His modified B.E.L sat on his back, the rail resting against the back of his head. Four stakes, one on each side of his body, were planted in the ground as the weapon loaded itself. “Hey, assholes! Sweetie has a gift for you!” he bellowed through his loudspeaker. The unnaturally black egg flew up the rail and into the air, the B.E.L letting out a strange, haunting wail.

The lasers stopped for a moment as every unicorn stopped to watch the egg. It seemed to pull in light, making it a patch of pure darkness in the already dark sky. Most of them had no idea what they were seeing, but those few that did immediately tried to run. It was futile.

“Yeah!” Danger Close shouted triumphantly over the deafening explosion. “How do you unicorn fucks like balefire!?” he asked the rising mushroom cloud that swept over where the unicorns had stood. Those who had been unfortunate to be right to next to the egg when it had detonated had vanished, not even so much as ashes remaining. Those who had survived but had been close to the epicentre had been reduced to charred flesh and warped metal, their faces twisted into displays on pure agony. Those who had been further away had been burnt and flung through the air, sending some hundreds of feet away.

The other Rangers stared at the scene with a mix of awe and horror. “Holy shit…” They weren’t the only ones.

“Y-you…” one of the survivors managed to get out as she shakily got to her hooves. “You monsters!” Her battle saddle made a few pathetic whining noises as it failed to fire. “Fucking - ” The mare’s back half suddenly vanished in a cloud of metal and gore, silencing her.

“What in Celestia’s name did we miss?” the Rangers heard Tomato Salsa ask over their radio channel.

“Ma’am, did we just see a balefire explosion?” Mousse asked, disbelief clear in his voice.

“Yes you did, Knight. Things were bad, we had to end the fight decisively and quickly,” the Elder explained. “I just hope it was worth it.”

“Is that all of them?” she heard one of her Rangers ask. “Are they all dead?”

“I see movement, looks like he’s trying to get back onto his hooves,” Salsa said. “I’m not sure how he plans on doing that with three broken legs,” she added.

“Round up the survivors,” Cherry Blossom ordered. “Hopefully we can get some information out of them.”

Thomas, Moonbeam, Rock Salt and Saltwater Taffy just stared in slackjawed shock. “What the fuck just happened?”

Author's Note

This chapter brought to you by Things That Should Put Me On A Government Watchlist!