Chapters He came into the bar slowly, like he was nervous. The pony wasn’t any kind of formidable figure by any means, so perhaps he could have had reason to be afraid. But this was a friendly bar. The barkeep, Oats, ran a clean establishment. Patrons could run short tabs, but were cut off at a reasonable point. No drink was watered down, and the food was always hot. Everyone was welcome, young and old, and it created a friendly establishment. Families came and had dinner next to aged travelers, drinking and singing songs they had learned in their lives. Even with whispers of war lurking in the shadows, this one establishment maintained a positive, happy feel, and was renowned for its pumpkin ale. If ever there was a drink to take the edge off, it was Oats’ fresh brewed ale.
As mentioned, the stranger had no kind of real presence. He was not tall or particularly strong looking. He wore a slightly fading dark blue hooded cloak that concealed his face, but what was visible of his coat was a dirty mixture of brown and grey. The colors were not patched, but all mixed together like he was beginning to age and his whole coat was aging evenly. His tail was a long, flowing golden blonde, well-kept despite his humble looks. The far end of his cape covered his cutie mark no matter which way he turned in the crowd, as though its sole purpose was to conceal his flank. He wore a faded blue shirt that covered both his front legs, revealing nothing but his hooves. The only real thing that made him noticeable in the crowd was the click when he set his left front hoof down. It wasn’t the same sound as a shod hoof, nor would that have been normal given that no other hoof made the same noise as it touched the ground. After all, what sane pony would have only one shod hoof? Several ponies around the room looked at the hoof, but none could catch a glimpse past his shirt cuffs. He clicked his way over to an empty barstool and sat heavily, his frame sounding heavier than it looked in the well-worn seat. “One of your finest,” he muttered, throwing the correct change on the counter. His voice was low, but not gravelly, and sounded smooth and even. There was something in his dialect that set his voice apart from all the others floating about, but Oats couldn’t place it as he swept the change into a pocket on his apron, not bothering to check the amount. He spun lightly on one hoof to fetch the drink from the massive casket behind him. The chubby barkeep seemed far too agile for his build and age, but nopony could ever come up with a sound reason why. After filling the mug he spun back around, smiling broadly. His face was clearly accustomed to smiling and laughing, and he continued to do just that as he greeted his newest customer.
“One of the finest, as ordered!” he boomed. His voice was a powerful one, and could easily be heard across the crowded bar if he had the notion for it to be. “Can I fix or fetch you anything else this fine night? Our waitress has shared with me her recipe for a world class cold tomato and melon soup. Perfect for a warm night like this,” he advised as the stranger drank.
When he was done the nameless stallion set the mug down with a thud. His mouth, the only part of his face visible beneath his hood, screwed itself up in a grimace of pain as his right hoof moved to his shoulder. “Another,” he grunted, clearly in some distress. He moved to pull another drinks worth from a small pouch around his neck, but Oats boldly placed a hoof over his.
“You won’t need to pay for that,” he said kindly. “You’re obviously in a fair amount of pain to be favoring a shoulder like that. This’un is on me.”
The mouths expression changed from anguish to displeasure. “I won’t take any charity, especially not from strangers,” he stated, moving for the pouch again.
“”I’m Oat Alewood,” the big man stated proudly. He shook his shabby red mane out like it was supposed to be impressive. “I’m the owner of this bar. I’m not a stranger to you anymore, am I?”
The stranger sighed, but put his hoof back down on the bar. He turned in his seat and looked across the dim room. On the other side of the room, a pretty young mare slipped through the crowd, serving drinks and laughing. Occasionally she would stop for only a second to swat a groping, drunken hoof away from her flank, where a smiling set of cups rested. Even as she dodged drunken ponies she handed pieces of candy to foals from her apron pockets. She really seemed to enjoy her job. The stranger sighed and turned back away from the crowd of happy ponies, focusing on the happy barkeep instead. He knew he wouldn’t dissuade this pony from buying him a drink, and he was running a little low on funds anyways, with all the repairs he needed to make. “I suppose not. But only one.”
Oats beamed again, apparently proud of himself for giving away a drink. “One it is!” After serving him again, he restated his question again and proposed another at the same time. “Well now, here I’ve bought you a drink and I don’t know your name! I’d greatly like to know it, and I’d like to know if I can get you anything else?”
The stranger almost laughed at the atrocity of his grammar, but let it go. “I need nothing else. And I have no name.”
Oats lifted his eyebrows, surprised by the answer. “Well, come now, everypony has a name!”
“You are correct, I suppose. I do have a name. But not one I wish to share with anypony.” His mug fell with a thud, just as it had the first time. “I thank you for the drink, but I must be on my way. I simply came in for some refreshment before carrying on with my travels.”
“Where are you travelling to?” Oats was beginning to get a little curious about this pony, and he was a pony who did what he wanted. Right now what he wanted was to find out more about this pony, and he could only do that if he stayed in the bar.
“I’m travelling to someplace… further away than here from home.” He got up and sighed, visibly keeping himself from grabbing his shoulder again. “Hrrk… Uhh… Well, I suppose… you could point me to the nearest mechanic?”
Oats was startled again. Very few ponies ever needed a mechanic, especially due to the discrimination about them. Not mechanics, but the ponies that needed them. Oats didn’t put much stock in those ideas, but he was aware of them. “Well, son, the nearest mechanic is actually a little ways down the road. Take a left out the door, then one block down. Place always look like it’s on fire. Course, it is also the forge. Smithy sort of took it up when we first needed one. I don’t know how much he can help you or how much help you need, but he’s there.”
The stranger almost smiled at the news, but didn’t. Instead he reached back to his coin pouch and pulled two bits out. Throwing them onto the counter, he nodded in recognition of Oats. “Thank you. You run a fine establishment.”
He turned to leave, but was stopped halfway to the door. He was stopped by a much larger pony, very drunk and apparently angry about something or other. “Hey!” the drunken pony slurred. “You ran inta me!”
The stranger moved out of the way and continued, simply saying, “I did not. Watch where you step.”
He tried to move out of the way and continue out the door, but his comment further angered the drunken stallion. “I didn’t duh shit to yuh! Youse watch whur youse is going!”
The stallion reared up, preparing to deal a devastating kick to the stranger, but toppled over onto the waitress behind him. Just before he landed, the stranger recognized her as the waitress he had noticed before. They both fell, she with a scream and he with a sickening crunch as his body broke a table and what could only be assumed to be bones underneath it. The drunken fool didn’t move after he fell, save for the struggling mare beneath him. “Oh, Celestia, help me!” she sobbed. Several ponies moved to pull the unconscious form off of her, all the ponies in the bar glaring at the stranger accusingly. But when they saw the waitress’ broken leg, every eye turned to her.
She had been wearing a blouse that covered both of her front legs, but when the large stallion had fell on her, her right front leg had been broken. That wasn’t surprising though. What surprised most ponies was the leg itself. Where she should have had flesh, blood, and hair, she had a dingy piece of metal. Dingy wasn’t the right word for the mechanical limb, though. It was dirty, poorly kept, and now it was covered in blood. The workmanship was fine, the piece looked to be about the size and weight of a real leg. It had been attached to her at a few inches below the shoulder, the connecting piece being a heavy looking metal cuff. The hoof had been padded so that it looked and sounded like a normal one. It looked like the leg was a fine piece of machinery when it was working good and proper, but now it lay on the ground, useless.
She screamed again, bringing everypony’s attention back to the fact that she was still injured. The stranger pushed through the crowd, ignoring the glares and the few elbows that were thrown at him. He quickly knelt beside her, looking the wound over with a professional eye. “That’s a doozy of a separation,” he muttered to himself. “Though not much of a job on the upkeep, design, wiring… Hell, it needs a complete overhaul.”
“What are you talking about?!” she sobbed. “Smithy made this for me! He’s the best in the city!”
He shook his head and clicked his tongue. “Well, he was until I walked in. Look here, he doesn’t even have a fail-safe power cutoff next to these nerves… What the hell did he do to-? Oh, I see. That needs to be fixed too. Well, there goes my budget.” She started to say something else, but he cut her off. “Never mind. Point is, you’re very lucky I’m here. This was about to fail on you anyways. I’m going to pick you up now, then we’ll go over to Smithy. Ok?” Without giving her a chance to refuse or even respond, he shoved his head underneath her and flipped her bodily onto his back. Somehow, the hood covering his head stayed in place, keeping his face shrouded in shadow and mystery. “Out of the way, injured mare coming through,” he grunted to the ponies in his way.
He was stopped at the door by Oats, who now wore a very serious and concerned expression. “Now look, son,” he started. “I don’t know who you are, but you don’t come into my bar, damage my property, and then leave with one of my waitresses on your back all busted up. I figure you have some explaining and some paying to do.”
The stranger tried to push past the barkeep, but couldn’t get past the girth of the older pony. Sighing, he adjusted the weeping mare on his back and looked at Oats. “The pony you should be taking pay from is the one lying in the remains of your table. He ran into me, became angry, and then tried to attack me. In his state, he reeled back into this poor mare. Now I intend to take her to the smiths shop and repair her damaged ambi-tech. And I suggest you get out of my way so that I can, indeed, help her.” As he finished talking he lifted his head suddenly, and a glint shone from inside his cloak.
Oats took a nervous step back as he saw the glint in the stranger’s eye. He suddenly believed the story he had been told, but also knew that this was not a pony to be reckoned with. He stammered something of an apology before backing away from the door, stepping out into the night. He looked at the pony as he moved past him and whispered some comfort to his waitress as she bounced past. A few ponies followed them a few steps out the door, but no further. One pony, one of the regulars, walked up to Oats, looking nervously after the figure like the others. “You believed that?” he asked.
Oats frowned, not sure why himself. “There was something in his eyes. They glinted, even under the hood. That pony is dangerous. He just needs to fix her up, then he’ll go. Just so long as he leaves…”
Just as Oats had said, it wasn’t far to the broken down old shop. The shop didn’t quite look like it was on fire, but he supposed it was close enough. The orange glow of the forge was comforting to him, reminded him of home. His own workshop. The young woman on his back squirmed a bit and splattered a little more blood on him, also reminding him of days past. He looked back and saw that the mechanical limb was about to fall off and into the dirty street, which wouldn’t do it any good. He trotted just a little faster to try and beat the inevitable drop. He only just made it.
Clang! He winced at the sound of the metal hitting the ground. It wasn’t the fact that it had fallen that really bothered him, it was the fact that it sounded so hollow. A good piece of ambi-tech should have more workings than a wagon axle, not less. He didn’t bother calling out to ask if anyone was in, the sound of the hammer against the metal told him the smith was working late into the night. Looking around the shop, the hooded pony could see that despite the shoddy, flaming look on the outside, the smith was doing very well for himself. Many high quality items hung around the main room, ranging from lances and shields to forelegs and flanks. Well, from the uneducated perspective, the forelegs and flanks looked to be of high quality. The stranger scoffed looking at them, seeing only a sad bastardization of the art that was required for ambi-tech.
The room was filled with smoke and felt as though it was over a hundred degrees. The stranger, looking at the filthy state of the tables in the room, decided not to put the injured girl down in a pile of soot. When the smith came out, alerted by the sound of the leg falling to the ground and the sound of the girl crying, he rushed to a door at the side of the shop and ushered the pair through.
“Quickly,” he rumbled. His voice was hoarse from all his time working in soot and ash. “Bring her in here before she gets covered in dirt.”
The stranger slipped by him, noticing a long streak of black appear on his cloak as he brushed against the large pony. The black coloration rubbed off on him, but did not come off of the smith. Either his coat was black as well, or the ash and soot were so ingrained in his coat that he was permanently dyed the color. The room they had been led to, on the other hand, was remarkably clean. The walls and floor were both made of a polished and cleaned stone, and the ceiling was made from a treated wood of some kind. He didn’t know what kind, he was never good with wood. In the center of the room was a table, and under the table was a large drain covered by a fine grate, made to let only small things through, like bits of dirt and dust, and keep larger items from washing away, like scalpels and metal plates. He put the still crying waitress down on the table, trying to be gentle but involuntarily wincing as she unceremoniously hit the table with another clang .
“Do you have any half decent tools in this… I hesitate to use the word workshop.” He grumbled, looking around the stone room. At least it was clean…
The big smith snorted indignantly. “Why, I’ll have you know that this is the finest forge and ambi-tech workshop in the whole of Equestria! It’s-”
“It’s a piece of crap,” the stranger interrupted rudely. “The worst place for the creation and application of ambi-tech is a forge! The steel used is thin enough to be worked without such extreme heat, but durable enough to survive being landed on by even the largest of ponies! This,” he added, gesturing abruptly at the mangled leg beside him. “This isn’t strong enough to last her jumping off of a tall table! Now go clean yourself up! On the off-chance that I need help, you’re going to have to do, and you are not touching any blessed tech covered in that amount of dirt and filth!”
The pretty waitress couldn’t help but stifle a giggle as she watched the smaller pony chew out the large smith pony. It was comical, the little figure in the hood taking the giant over the proverbial knee. The smith slunk away like a scolded child, washing up before dinner after his mother found him playing in the mud. At the sound of her laughter, the stranger turned and faced her, and suddenly she was reminded why she was afraid of him. The same glint that had startled Oats pierced her and seemed to gaze into her heart. A shiver not entirely unpleasant ran through her body, a shiver of fear unknown.
She bit her lip to keep from crying again and forced herself to smile. “Little harsh on him, weren’t ya?” She batted her eyelids at him, hoping it would take a little of his edge off.
He didn’t flinch as she fluttered her eyes. He didn’t even react. “He deserved it. His manner of attaching ambi-tech is a danger to the patients he draws in here. Ambi-tech should be made carefully, with love and compassion. A true Tech-Worker sees and empathizes with the pain their patients are in, and craft every piece specifically for its owner. If it were ever attached to a pony it wasn’t intended for, it wouldn’t feel right.”
She lifted an eyebrow almost seductively. The bleeding stump of a leg ruined some of the appeal. “Ooh. Tough guy has a soft spot. That’s good, though. Sensitive guys are hot.”
He scoffed, uninterested in her advances. He did, however, begin to actually look at her. Before this moment, he just saw a patient. Finally he started looking at a mare. She was admittedly pretty. Prettier than he would have guess some waitress would be. She had a long, flowing, yellow mane, and her coat was a near exact match, perhaps a little bit darker. It wasn’t common for the coat, mane, and tail all to match so closely in color, but she pulled it off nicely. Her eyes, when she wasn’t batting her long lashes at him, were a striking shade of green. It made the strange stallion remember the Great Sea. He had only been there once, a long time ago… With her…
He shook his head at the sudden memories that flooded his mind. He couldn’t go thinking about her right now. He had to pay attention to this mare, the one bleeding in front of him. But now that he remembered, they both had the same color scheme, too. How could he have missed that?! He wanted to kick himself, but he would probably topple over. His balance wasn’t all it could be. And after this, he wouldn’t be able to afford anything. Maybe she would be able to pay for something too.
He was interrupted in his thoughts, confused as they were, but the sound of the smith entering the room again. He was a little wet from washing up, but the ash had seemed to have been washed from his coat. He was frowning a little bit, but didn’t say anything to the stranger that could be considered risky. He was very respectful in his tone when he addressed the still cloaked pony in front of him. “You going to do this with that hood still on?”
The stranger sighed. He often forgot that he was wearing the hood. His eyes were used to the eternal shadow they peered from. “Yeah. I’m going to wear the hood.”
The smith grunted like he disapproved, but he was scared enough to keep quiet. He did, however, make the mistake of trying to help. “Here,” he grumbled. “Let me at least give you a little bit of light.” He pushed a part of the wall and it opened up, revealing the fires of the forge. The flames lit the room splendidly, though there was no grate to cover the flames.
“Close that back up, you idiot!” the stranger bellowed. “Do you realize how much ash and soot you’re letting in here?! Do you want to get her leg infected?!”
The poor waitress began to whimper again, just a little. “I’d really like to keep my leg…”
Grumbling, the smith closed the panel back up. “Sorry. Didn’t mean to be a bother. I was just trying to help.”
The stranger let out a long, shuddering sigh. “I apologize. But I know what it takes to make true ambi-tech. Please fetch for me the foreleg hanging on your wall, third on the right as you enter through the front door.”
“That limb is for the left foreleg.”
“Do you want to help or not?!”
The smith shot out the door like his tail had been set on fire. The pretty waitress giggled again. “You know, as flattering as it is having you so worked up over little old me, I think it might help to be a little nicer to him.”
He grunted and brushed at a blood stain on his shirt. “I’m here to do a job, not be nice. Thinking of which, are you planning on paying for… anything? I can’t afford a bunch of repair costs.”
“She has all of her repair costs covered.” The smith reappeared in the doorway, holding the metal leg. “If you need anything, you will need to pay. She is an old friend. You are not.”
The coin pouch nearly hit the smith in the face as it flew from the stranger’s hoof, despite the smiths assertions.. The smith grumbled something, undoubtedly impolite, but the stranger moved swiftly and plucked the heavy metal limb out of the smiths grasp. “Come on, we need to fix her up before she loses any more blood.”
“Yeah, that may be a good thing, dearies. I’m getting a teeny bit light headed…”
“Hand me the half inch.”
“The which one?”
The stranger sighed. “The little shiny wrench. No, the next one over. Give it to me.” The smith did so, and the stranger tightened the last bolt. Wiping a hidden bead of sweat from his brow with his right hoof, he snorted to try and get something caught in his nose out. He didn’t really think the smith washed up very well. “Ok, that’s the last piece. The connections are all laid out, the cuff is back in place, the blood is mostly wiped up… we’re ready to make the connections again and lock it in place.”
“I still don’t understand why you took the left leg from the shop and turned it into a right.”
“Because it was the one that was worthy of her. Well, most worthy. I fixed it for her leg. It wasn’t quite right. Once it gets attached, I’ll do some final tinkering.”
“Um, can I please be unconscious for the connecting of the nerves?” The waitress craned her head to try and look at her stump, but her head was pushed back down by the stranger.
“No. the connection of the nerves is the part you most need to be awake for. The nerves are more active when you are awake, and for the best connection to be made you need the nerves active. Now, I’m going to do it on the count of five.”
“Why five? Why not three?”
“Five gives you two more seconds to prepare. Now, when I say one, I want you to take a deep breath in. On two, a deep breath out. Keep going like that. OK?” She nodded. “All right. One.” She took a breath in. “Two.” As she breathed out, the stranger gave the leg a crank, locking it into place. A spark of electricity lit the room as the waitress screamed in agony.
“AAAAAHHHHH!!!” The stranger didn’t even flinch as her screams echoed in the small room.
“Yes, yes, I know it hurts. I know exactly what it’s like.”
“How do you know what this is like?!” she screamed, crying more now than she had when her leg had been broken just earlier.
“I’ve performed this… operation before. Many times.”
“That doesn’t mean you know what it feels like!!”
“Yes I do. I know more pain than you could ever know. Just keep breathing. In, and out. In, and out.” He kept guiding her breathing until the hershness of the pain began to subside and she stopped screaming, instead lying still and panting. He turned to the smith and nodded towards the door, indicating they should go. “She needs to rest here. Let’s give her a few minutes.”
The big pony nodded and followed him quietly, but as soon as they were outside the room he turned and confronted the strange, cloaked pony in front of him. “Why did you leave her awake? She shouldn’t have to go through that.”
“If she really wants high quality ambi-tech, then she does. This machinery does not connect to just the body, but to the mind, heart, and soul. It needs to become a part of its owner so that it isn’t just a piece of machinery, but a true part of the pony. I don’t expect you to understand that. I don’t fully know what it means either.”
The smith frowned. “If you don’t know, then how do you… know?”
Through the veil of the cowl, the smith saw a faint smile. “Huh,” he chuckled. “My daughter, she… Well, you wouldn’t understand.”
The smiths frown deepened, but softened at the same time. “I have a daughter too, you know. Prettiest little thing I could ever hope to see.”
The strange pony smiled a little more, his strangeness only growing. “Well, you never met my little Gasket…”
The frown disappeared from the smiths face, turning into a compassionate half-smile. “Well, I’m sure she’s a wonderful pony.”
The stranger turned away, bowing is head. “Yes. She was.” As he put his left front hoof down, he cried out in pain and grabbed his shoulder. He nearly doubled over onto the floor, but was caught by the strong hooves of the smith.
“Woah, now. Easy. What’s the matter with your shoulder, anyways? You had to stop to work a few kinks out of it while we were in there.”
“I- Arg! Goddesses damn it all!” he groaned again, falling out of Smithy’s hooves. “It’s a wire and a couple of bolts, nothing serious.”
Undoing and removing the stained blue shirt, Smithy took a look at the stranger’s leg. He gasped as he saw the real extent of the ambi-tech the pony had kept hidden. “ W-well, where is the problem here? Half your chest is made of tech!”
Indeed, much of the strange pony’s chest was made of metal. The plating extended over the left half of the pony’s ribcage, extending no further than the bottom rib. It moved up and encased, or rather made up his body all the way up to his spine. It was the most advanced ambi-tech the smith had ever seen. He doubted he would ever see anything quite like it again. As he looked over it, he couldn’t see anything missing or out of place. Other than the fact that the tech covered so much flesh, the oddest thing was that most of the bolts and screws had been covered over by the plating. The plating covered everything so well that it was difficult to tell how it had been attached. It was artfully decorated with little carvings and engravings, done with a careful hoof. Smithy ran his hoof over the carvings, admiring them. One depicted a little house, with two ponies standing in front of it. A third was up in the sky, standing on a cloud. It struck the smith as strange because the pony on the cloud had no wings, and last he knew only pegasus ponies were able to stand on clouds.
“My, my,” Smithy whispered. “What are these carvings?” The stranger pushed a few different places on the plating and it came off. The smith guessed that it could only have been a special kind of pressure sensitive locks. He slid it down his leg, removing it in one piece. There were a few small hinges and joints for flexibility, but it was a nearly solid piece of metal. Marveling at the technological wonder, Smithy gingerly took the piece from the stranger, but soon noticed that several of the ribs of this pony were made of metal too. “Great Celestia,” he whispered. “How deep does your tech go?”
The quarter mechanical pony smiled and laughed, not loud but louder than he had laughed all night. “Ha! No farther than that. Those few rib replacements are as deep as any ambi-tech has ever gone. And the carvings are from my daughter. I never thought they were necessary, but she said that every little detail, every little piece of a pony is unique and special and important. If we’re trying to recreate a pony’s parts, why shouldn’t the parts we make be unique and special and important too?”
Smithy smiled sadly, looking at the workings in the pony’s chest. It didn’t seem possible that he had that much tech in his body, but there it was. A leg, a pec, a third of his ribs, and all of that covered by mechanical workings, wires, gears, and a few things that the simple forge worker couldn’t identify. He had been under the impression that ambi-tech had been a fairly new invention, only around for a few years, but this was something he barely believed was possible.
“So… what do you need me to do?” he asked, not sure that he could even offer anything.
“I want you to take me back inside where it is clean, help her off of the table. Then help me on the table. The spasms have been coming more frequently as of late. And more painful. I need three bolts, half inch, and four other bolts, three eights. A roll of the smallest wire you have, and, despite what I said earlier, I need you to make me a piece in the forge.”
…
Five minutes later he was lying on his right side, looking at the fully unconscious waitress. Ten minutes later he was working on his leg and chest while avoiding questions being asked by the fully conscious waitress and listening to the hammer blows coming from the forge next door.
“So, why didn’t you let me have at least some sort of painkiller?”
“It would have resulted in an inferior connection between your nerves and your wiring. Let me work.”
“How did you get so much high quality ambi-tech? Especially if you’re so poor.”
“It’s none of your business.”
“Well, why are you so poor at least?”
“Because I’m out of money.”
“Why?”
“Because talkative waitresses keep preying on my kindness and spending all my money on repairs.”
“Fine, if you want me to stop talking, just ask nicely.”
“Please stop talking and let me work.”
“You can talk and work at the same time. What’s that wire?”
He sighed. “It’s for sensory perception. I mean it. This is more delicate work than your leg was. I need quiet to focus.” He tried to focus on the sounds of the hammer instead of her voice, but she was always talking. It was difficult. He was, however, able to marvel at the fact that the room didn’t heat up, despite the sweltering heat next door.
“So, I thought that ambi-tech wasn’t advanced enough to connect to feelers? That the pony who invented it didn’t decide to give feeling back to the limbs.”
“He gave plenty! And he didn’t know how to make the metal feel!” he snapped. He sighed, trying to calm down. He really needed some peace and quiet.
The waitress looked at him curiously. “You sure are temperamental about your ambi-tech, aren’t you? Can’t you just get it fixed up anytime?”
He glared at her through his hood, which he still had on. “Ambi-tech needs to be taken care of, maintained. It isn’t just a machine strapped onto a pony, it is a part of you.”
She rolled her eyes and scoffed at him. “No, it is just a machine. It’s a bunch of wires hooked to nerves and a bunch of metal hooked to muscles and bone. Nothing more. I don’t know who filled your head with the idea that this stuff about ambi-tech being a living thing, but whoever it was pulling you along to make you buy the highest quality. If it even is high quality. There’s so much junk in there that I can’t tell what’s what. Though admittedly I don’t know everything that’s in this stuff.”
She could have sworn she heard the strange pony growl as she inadvertently insulted his tech. “I don’t know who you are, and I really couldn’t care. You are a stranger to me, and I’ve helped you out of compassion. But do not insult my ambi-tech or my mechanic. I had the best damn mechanic there ever was and ever will be. I am not done working on that leg, and if you say anything more about my mechanic that is unsavory, you will find that it breaks down very quickly.” He turned back to his tinkering, moving hair away from one of the bolts holding the limb to his body.
She shivered at his threat, and didn’t doubt for a second that he would follow through on it. She thought it strange that he was so attached to his mechanic or his mechanical limb. Usually ponies would love nothing better than to have their original limbs back, but this pony took better care of his ambi-tech than his real body. She looked over his body, trying to understand him. She fancied herself quite a good reader of ponies, especially after working at a bar for years. The hair immediately around his plating was gone, about an inch all the way around. The hair that was there was damaged somehow, like he had suffered some terrible injuries. His tech ran deep, as the smith had seen, but she also noticed that it was difficult in some places to tell how far it went. She had to admit, his tech was the most advanced thing she had ever seen. Long sections of metallic, artificial muscle ran through his chest, connecting to the real muscle where it did when it was still flesh. Exposed nerves could be seen running through everything, and she actually believed that whoever had worked on this pony had tried to complete his nervous system in its entirety. She squinted, trying to look past his metal muscles, but they flexed and shifted every time he moved, and though they weren’t as complete as the nerves they covered most everything underneath them up. It didn’t matter anyways, though. She could see that several of his ribs were tech as well, though they were a made of much tougher stuff.
“Do they move?” she asked, a little worried that she would upset him again. “Your metal ribs, I mean.”
He looked up, though she couldn’t see his eyes. The hood didn’t move, just his muzzle. It moved upwards in its place, just a little. He must have been keeping one eye on his work. “No,” he stated bluntly. “My ribs don’t move.”
“Why not?”
He groaned. “Because the ribs protect the heart, lungs, esophageal passageway, and other things. Please, keep your questions, if you must ask them, intelligent.”
She pouted, hurt. “Hey! Just because I don’t know all about pony anatomy doesn’t mean I’m not intelligent!”
He muttered something unpleasant. She could almost feel the air grow heavier with the weight of his curses. “I meant about ambi-tech. if you need to ask about my leg, make them real questions.”
“How does the metal feel? Is that a better question?”
“Do I have to answer it?”
“Yes.” She moved to cross her hooves, but winced as she moved her tech limb. “Ow! Damn.”
He hopped off the table, keeping his injured leg of the ground. He made his way over to her, biting his lip the whole time to keep from making any noise as the exposed nerves and muscles moved in their places, loosened by his unfinished work. “Let me see it,” he said. His voice was uncharacteristically gentle suddenly. “Don’t move it too much. Like I said, I’m not done tinkering with it.”
She cringed again as the stranger touched her false hoof, moving it only slightly. “Ah! Hey, that hurts! Didn’t you do a good job?”
He chuckled, just once. “Huh. I did a wonderful job. This is the best ambi-tech in this entire city. Canterlot has never seen tech like this. Save for mine. It’s going to take some getting used to, I made… Well, quite a few changes.”
She lifted her eyebrows. “Changes? Like what?”
“Nothing you’ll even notice, ultimately. Performance upgrades. Hold still.”
She held still, but seriously considered jiggling the leg just to get his goat. But as the thought passed through her head, a large electrical spark, similar to the one she had seen when the leg had been connected, flashed and tried to light up the stranger’s cowl. Failing to make even the slightest dent in the darkness, it fell back down and landed on the stranger’s hoof. Not flinching, he let the spark hit him and kept working. A little scorch mark appeared on his hoof, marring the dry surface.
“Didn’t you feel that?” she asked, looking worriedly at the mark. “I mean, I know that didn’t just affect your hoof. I may be stupid, but I’m not…”
“Stupid?” the stranger finished her sentence, smirking. “Yes, I felt it, but I’ve been burned far, far worse.”
She licked her hoof and rubbed at the mark, trying to wash away the burned surface. “Come on, now. Don’t act tough. A little pain can be good for the body, but you need to take care of it.”
He didn’t know what happened, but the next thing he knew he was lying on the floor, shivering.
“Daddy! Lookit me!”
Grease Hoof laughed as he watched the little filly hang upside-down from the tree in their yard. She was the most beautiful filly he had ever seen. She was still young, only six years old. She was blue, just like her mother, with a shining gold blonde tail and mane. Just like her father. She had a bad leg, her left front. The leg was just a little bit under formed, so she didn’t run well and couldn’t walk straight. It never slowed her down, though. She always managed to do everything that the other fillies did, especially climb trees. She didn’t have her cutie mark yet, but she didn’t get any flak from the others at school about it yet. He twisted the rag he was holding in his hooves around, trying to get some of the grease off. “Be careful, Gasket! You don’t want to fall and get hurt!”
“I will, daddy!”
He chuckled and turned to go back into the house. As he saw it, he stopped for a moment and looked. It was a pretty sight. Just a simple little place, a little ways outside Ponyville. It was just far enough away that they were given their privacy, but close enough that it was easy to go into town to go shopping or pick up supplies. It was a small wooden home, built to last. There was a small attachment on the side of the house that looked like it was some sort of workshop. There was a chimney on both the main house and the workshop, though smoke came out of the workshop chimney more often than the main house’s.
A beautiful mare stood at the door, leaning up against the frame. She was a unicorn, though she didn’t use her magic all the time. At this moment, though, she was mixing a bowl of something. Grease Hoof’s mouth watered, thinking of her cooking. She made the best home-cooked meals he had ever eaten. He trotted up to her, tossing the rag onto his back with a flick of his head. He kissed her quickly on the cheek and peered into the bowl.
“Ooh, what are you making?” he asked, hoping it was one of her hay casseroles.
She smiled and levitated a tiny bit up to him to taste. Just before the morsel touched his tongue, she stopped it in midair and looked into his eyes. “Please, sir. Don’t die!”He stumbled back, startled. “What did you say?”
“Smithy! I don’t know what happened! He just collapsed! Help him!”Grease Hoof looked at his wife. Suddenly, with those words, nothing felt right. “Who are you?” he asked the pony next to him. “Where am I?”
“Hey! Stranger! You don’t get to die! Come on, Teacup, help me get him onto the table.”Looking around, everything began to fall apart around him. Not fall apart, really. Everything began to turn to ash, though there were no flames. He looked as his wife, saw her starting to fade. Gasket ran up to him, jumping up onto his back. “Daddy, where are you going?”
He spun, looking frantically for something… stable. “I-I-I don’t know, sweetie. What’s happening?”
His wife turned her head and smiled at him eerily. “Don’t you remember? That pretty little waitress got hurt.”
A surge of pain ran through his left leg. “Gah! What…! What’s happening?!”
“Hey! Buddy! You awake?!”
The world came flooding back to him in a rainbow of pain. Smithy stood over him, trying to work on his leg. “And yer back. Think you can tell me a little something about this leg of yours?”
He opened his mouth to explain the equipment to him, but no sound came out. It didn’t appear as though he had been unconscious very long, but his mouth was already dry. He licked his lips to try and moisten them, but that didn’t help either. He cleared his throat and whispered to the two worried looking ponies. “Battery dry… using too much… bioelectricity.”
The smith and the waitress looked at each other like they had heard him say he was Celestia’s brother. “Uh, don’t… don’t ambi-tech limbs… I mean, aren’t they supposed to draw electricity from the body?” the waitress asked.
“And I didn’t think they had batteries,” the smith added.
“Special limb… extra power… Open hoof…”
The smith did as he was asked. He reached inside the tiny space and pulled out a cord and a locket. Though small, small enough to be kept in the hoof, the locket appeared too big for a man to wear it comfortably, so he didn’t think it strange that it was kept in the hoof. It was a little strange in that most lockets he had seen were heart shaped or had a design on them. This, however, was a simple thing, gold plated without any engravings or designs on it. It was a perfectly circular around the edge where it opened. It was flat otherwise, about an inch and a half, nearly two inches thick. The waitress popped up, looking over the smith’s shoulder. “Huh. I didn’t think men carried lockets.”
“Open,” Grease Hoof growled. He was feeling a little better, just enough to growl like he did. “Open it. Plug in with the cord…”
The smith looked around the pony’s chest, looking for someplace to plug into the locket. He found it on the side, masterfully worked into the hinge, but what he couldn’t find was a place to plug it into the strange pony’s chest. “Uh, where does this go? I don’t see a place to put it.”
“Chest… fourth rib down… under muscle…”
“Oh. Well, I’ll be damned.” The smith found it in the middle of the rib, underneath the muscle like he had been told. He quickly stuck both ends of the cords where they belonged, but nothing happened. He wasn’t sure if it was working at all. “Is anything supposed to happen? Little lights or something?”
“Open it!” he grunted again. “I said open it!”
The smith quickly remembered that he had, indeed, been told to open the locket. When he did, music began to play from inside. It started quietly, the music sounding like it was being played much, much more slowly than it had been when recorded. The longer the locket was open, the stronger and faster it played, finally smoothing out into an easy, jazzy tune. There were no words, just the brassy music of the instruments. The smith closed his eyes and looked to the ceiling, smiling. “Oh, yeah. That’s a real sweet tune. Real easy.” He opened his eyes again, looking into the locket-slash-music box. He saw two pictures inside, one of a mare and one of a teenaged filly. The mare was beautiful, entirely blue. She was the color of the shirt the stranger was wearing. Had been wearing. Before it had been stained with the blood of the barmaid. The woman’s face was drawn in a smile, but a sad, weak smile. She looked like she was sick. But even sick, and even through a picture the smith could see that she was one of the most beautiful ponies he had ever seen. The filly was the same color blue, but had a brilliant golden mane. She was smiling broadly, like she was laughing at the camera. She smiled a little bit crooked, the teeth on the left half of her mouth showing brilliant white through her lips. The mare on the right half of the locket was beautiful, but the fill on the right was her rival.
“Let me see,” Teacup said, bumping into him to try and get a better look. “Oooh,” she cooed. “What a beautiful family. They yours?”
He nodded. The locket was a music box, yes, but it was also little generator. A miracle of modern engineering, he couldn’t have possibly made something so incredible. He reached out his real hoof and took the locket from them, looking at the two pictures. He was careful not to pull it out of place, to unplug it. It was a little thing, but it was powerful. He was feeling better already, feeling recharged. He shouldn’t have gone so long without recharging. She would have been upset at him for not taking care of himself. “My wife. My little girl.”
Smithy moved to look over his shoulder and see the pictures again. “They’re beautiful. You are a lucky pony.”
He coughed and carefully sat up. “Was. I was a lucky pony.”
Smithy frowned. Teacup scratched her head uncomfortably. Neither knew what to say to the pessimistic pony. “Um, I’m sorry,” Smithy groaned. “But I never got yer name.”
He sighed. “I suppose I owe you that much. I’ve caused you so much trouble. I’m Grease Hoof.”
The smith lifted an eyebrow. “Seriously? Huh. Ok. And… can I see your face?”
“No.” Grease Hoof even pulled his hood a little bit further over his head. The movement finally pulled the back end of the garment up enough to reveal his cutie mark. It depicted a wrench crossing over a leg like they were swords. It caught the eye of both the ponies standing over him, and the smith was the one to make the connection.
“Yer cutie mark is in ambi-tech?”
He groaned. “Ah, shit.” He threw back his hood and looked at the pair. They both jumped at the sudden movement, then drew in closer to look at his eyes. His eyes were a bright silver, a shimmering kind of silver that neither had seen before. His left eye was bloodshot as well, giving him a somewhat frightening appearance. His face was otherwise unremarkable, though handsome. Smithy didn’t take so much notice of the face, but Teacup thought that if his eye wasn’t bloodshot he would be one of the more attractive ponies she’d seen. Actually, with the eye, he had a sort of sexy mystery about him. Like the kind of mystery stallion who would sweep a woman off her feet for a night and then disappear into the darkness…
Her increasingly heated musings were interrupted by the stranger swearing at himself. “Ah! Damn it! Hand me the wrench next to your hoof?” he asked the smith.
“Maybe once you explain yourself.” He glared at the big pony, not saying a word. Now that his hood was off, one could appreciate the ferocity of his hateful glare. The smith stood strong for only a moment before crumbling like a cupcake in a child’s lunchbox. “Um… ok,” he muttered, sheepishly. He was getting a lot of practice at being humble with this strange pony.
“And the part I asked for?” The smith, suddenly remembering the piece, moved across the room and picked it up. He handed it to Grease Hoof, who promptly reached into his chest and tore out one of his ribs. There was no electrical surge this time, as there seemed to be with most sudden movements he made. He picked up the locket again, which he had put down, and looked sadly at it. “Ok,” he sighed. “One for the money.” He kissed the pictures in the locket, first the mare, then the filly. Then he positioned the rib closely to where it was supposed to be positioned. “Two for the show.” He shoved the rib into his chest and cried out as it locked itself into place. “Gar! Shit! Three to get ready.” He grinned at the waitress, who he had surprised on two earlier. “You’re never ready. Ever. Not for ambi-tech procedures.”
She frowned, touching her shoulder. Grease Hoof looked back at the locket, and a tear formed in his eye.“Daddy! What about this? Could this work?”
“Hmm… What… How did you come up with this?”
“Pony bodies carry more similarities with metal than it seems anypony has ever realized. If we were to treat the metal kind of like this… then move these wires here, and add a few more here, here, and here,” she explained, pointing at the diagrams she was showing her father. “We can re-make the sensory nerves and give back feeling to ponies! We can do it!”
Grease Hoof smiled at his daughter. “You really never give up, do you?”
She smiled back at him. Her eyes shimmered with the thrill of inventive progress. “I had the best teacher ever. They told you it was impossible too, didn’t they?”
He laughed. “Yes, they did. But you are far more brilliant than I am, my dear.” His smile turned sad. “Your mother would be so proud.”
Gasket put a hoof over his shoulder. “She is proud of us, dad. I know it.”
“Smithy!”
A sudden, violent pounding came at the door, bringing Grease Hoof out of his reflection. “Who is that?” he asked, recognizing the voice but not quite placing it.
Smithy shrugged. “I dunno,” he offered helpfully.
He started to move to answer the door, but didn’t make it far before Grease Hoof grabbed his shoulder and pulled him back with a surprising amount of strength for somepony who was just unconscious. “Ask who it is,” he ordered.
“But why-“
“Just do it.”
The smith frowned and considered disobeying, but there was something about this pony that made him keep thinking that doing as he asked was the best for all parties involved. “Who’s there?” he bellowed. “It’s late! We’re closing up shop!”
“Please, sir. This will only take a minute. I simply have to ask you about the whereabouts of a certain pony.”
He was suddenly had a terrible feeling about everything that had happened that night. “Who wants to know?” he pressed.
“I’m here on behalf of The Insurgence,” came the reply.
Both the waitress and the smith’s heads snapped to look at the strange pony. “The Insurgence ?!” they both whispered frantically.
The stranger groaned, frowned, and hurriedly snapped the ornately decorated cover plate back into place on his chest. “Well… Shit.”
“Have you done something to get The Insurgence after you?”
Smithy towered over Grease Hoof, trying for once to intimidate him. Even as he puffed out his chest it occurred to him that he was far less frightening than even the thought of what The Insurgence would do to him if he were wanted by them…
Grease Hoof grunted as he stood up. “Coulda used a couple extra minutes. I think one more wire needs tweaking.” He quickly flipped his hood over his head. “I don’t suppose you still have my shirt?”
Smithy muttered under his breath and quickly retrieved the bloodied garment from the floor. “Sorry, it was just kind of lying out there for a bit.”
“Yeah, whatever.” He threw the shirt on underneath his cloak and buttoned himself up. When he was done he shook his head like he was shaking out his mane, despite the fact that he was wearing a hood. “Thanks for everything. I hope the money I gave you will cover everything.”
He looked towards the front, where The Insurgence was waiting. “I get the feeling it will only cover parts .”
Grease Hoof chuckled dryly. “I’m not personally busting up your shop, so I don’t count myself responsible for the damages.”
As he spoke, the sounds of the front door being smashed in reached them. “We warned you, Smithy! If we find the pony we want, you’ll be charged with harboring a fugitive!”
Smithy growled and picked up a hammer from the workbench. “I don’t answer to a government other than that of our great Princess Celestia,” he growled under his breath.
“Well, everyone makes mistakes,” Grease Hoof muttered back.
“In following Celestia?”
“In following.” He gave his left hoof a shake. “You aren’t gonna need that hammer. Everything out there is made of stone and metal, right?”
“Um, yes?”
“Good enough for me. Stay here.” He spun on his front hooves and aimed a powerful kick at the metal door. The door flew open with a clang and hit a tough looking pony in the snout. He reeled back with a startled yell and grabbed at his nose.
“Damn it! Sir!” he cried.
An official looking pony in a fine red uniform strode into the room, grinning widely. It was a frightening grin, one that forebodes only death. The uniform appeared as though it were made of a fine, comfortable material, well suited to patrolling or even light combat. A golden cord hanging across his chest and a black insignia in the shape of a salamander identified him as a high ranking officer of The Insurgence’s Third Corp. Most ponies wouldn’t take note of such a small detail, but Grease Hoof recognized it almost out of habit. The uniform consisted of a long sleeved shirt and pants, all very red and all very clean. The pony himself was orange with a fierce red mane, unkempt and fluttering dangerously in the room as the cold night air from the outside clashed with the heat of the forge, spinning the dust and ash up into the air. “Aah. Grease Hoof. We finally meet again. It’s been a little while.” Despite his frightening appearance, his tone of voice was quite calm and civilized.
Grease Hoof crouched like he was preparing for a fight. “Not long enough, you slimy bastard.”
The military pony clicked his tongue and shook his head sadly. “Now, now, dear friend. I simply wanted to catch up a little while. How is that lovely daughter of yours? Gasket, wasn’t that her name?”
At the sound of the name, he leapt forward, roaring, “Don’t you dare say that name!”
He tried to spin and buck like he had kicked the door earlier, but the pony in red moved too quickly. He jumped to the side and aimed a kick at Grease Hoof, who was still reeling from the force of his own kick. He performed the same spin-and-buck, but was successful in making contact with his opponents left side. Grease Hoof flew across the room with a bellow, landing hard on his right side. The Insurgence pony chuckled and rubbed the bottom of his hooves. “My, my. I see you got some solid ambi-tech in place of that old, shabby leg of yours. Too bad. I might have to break a sweat. Or the right half of your body.”
“I’m not here to deal with you, Flare!” Grease Hoof yelled. “Leave this place alone! They don’t know who I am and have no business with you!”
“Oh, but they do,” Flare corrected him. “Even in unknowingly assisting you, they have committed treason against The Insurgence, and that cannot be tolerated.” His hair suddenly began to glow with a powerful yellow aura. As it parted, it revealed a crooked horn, charging up for a magical spell. “Now they shall learn that all who cross The Insurgence will perish!”
He wasn’t big on maniacal laughs, but he did grin feverishly as flames burst from the tip of his horn. The magical flames seared the stones of the room, quickly beginning to turn the structurally sound forge into an unstable collection of slowly melting rock.
“Leave this place alone!” Grease Hoof bellowed, pointing angrily at Flare with his left hoof. As he leveled his leg a hidden compartment on the bottom clicked open and the hoof belched fire back at the mad-pony, breaking his concentration on his spell as he was forced to leap backwards. He only just made it to a safe distance away from the fierce flames snapped at him, eager for a taste of that bright red uniform. A few met their goal as the fabric flared briefly, leaving a charred area on Flare’s right front cuff.
Grease Hoof squinted hard at the patch of flesh revealed by the burning uniform. He was able to get a good look at it since Flare made no move to pat out the already dying flames on his sleeve. “Fire retardant material,” he bragged with a cocky smirk. “They figured it was a necessary precaution for my men and I, what with our propensity for… shall we say, warm temperatures?” He noticed Grease Hoof staring beyond the simple burn on his sleeve and smiled again. “Aah, you’ve noticed,” he purred. “Yes, thanks to your contributions to The Insurgence, many high ranking officials, myself included, have been given the option of having ambi-tech surgeries in order to create… well, the perfect soldiers.” He pushed up both his front sleeves and showed off a pair of shiny metal legs. “Like them? We apparently haven’t unlocked their full potential, judging by your ingenious hidden flamethrower. I may have to pitch that idea to our doctors upon returning to our city.”
Grease Hoof kept himself from gasping at both the sight of the two false legs and the mention of the city. “You have a city now?” he asked, not entirely believing.
Flare flipped his hair out of his face, covering up his horn again. “What, you didn’t hear? I thought that you would have been kept in the loop. Yes, The Insurgence has gained the support of enough ponies to build a small city, free of the tyranny of Equestria’s so-called ‘Princess of the Sun’. We live in true freedom, where only criminals are punished, and then only in accordance to their crimes.” He turned his back on Grease Hoof, looking out the window of the shop and out into the night. His shadow was cast far into the street through the doorframe by the shouldering shop behind him, the melting stones radiating both heat and light. “This is my dream for Equestria. Peace and freedom for all its subjects. Not this false freedom that Celestia preaches, one of overzealous guards and constant attacks by rival kingdoms, like the Changelings. But a quiet life, filled with the good things that we as ponies, as the pinnacle of intelligent life, deserve.”
He turned back around and looked grimly at Grease Hoof. “All ponies are equal. No one kind of pony is special. Alicorns are no better than unicorns, unicorns no better than pegasus, pegasus no better than earth. Our society and our leadership is corrupt, with tiers forming between the pony races again. Our new government has resolved that tier difference within our city, and we wish to spread that unity throughout all of Equestria. I offer you one chance and one chance only to be a part of that. Do you follow us, or do you follow Princess Celestia?” As he asked his question, he planted his hooves firmly on the floor, warning his foe that there was only one acceptable answer.
Grease Hoof took the same powerful stance, knowing he couldn’t give him the proper answer. At least, not honestly. “I do not follow Celestia.”
Flare flared his nostrils, grinning happily. “That’s what I like to hear.”
“I’m not finished yet!” Flare’s smile disappeared quickly as Grease Hoof snapped angrily at him. “I do not follow Celestia. But I do not follow The Insurgence. Now, before you pop your head open trying to figure out who or what I follow, let me tell you. Not that I wouldn’t love to see you blow yourself up, but Smithy has plenty of a mess to clean up. I follow a greater power than Celestia or your false replacement government. I follow the three Goddesses who created our world and the sense of morality they bestowed upon me.”
Flare stood straight and snorted in derision. “Pretty words. But what you said at the end there, about your sense of… morality. I wonder what your daughter would say about that.”
The mention of his daughter set Grease Hoof off again. Howling like a pony gone mad, he bucked the guard behind him without looking at him. He felt a satisfying crunch! as his hooves connected with the soldiers jaw and broke the jawbone and more than a few of his teeth. The guard crumpled, falling to the floor with a sizzle as his head fell into a pool of melted stone. The pain of the burn instantly brought him too his hooves again, but not before his mane caught fire. The blazing stallion ran past his commander, running screaming into the night in search of relief.
One down, two to go , Grease Hoof thought grimly to himself. There was still a pony in the forge, assumedly destroying all the poor smith’s tools. That meant there was one in the other room, the room where Smith and Teacup were hiding. Not giving Flare another thought, Grease Hoof spun and ran toward the back room again. He felt the heat of another blast of magical flame singe his tail as Flare tried to block his escape, but Flare wasn’t quite fast enough. The pony whose nose Grease Hoof had broken earlier was locked in a fight with Smithy, who was wielding a wrench against the soldier’s wings. The soldiers wings, now that Grease Hoof took the time to look, were covered with metal rimmed feathers, greatly hindering his ability to fly but giving his wings a good deal of shielding and dozens of deadly blades at his disposal.
Smithy, distracted by Grease Hoofs entrance, looked away from his foe and let his guard down. The soldier, seeing his opportunity, lashed out at the bigger pony. Smithy fell back against the wall, clutching at his eye. He toppled over onto Teacup, knocking her to the ground but continuing to protect her from the soldier’s onslaught. The pegasus swung his wings over and over again, tearing great gashes in the smith’s sides and legs. Grease Hoof moved quickly to help the big pony, but wasn’t fast enough to save him from a serious beating. Snatching up the wrench, which had flown across the room as Smithy fell, Grease Hoof threw it as hard as he could at the back of the soldiers head. His aim was perfect, as though he had trained at throwing heavy tools. The open areas of the wrench, the edges sharpened by its use, struck the still violently attacking pegasus in the back of the head, digging deep and gouging large chunks of flesh out of his neck while knocking him unconscious and bringing him to the floor.
“Come on!” Grease Hoof bellowed. “You can still stand! We all need to get out of here, now!! ”
Teacup cried from her place on the floor, unable to push the dazed smith off of her. “Please, help him! He’s hurt! Oh, Celestia, there’s so much blood!”
“Celestia isn’t going to hear your prayers! Just push him up to me!” Grease Hoof, in a display of strength impressive for a pony of his stature, he hefted the smith bodily over his shoulder. “Now let’s go!”
She struggled to her feet and followed him out the door, right into the grinning face of Flare. “Peek-a-boo,” he sang. He began to charge his horn again, but Grease Hoof and Teacup slipped by him before he could attack. They nearly bowled over the third soldier, who was just coming out of the forge. Teacup squeaked and reared back onto her hind legs, flailing with her front hooves. Catching the soldier off guard, she was lucky enough to scratch up his face and send him scuttling backwards.
Grease Hoof laughed over his shoulder at the increasingly frustrated captain. “Real tough soldiers you’ve got there. Your other man is in the shop, knocked out by a little bitty wrench.”
Flare didn’t take the taunting well, and responded with an unintelligible yell and another blast of flame. Grease Hoof kept laughing all the way out the door, kicking the severely weakened frame as they left. Flare cried out as the building began to crumble in on him. “You bastard!” he cried. “You’re a traitor to the true government! And Celestia! At least pick a side, you spineless coward!”
“I told you before, I follow only the Goddesses! They are the ones pony-kind has turned against!” Grease Hoof called over his shoulder. He turned to the quaking Teacup at his side and grinned. “Not bad for your first near-death experience. Come on, keep going. We need to get far away from here. And you probably need to get out of town. You’ll be wanted for attacking an Insurgence soldier now.”
She stumbled over her words before finally asking, “Well, where are you going?”
He stopped smiling at the thought of what she might mean. “Far away from here. Without anypony tagging along.”
She pouted, her bottom lip quivering. It quivered from adrenaline and fear, but it suited her purposes all the same. “But I won’t be able to fend for myself out there in that big, scary world… Pleeeeease?”
“No.”
“Pretty please?”
“No.”
“You can’t even open your heart for little old me?”
“No.”
“I can make it worth your while,” she cooed, rubbing her flank against his.
“No.”
She sighed, her shoulders sagging. “You’re awfully cold, you know that?”
“Yes.”
She glared at him, becoming upset. “Are you at least going to give me any advice on what to do?”
“No.”
“Are we taking Smithy to a hospital?”
“Yes.”
“Can I follow you after the hospital?”
“No.”
“Not even just a little ways?”
He sighed, keeping his eyes focused on the lights of the Canterlot Memorial Hospital, shining brightly in the night. After the Changeling invasion five years ago, the hospital had to be rebuilt. They had fine facilities. At least, they did four years ago. The mare next to him stomped a couple times to remind him she was still there. He groaned. “I don’t take on extra luggage, kid.”
She blew a lock of hair out of her face. “Hey! I’m not a kid!”
“How old are you?”
“Um, twenty eight.”
“See, even if you were telling the truth, you’re still a kid.”
“Right, and children need protection from adults!”
“You don’t learn very fast, do you?”
“I don’t have to. I’m a girl, that means I’m always right.”
Grease Hoof sighed. He would have to ditch her at the hospital, otherwise this was going to be a very long journey.