"Look, buddy my job here is to keep the peace, and if I have to break a few heads to do it, then a few people are going to be hurting."

By the end of my talks with the Prime Minister, I wasn’t exactly thrilled about the prospect of wandering off into the northern mountains in search of some Old World armory just so that Ebony Song would ‘consider’ bringing up my ‘concerns’ with Princess Luna. This was ridiculous! I had even brought him proof later that day in the form of an obviously not very normal looking unicorn stallion, and he’d seemed to hoof-wave Arginine aside as though seeing ponies as mutated as he was wasn’t something super unusual. Two horns, the size of a hell hound, and each and every one of them looked to have had pretty much the same coat and mane colors. Granted, I wasn’t able to verify that last point, but the other two should have served as pretty big clues that our stallion prisoner wasn’t just a one-off Taint product.

His offer to keep Arginine in custody and ‘interrogate’ the stallion while Foxglove and I were away had been...almost tempting. Given what I knew the stallion and his comrades had been doing to ponies for only Celestia knew how long, leaving him behind to be tortured was an option that I had briefly entertained as a form of richly deserved justice. However, as much as Arginine might have deserved it, I wasn’t positive that I could trust the Republic not to end up killing the valuable stallion. What he knew could still prove useful.

I was also the only one who knew how dangerous he really was. If those Republic ponies let their guards down for a even a moment, he might find some way to get away and warn his Stable that somepony was trying to get the valley to move against them.

It was just safer to take him with us. Well, I used the word ‘safer’ with more than a few caveats attached to it. He was powerful and clever, and he was watching me like a damn hawk for any sign of weakness or complacency. If I fucked up, me and Foxglove would both pay the price with our lives, and the rest of the Wasteland would fall soon after.

No pressure, Windfall!

I flicked on the radio on my pipbuck and let the music distract me from my progressively more melancholy thoughts. The voices of stallions and mares who were centuries dead swirled around me. They presented a curious mixture of sobriety and optimism. I wasn’t a huge history buff, so I couldn’t be sure, but I sort of wondered if there would have been a correlation between the general emotional tone of the music as the war had progressed. Like, did the ponies start out all optimistic and full of hope, believing that the fighting would be over before they knew it; and then when the years dragged on, and the death toll mounted, did they begin to despair?

One moment there would be a song about a stallion pursuing his first crush, and I’d find myself smiling a little. Then the next song would come on, and it would be a mare, pining for the return of her husband from the fighting and her anxious desire for him to survive to come back to her. Then, to complete the mood whiplash, the song that followed that was about a pony feeling nostalgic for what he’d considered ‘better days’ as he pointed out what could have been considered amusing antics that ‘modern ponies’ performed.

Homily, I love you, but you really need to learn how to put together an order that makes some sort of sense. You are playing with my emotions something fierce right now.

With a shake of my head, I tuned the pipbuck’s radio to the station hosted by DJ Pon3. Maybe the news wasn’t quite as relevant, but at least the Manehattan stallion knew how to arrange songs so that they flowed better.

As it happened though, I managed to catch him in the middle of one of his news broadcasts, “―vening wastelanders!” the rich baritone of the radio personality blared out, sounding far happier than I thought most ponies should in this day and age, “How’s every pony doing? Got some great news for you today!” oh? “Remember that little Stable Gal who took on the slavers of Appleloosa and saved all those ponies? Well, don’t ask me how, but she survived taking a nosedive off a cliff in a speeding train. That’s right fillies and gentlecolts, she’s back!”

I blinked at the news. Who in the Wasteland could he be talking―

Then I recalled the broadcast that I’d heard Homily make a week or so back. She’d mentioned that a mare from a Stable out east had been making some waves. DJ Pon3 must have been talking about her. I had to admit though, this wasn’t the sort of news I expected to hear with regards to a mare who’d grown up in one of those underground shelters. Foxglove was hardly the sort of pony to go looking for trouble she didn’t need, after all.

“And what’s she been up to now, I hear you ask? Well, sit down an’ put on your listening ears, cuz it’s time for DJ Pon3 to tell you a story. Ready? Good. This is the story of a little filly named Silver Bell…”

My ears perked up as I listened to the Manehattan stallion launch into his recounting of a little unicorn mare from a Stable and how she had essentially rescued and rehabilitated a lost little filly that had endured more than her fair share of strife. As I heard some of the details about what had happened to this Silver Bell though, I felt my insides tighten.

She’d watched her family get slaughtered by raiders, huh? It sounded like it drove her off the deep end for a good while there. I could relate to that. Sometimes I did find myself wondering how I would have turned out if I hadn’t had somepony as stable as Jackboot looking out for me. Even then, I knew that I was a very different sort of pony than I’d have grown up to be if the White Hooves had never attacked my home and destroyed everything I’d held dear.

That first part of the broadcast though, that had me wondering about this Stable Dweller...took out a whole group of slavers and managed to survive a horrific crash, huh? Considering the only other Stable mare I knew, that little unicorn must have been made of some pretty stern stuff. It also sounded like she was on something of a crusade to clean up the Wasteland, the way that DJ Pon3 was going on about it. Of course, I’d heard that sort of story before from the radio jockey. Every time, it had ended in a less than stellar fashion.

Frankly, at this point I was wondering if I should follow this mare’s exploits just so that I could place a private bet on how long it would be before she was either slaughtered like the Mare-Do-Well had been, or just simply snapped in the face of the futility of it all like the Lone Ranger.

Wasn’t that a depressing thought?

I wish you luck, Stable Dweller, I really do; but I’m not going to hold my breath waiting for you to fix everything.

Then I found myself chuckling mirthlessly. Just who was I to talk? The pegasus who was still a mere filly in the eyes of most ponies in the valley trying to almost single-hoofedly avert an imminent invasion by a horde of mutant super-ponies? The filly who was fashioning herself to be a ‘Wonderbolt’. The Stable Dweller was at least limiting herself to killing slavers and helping troubled fillies. Ah, the good old days…or last week, heh.

Still, I guess in some odd way, it was reassuring to know that I wasn’t the only pony in the whole Wasteland trying to do some good. Maybe I’d track her down when this was all over and we could exchange notes or something. Perhaps we could even recruit other ponies and form some sort of group that went around protecting good ponies and punishing the bad ones out there; like a...Justice squad, or―

A notification appeared in the upper left corner of my vision. My pipbuck was informing me that it had just picked up a new radio transmission source. I squinted at the label that the old world device had assigned to it and frowned. It looked like a nearly random collection of numbers and letters. Curious, I began tuning the radio once more, honing in on the new signal.

“―ay, mayday!” a mare was screaming in near panic, immediately grabbing my attention, “this is Sentinel Dopple-Two, we are under heavy fire; repeat: heavy fire! We are being engaged by heavily armed Steel Ranger forces and have taken casualties. Requesting immediate assistance and evac! I say again: Dopple-Two needs extraction now! We’re located at―” the transmission cut off suddenly in a burst of static.

Simultaneously my attention was drawn from my fetlock mounted device as the sound of something that sounded very much like a distant thunderclap rumbled across the wasteland. Far to the right of our current course, I spied the outline of a small town in the distance, and a fresh tendril of smoke that was growing up into the sky which had not been there a couple of minutes ago.

I turned my face back to the now silent pipbuck, staring at it blankly. I was pretty sure that I’d just listened to somepony die while calling for help.

Then I heard the radio crackle once more and a stallion’s voice came over the speakers, “Dopple-Two, this is Watch Tower, we did not copy you last transmission,” there was an edge in the radio operator’s voice, but he was doing a good job of keeping himself composed enough to make himself clearly heard as he tried to get the information he needed, “please repeat your location and strength of the enemy forces. Over.”

There was a long pause where nopony spoke. Then the stallion came back, “Dopple-Two, do you copy? Over.”

“Dopple-Two, respond. Over,” I heard the resignation in the stallion’s voice this time. I felt my own heart sinking as the other end of the line remained silent.

“...Watch Tower, out.”

I was about to turn the radio off completely when my ears swiveled towards the column of smoke, and the faint crackling of gunfire. My eyes went wide and my head whipped around. Somepony was still alive and fighting over there! The radio remained silent, and I had to wonder if the surviving ponies in that distressed group even knew that their call for help wasn’t going to be answered. As far as Watch Tower seemed concerned, everypony was dead and there was no longer anything that they could do. Frankly, as bad as it sounded like the situation was over there, I very much doubted that any reinforcements that could be mustered up would have any hope of making it in time to rescue whoever was still alive.

On the other hoof, me and my companions were in the area, and we could be there in minutes. If Dopple-Two had any hope of surviving, it was probably going to lay on our shoulders.

Taking on a group of Steel Rangers was no small task though. I recalled vividly how much firepower just three of them could lay down. If not for a very risky move on Jackboot’s part, we’d probably all have been killed right then and there. Could a juvenile pegasus, a unicorn who was still new to the whole ‘fighting’ thing, and their prisoner really serve as viable reinforcements against a force of battle-hardened ponies wearing powered armor?

My brain issued a resounding, ‘fuck no’ in answer to that question.

Was I going to be able to live with myself if I just sat back and let a bunch of ponies get killed when there was at least the tiniest little chance that I might have been able to help them in some small way? Would a real Wonderbolt just hover out here and watch while ponies were in trouble?

I liked to think that the answer to that was ‘no’ too.

My wings folded to my sides and I dropped down to the pair of ponies below. Both of them had heard the commotion as well and they turned their heads to look at me, “what’s all that about?” Foxglove asked.

“Some ponies are being attacked by Steel Rangers,” they were probably Republic soldiers, I guessed. It wasn’t unheard of for the Steel Rangers out here to attack mercenary groups and such, but those radio transmissions sounded a little too professional to be some sort of contract outfit. At least, I hoped I wasn’t about to rush in and rescue a group of Lancers. Wouldn’t that be awkward…

“I’m going to go help them,” I added, bracing for Foxglove’s inevitable reaction.

As expected, the violet had some reservations about my plan of actions, “are you crazy, is that your problem?!” she sputtered.

“They’re in trouble,” I pointed out, “and I don’t like turning a blind eye to ponies in trouble,” I held the unicorn’s gaze for several long moments. Foxglove bit her lip, remembering how my propensity for charging in to save random ponies in trouble in spite of a whole list of reasons not to get involved had resulted in her own salvation not so very long ago. As much as she may not like the notion, it would have been fairly hypocritical of her to admonish me for my decision too harshly.

She did have some valid concerns though, “Windy, we’re not equipped to take on Steel Rangers!”

“We weren’t last time either,” I pointed out, already arranging the grenades on my barding and making certain that I’d have fresh magazines ready to load into my submachine guns when the need arose. It might be a tough fight, but I was going to at least try and be as prepared as I could be.

“Please, Windy, we can’t―”

“You’re staying here,” I said without even looking up at the unicorn, “where it’s safe. If RG and I don’t make it back, it’ll be up to you to get the word out about what his Stable is planning. We’ve got enough money that you can probably hire some mercs or something to raid that bunker Ebony Song was talking about.

“Talk to Summer Glade and see if she knows anypony that’s trustworthy for that sort of thing.”

“You are taking me with you?” the gray stallion sounded surprised.

I held up the pipbuck, “proximity detonator, remember? You get too far away, and your head goes pop,” the unicorn did not seem the least bit amused by this reminder, “and I figure you’d want to make sure I survive. Your collar is also tied to this thing’s health monitor; I die, you die,” his scowl managed to deepen, “so, I mean, I guess I’m not really ‘taking you with me’, per say; but I figure you’ll want to come along anyway,” I smiled at the stallion. It was not a pleasant one.

“Will you at least provide me with a weapon?”

“What? But aren’t you some sort of super-tough, ultra-strong, perfect pony?” I snorted, “what do you need a weapon for? Those Rangers are just a bunch of invalids, right?”

If I had ever wondered if it were possible for a pony to glower so hard that their face would literally implode, I had my answer: not quite. It seemed that there existed a point of what I was going to call ‘Peak Grimace’ wherein a pony’s facial muscles hit their limit and all that was left with a look that perfectly summed up the thought: ‘I want you to die in such a manner that it will forever redefine what it means to have died, and be deserving of its own special name in order to even approach doing justice when describing the horrors which you suffered on your way to death’s door.’

I looked back at Foxglove and passed her all of the caps and bits that I had on me, “I hope I’ll be taking this all back, but, you know...” I shrugged at the mare and took off into the air before before she could respond.

Arginine hesitated for a brief moment, seeming to debate precisely how much he was willing to put up with before death seemed like a viable alternative; but he eventually started galloping after me. His large size and long gate allowed me to fly much faster that I would have it Foxglove had been with us, which I certainly appreciated.

My mind was now free to focus on the upcoming ruins, and the fight that awaited me. Foxglove had not been wrong: I didn’t have the hardware to make this an easy little assault. My supply of those pulse rounds was extremely limited. Mentally, I berated myself for insisting on not delaying even for a couple days in Seaddle; at least long enough for Foxglove to work her magic and restock my supplies of that special ammunition of hers. I had a decent number of armor piercing rounds at least.

That being said, my submachine guns fired 10mm pistol cartridges. Those steel-cores did fine against hardened leather and even thin ceramic barding, sure, but the kind of stuff that the Steel Rangers wore was on a whole other level. My rounds would put some dents into their suits, and enough of them would probably penetrate, especially around joint areas like their necks and hips, but even then I’d have to make sure I was getting in solid strikes that were almost completely dead on. If my angles of fire were too oblique I might as well just be throwing Sugar Apple Bomb cereal at them for all the good it would do.

I had a pair of those blue-banded pulse grenades, which would help out a lot. My quartet of the standard frags would do a number on them if they detonated nice and close as well. Realistically, I guessed that I could take out about six or so Rangers, assuming I wasn’t too wasteful with the bullets and my grenade drops were on point. I didn’t know exactly how many of the armored technophiles I was going up against, but I sincerely hoped it wasn’t too many more than that.

Hopefully, if I took out enough of them, I could convince the rest to turn tail and run. I doubted that the Rangers would be the type to accept that sort of offer, but it was still a nice thought…

The gunfire was growing steadily louder, and every few seconds, an explosion rocked the ruins; which, it turned out, didn’t belong to a town at all, like I’d thought. It was actually some sort of factory complex. A large sign had managed to keep itself affixed to the side of one of the larger buildings. ‘Arc-Lightning, LLC.’ was written a large golden flowing text above the cyan silhouette of a pegasus mare. At the bottom, in smaller black letters was the tag line, “Leave Your Competition in the Dust!’

My EFS started populating with blips now. My stomach clenched as I saw their color: amber. Every blip that I could see was amber. None of these ponies considered me a threat or bore me any ill-will, according to the pipbuck; and why should they? Each side was a whole lot more concerned with fighting each other than some random little pegasus that flew in from the Wasteland. It wasn’t like either side in this fight were genuine raiders or anything. Granted, the Steel Rangers weren’t the friendliest ponies in the valley where the Republic was concerned, but I didn’t exactly look like a Republic soldier, or even a typical citizen, now, did I?

In the same vein, I clearly wasn’t a Steel Ranger either, so why would the Republic soldiers shoot at me?

I wasn’t anypony’s enemy in this fight.

...yet.

Could I do it? Could I open fire on ponies that weren’t after me like this? The Republic and I had had our issues in the past; and they were in a state of war with the Rangers. This wasn’t a band of raiders attacking an innocent caravan. These were two groups who had gone into this knowing there was going to be a fight. Was I really going to start killing ponies because of part of a radio call I’d accidentally intercepted? Was that what a Wonderbolt did?

If I’d intercepted a distress call from the Rangers, would I still have come?

Fuck me, I’m an idiot. Windfall, you naive little filly; of course life isn’t this simple. If Jackboot was here to see you, he’d tan your flank for being such a moron.

But you’re here now, aren’t you? Did you really fly all this way to flap around and watch a bunch of ponies kill each other?

No. That was not why I was here. I was here to be a Wonderbolt and to save ponies. It just hadn’t occurred to me at the time what that really meant. Now I had a slightly better idea.

I sighed heavily and shook my head. This was going to be, hooves down, the dumbest thing that I’d ever done. Which, looking back over the past month or two was really saying something! Someday I’d stop trying to one-up myself like this. But today was not that day.

From where I was, I could see that things looked to have reached a tentative stalemate between the two sides at the moment. The Republic soldiers had taken refuge inside the factory’s offices and were currently fending off the Steel Rangers from behind the remains of the first story’s brick wall. Meanwhile, the power armored ponies were engaging those barricaded defenders from the parking lot, using the remains of old carts and wagons as cover while they launched barrages of heavy ordinance. It was clear that the Republic’s forces weren’t going to be able to hold out for very long―and neither was that wall.

Detaching the four fragmentation grenades from my barding, I angled my wings for a low pass in between the two firing lines of ponies. Pulling the stems, I tossed down the explosives, sending them out in a line as I made my first pass. A series of nearly simultaneous detonations erupted in my wake and I doubled back the way that I’d come. As the smoke from the grenades started to ebb away, I landed right there in between the two groups of fighting ponies, staring out at the Steel Rangers.

I wasn’t sure what made everypony stop shooting at that moment. Maybe it was the brief confusion that both sides experienced upon seeing the explosions that clearly had not been triggered by either of them. Perhaps it was finding themselves staring at an ivory pegasus dressed in brilliant blue and gold barding who had wandered into their lines of fire for some baffling reason. In any case, I was grateful for the lull.

My eyes were drawn to the sound of a very unamused Arginine cantering up to me, his eyes surveying the forces arrayed around us. He came to a stop at my side, swiveling his head in all directions in a vain effort to keep all of the potential threats in sight.

Things felt every tense as the seconds of continued silence drew on. I was waiting―dreading, really―for the moment when one of these ponies decided to take advantage of the confusion and resume shooting so that they could capitalize on the surprise. As the lull grew longer and more pronounced, I was more certain that things wouldn’t spontaneously descend back into bloodshed―for the moment, anyway.

Well, I certainly had everypony’s attention. Now for the hard part: making this impromptu cease-fire last long enough to not get everypony killed.

My attention was drawn to a Steel Ranger, their foreboding grim helmet accented with dark green markings, as the walking tank of a pony advanced towards me from their firing line. A robust belt-fed grenade launcher was mounted on what seemed to be a small turret that rested atop his spine. More concerning was the fact that it seemed that wherever he looked, the barrel of the imposing weapon pointed; and right now he was looking at me.

Oddly enough, their armament and the coloration of their barding weren’t the characteristics that set them apart from all of the other Steel Rangers that I could see. No, that award went to their height. They were, hooves down, one of the largest ponies that I had ever seen; second only to Arginine. Theirs was a different sort of ‘largeness’ though. They weren’t very broad, even with the powered armor that they were wearing, they were simply tall. They didn’t even seem to have the same proportions of a pony, with most of their height being possessed in their legs and neck. The lanky armored figure stepped out well ahead of their Ranger brethren and came to a halt, staring at me expectantly with their grim helmet.

Swallowing back my reservations about how bad a plan this really was, I walked as steadily as I could managed towards the Ranger. Under my breath I said, “load pulse rounds,” and felt my nerves calm ever so slightly as I heard the weapons at my side lock in the sapphire-tipped anti-magic rounds that would be my best hope against the armored pony if things went sour. Arginine started to walk with me, by I motioned for him to stay put with a wing. This Ranger was coming alone, and so would I. Maybe there would be something that we could work out after all.

“Star Paladin Hoplite,” the mechanically augmented voice of a stallion said through the speaker of their helmet, “of the Neighvada Chapter of the Steel Rangers.”

I inclined my head slightly and forced myself to speak up and sound as self-assured as I could manage in the face of so much firepower all around me. The lack of any real protection being offered by my barding was something that I was very keenly aware of at this precise moment, “Windfall. Nice to meet you, Hoplite.”

The Ranger cocked his head, “what business does the Enclave have here, pegasus?”

Well, so much for being friendly, I guess. The tone of his question also suggested that this conversation could turn ugly in very short order; if the only reason that the Rangers had stopped shooting―and the Republic soldiers too, perhaps―was because they thought that the third, and rarely seen, great technological power in the Valley had decided to make an appearance and neither side was inclined to draw a third side into this little war of theirs.

Did I lie and try to play myself off as a representative of the pegasus nation? A little orange pony that bore a strong resemblance to a statue I’d seen before didn’t much care for that notion. The fact was that the Steel Rangers and even the Republic soldiers behind me knew a lot more about the Enclave than I did. I’d never even met a pegasus from the Enclave before. If I said the wrong thing this Paladin Hoplite would immediately know I was trying to put him on and I didn’t see how that could possibly go well for me.

No, honesty was my best policy here. I just had to remember to tell the truth and Be Pleasant!, and everything would be alright.

...Maybe.

“Sorry,” I said, shaking my head, “I’m not from the Enclave. I’m sort of just here representing myself,” I offered a wan smile at the Ranger, wishing that I could see his expression to be able to gauge how he was taking the news. As it was, the only thing I had to go on were the blips overlaid on my EFS, and it might be too late to fix things if the first I knew that they’d gone sour was when their blips went crimson and they started shooting at me.

“I’m just sort of really hoping that there’s a way for everypony here to walk away alive…?” I felt my smile straining slightly as my tone crescendoed into a hesitant question near the end. Way to sound self-assured there, Windfall. You’re just exuding confidence. I bet this guy is really intimidated right now.

“If the Republic soldiers are willing to lay down their weapons and surrender, I can guarantee their safety in one of our work camps out east,” Star Paladin Hoplite informed me.

Oh. I’m sure the Republic soldiers who have sworn to fight to the death in the service of Princess Luna will be willing to accept those terms. Or…

“Look, I don’t believe that you’re doing all of this just to take prisoners for a work camp on the other side of world,” I said, waving my hoof around at the destruction that surrounded us, “and I don’t mean just this fight. I mean the whole war. Maybe if you tell me what it is you’re after, I can help? I know a lot of ponies in the Republic, and I might be able to work out some sort of deal…?” Windfall, super negotiator pony!

“We are trying to retrieve an advanced weapons system that Ebony Song stole from the Steel Rangers,” Hoplite responded in a flat tone that did little to hide his doubt in my ability to resolve the situation. Now that I’d heard it, I shared those doubts, “if you can manage to persuade him to return it, then we’ll leave your little, ‘Republic’ in peace.”

You don’t need to sound quite that dismissive, I thought at the Ranger. I mean, yeah, there was absolutely no way I was going to be able to manage that, but still. Okay, so, I wasn’t going to end a war that had been waging for over a decade in just a single afternoon. Fair enough. Could I at least get him to go away though?

“Okay, I get it,” I assured the stallion, “but everypony here killing each other isn’t going to do anything about that, is it? It’s not like they have the weapon you’re after,” I motioned towards the bunkered down Republic soldiers, “all that’s going to happen here today is a lot of ponies are going to die, and I doubt they’re all going to be Republic soldiers, are they? Are the lives of your ponies really worth throwing away in this useless little skirmish?”

“We pledge our lives to the Cause,” Star Paladin Hoplite replied cooly, “and any one of my knights would be willing to lay down that life in pursuit of it,” horseapples, “you’re wasting your breath, little filly. You’d best get out of the way before you regret getting involved.”

This was my chance to just fly away and let these ponies kill each other. It wasn’t my fight, and it wasn’t my fault. I didn’t have anything to do with the war, and I didn’t put any of these ponies in this position.

Ooh, that’s a dangerous line of thinking there, Windfall, and you know it. You didn’t have anything to do with Foxglove either, and if you’d thought like that back then she’d be...well, you don’t want to think about that now, do you? Homily and her friends weren’t your problem either, were they? You could have turned down that contract; but look what’s happening to the Valley because you didn’t? Ponies have news that they need, and it’s going to make a difference in the lives of everypony in Neighvada.

What if Jackboot had left you to your fate with the White Hooves? Or had just walked away from you the day he found you and you’d begged him to help you?

Sure, I could just turn around and walk away. I could tell that RG would have very much liked me to do just that. Even Foxglove would be telling me to do that right about now.

You just have to ask yourself one question, Windfall: is your life worth risking for a bunch of ponies you don’t even know, and who don’t give a fuck about you?

Be Unwavering!

The hard fact was that my life wasn’t worth any more than anypony else’s. That wasn’t the point though, was it? It’s not about the ‘worth’ of a life―death was cheap in the Wasteland, after all. What mattered was what I did with my life, and nothing else. I had to be able to live with the consequences of my actions, and that was all that truly mattered.

And I knew that I wouldn’t be able to live with myself if I turned my back and a bunch of ponies died because I did it. If I had a chance to stop ponies from dying, then I was going to take it. And maybe, if I was really lucky, I wouldn’t even have to kill a bunch of ponies to do it.

“This is what’s going to happen,” I told the stallion evenly, fixing him with my unblinking gaze, “I’m going to go over there,” I nodded my head in the direction of the fortified Republic soldiers, “and I’m going to march those ponies out of these ruins and tell them to go back to Seaddle. I’m going to do that; and you, and your Rangers, are going to stand right here and let us all leave.”

I heard a derisive snort from within the confines of the green-tinged helmet staring at me, “if you think that we’re just going to let all of you leave here then―”

“The fight is over,” I snapped at the armored stallion, “look around you. Nopony’s fired a shot since I landed. It’s done, and you’ve won,” I swept the scene around us with my wing, “this place is now yours to loot and fortify all you want as far as I’m concerned; and I’ll make the soldiers over there accept that.

“They don’t have your weapon, and killing anypony else today won’t change that either,” I glared at the Star Paladin, “there’s no point in continuing; so let them leave.”

“I cannot do that,” the stallion insisted, and I felt my despair growing. I didn’t want to have to kill anypony today. Please don’t make me have to kill anypony, “they know our position and our numbers. We can’t let that information get back to Seaddle.

“They either surrender...or they die,” my heart sank, “if you truly care about saving lives, you will convince them to lay down their weapons. I will give you five minutes to talk with them, and then my knights and I will assault their position. It would behoove you to be elsewhere when that happens, little filly,” with that, the Star Paladin turned and started walking away.

I heard Arginine step up beside me, “we should leave and let them settle their own affairs,” he said.

“It’ll be a bloodbath,” I whispered, “on both sides…”

“How is that any of your concern?”

“Because I know about it,” I responded, forcing a wan smile as I heard the stallion echo my own private thoughts allowed. The look of confusion on his face prompted a sigh as I turned and started walking towards the factory’s offices. An irritated gray stallion followed behind me, “if I don’t like the idea of your Stable going around killing a whole bunch of ponies, why do you think I’d be okay with anypony else doing it?”

“They are your own kind.”

“That’s supposed to make it okay?” I frowned at the unicorn, “ponies’ll still be dead, you know. Why should it matter who’s doing the killing?”

“Because stopping this will require you to kill other invalids.”

I nodded, “yeah, and you just saw me do everything I could to try and keep that from happening, didn’t you?” I glanced briefly at the line of Steel Rangers as they organized themselves for the resumption of hostilities, “I don’t want to fight, and I don’t want to kill; but that doesn’t mean that I won’t if I have to.”

“You don’t have to. You are choosing to,” Arginine reiterated.

“Your Stable doesn’t have to wipe out everypony in the Wasteland, either,” I shot back at the unicorn, relishing the rebuked expression on his face, “you’re choosing to; because you think that’s how you can make the Wasteland a better place. Am I right?” the gray stallion gave a slight nod, but said nothing, “well, here’s my method of improving the Wasteland: try to keep as many ponies alive as I can, even if that means that I may have to kill a few of them to do it.

“I may not be ‘perfect’, like you, but I am trying to be a better pony.”

I turned my gaze now from RG to the half-demolished first floor of the office building that the Rangers had taken refuge in. I waved a friendly hoof, “heya! I heard your message on the radio; figured I’d lend you fellas a hoof.”

A pony peeked their head out from behind what was left of the brick window they’d been taking cover behind. My eyes widened slightly as a glimmer of recognition flickered across my mind, “hey, you’re...Picatinny, right?” I trotted up to the bemused looking Republic soldier and extended a hoof, “I’m Windfall, we met outside my family’s old house a few months ago?” I actually managed to genuinely chuckle now, “helped you out with a Steel Ranger problem then too, as I recall…”

The pony blinked several times, and then their eyes widened, “Wind…? You were with that White Hoof we were tracking down!”

“That’s right,” I nodded. Then I looked around, “does that mean Ramparts is here too? Ooh! I have some good news for him!” I looked like I was going to be able to deliver Yatima’s message in the flesh after all!

“...Lieutenant?” the pony called out with a note of uncertainty, “Somepony’s here to see you.”

“What the fuck are you talking about, Pica―you?!”

The familiar brown earth pony stallion popped into view, descending from a set of stairs that led to the floor above. He had been carrying a roll of wire in his mouth; a roll which fell out when his jaw went slack upon seeing my smiling form waving at him.

“S’up, Ramparts! Long time, no see. Oh, and have I got some good news for you!” then I grimaced, “but...maybe first we should talk about your Ranger problem.

“So, um, I just had a chat with them, and they’re willing to accept your surrender,” I didn’t even bother to wait for an answer. I had fully anticipated the looks of disgust that I received upon even deigning to make mention of the term, “but since that’s not going to be an option, I figured you guys could use another gun; and I brought a pair of ‘em,” I lifted my wings and showed off my armament.

“They’re also going to start shooting in, like, two more minutes, so...what’s the plan?”

The lieutenant and each of the other four ponies who were set up on the firing line were all staring at me now. Ramparts was the one who managed to recover first, “um...the plan is win the fight and not all die.”

“Good plan,” I nodded, “I like it,” I paused for a beat, “...how?”

“By falling back and luring them inside so that their heavy weapons are mostly negated,” he explained, still eyeing me with a little a curious look, as though he couldn’t quite decide if having this young little pegasus ‘helping’ him and the rest of his squad would actually prove to be an asset in the fight, “we have three more floors of hallways and offices to work with before we reach the roof. We’ll draw them into as many fatal funnels as we can and hold them there until they finally push us back to the next one.

“We should be able to whittle them down enough that they’ll eventually be unable to get through. At that point, we can try to go for a breakout and get out of here.”

I felt myself frowning. Ramparts sounded like he was expecting the fight to go very poorly, honestly. I could see why too. His plan was effectively just a series of delaying actions while they kept falling back until they had nowhere else left to fall back to; all the while hoping that they killed enough of the Rangers to even out their odds. In fact, the only way that this ended well for the Republic forces was if they managed to kill somewhere near three quarters of the Rangers who would be attacking them; and I doubted that those armored ponies were going to just throw themselves down hallways full of bullets and explosions like a horde of ghouls.

Honestly, if I was on the Ranger’s side, I’d refuse to play their game. I probably wouldn’t even have to if I had the sort of gear that they did. Experimentally, I trotted over to a nearby interior wall and gave it a stiff buck. As I pretty much expected, my hind hoof went clean through the ancient half-rotted drywall. I peered at the small amount of destruction that I had just wrought and then glanced at Ramparts.

“This isn’t some sort of fortified bunker,” I pointed out, “this place is ancient, and it’s falling apart. Those Rangers could literally just walk through any wall in here that they wanted with that barding of theirs. They aren’t going to just trot down any trail you leave for them to follow.”

The Republic officer looked at the hole that I had just made, his expression sour as he realized that his whole plan had just had its legs taken out from under it. His eyes went back to me, “I take it you have a better plan?”

I looked around at the crumbling lobby that we were standing in and nodded, “like I said: this place is falling apart. We may as well help it along,” I smiled at the dubious soldiers around me, “let them get to about the third floor or so, and then take out the supports holding everything up. Send them crashing to the ground and bury them in the rubble.”

There were a few hopeful expressions that I could see appearing on their faces, but Ramparts himself was still a little skeptical, “with their power armor, are you sure a fall like that will kill them?”

“Probably not,” I admitted. Personally, I was kind of hoping that most of them would actually survive the collapse with only mild injuries, if that. Killing a whole bunch of ponies wasn’t my goal here, “but it’ll stop them long enough for you to get your ponies to safety,” I pointed out, taking a much sterner tone with the office, “I’m just your friendly neighborhood Wonderbolt here to help you all get out alive, not win your damn war.”

Lieutenant Ramparts grimaced at that revelation, but after a few moments of thought, he finally nodded, “it’s not like I’m in a position to turn away help,” the stallion admitted, “fine. We’ll do things your way. Take charge of things down here,” he turned his head back up the stairs, “change of plans, corporal! Rig the charges on the inner supports,” he trotted up the stairs, “we’re going to do some remodeling…”

I blinked and glanced around, aware that many of the other ponies that had been maintaining the defensive firing line on this floor were now looking at me expectantly. They were waiting for me to give them their new assignments, I realized. Had I...just been given a battlefield commission?

“So―” I cringed at the slight crack in my adolescent voice that had yet to fully settle into its new range and cleared my throat, pretending that I’d always sounded this deep when I spoke, “so, yeah, change of plans. We’re still going to need to draw the Rangers inside, but we won’t be trying to hold them in one place for too long anymore. The trick is getting them to follow us up, and get them where we want them.

“Way I figure it, we want them thinking you’re all running scared the moment they start things back up. So you ponies need to panic,” I rolled my eyes at the mildly disgusted looks I was getting, “no, seriously, you all need to freak out and run for the hills. They’ll chase after you, thinking they got you good and scared. Then, once we’ve got them where we need ‘em, you’ll turn around and hold that line like you’ve been doing here.

“They’ll be so surprised that they’ll hold up long enough for us to drop the building out from under them,” I smiled, seeing some of the soldiers looking a little more satisfied with the new plan, “once they’re down and out, you can all make a clean getaway back to Seaddle or wherever.”

“Or we could go down there and finish them off,” one of the soldiers suggested, receiving several grunts of agreement from her comrades, and a stern glare from me.

“No!” I snapped at the mare, ignoring the looks of consternation I got from those that had found her notion amenable, “I am here to help you get back to your families, not murder helpless ponies,” that’s my job, I thought to myself as my mind replayed what I’d done to that Lancer stallion, “once they’re down, you get out. End of discussion. Got it?”

There was grumbling―a lot more of it than I liked―but nopony voiced an overt objection, so I took that as a win. My eyes then went to my pipbuck’s clock, “we should get ready,” I muttered, “they’ll be starting up again in―”

My head whipped up as a piercing whistling sound carried through the air. Somepony was considerate enough to shout, “get down!” just before the missile struck the side of the building. I, however, was far to slow to react, and could only watch in horror as a torrent of brick and debris arced towards me…

...only to bounce around and away from me amid a pool of shimmering golden light as those fragments of wall were deflected by a magical barrier. I blinked and looked around, my eyes falling on the large gray stallion standing behind me, his horn flaring with a bright amber aura as his critical eye glared at me. Arginine had just saved my life, I realized. Again.

“Thanks,” I said meekly to the stallion.

He snorted, “if you die, I die,” was his tart reply, which prompted an internal wince.

The air around me was saturated with smoke and dust left over from the explosion. All around, gunfire crackled, even as crimson lances of magical light pierced through the smoky haze, gouging charred craters on the walls and pieces of ancient furniture behind us. Republic soldiers were on their hooves, battlesaddles and floating weapons spitting back bullets at the advancing armored ponies. The disparity in firepower was profound; the mechanically augmented barding of the Old World relics allowing them to support much more destructive weapon platforms. Yet, even in the face of that devastation, the Republic soldiers held their ground and continued to fire back at the enemy.

It was commendable.

It was also not part of the plan. These ponies were reacting to the threat on instinct, I realized. They’d been shot at, and so they had to hunker down and shoot back and not give up any ground that they didn’t have to in the face of their adversary. It was what those who had pledged themselves to Princess Luna were expected to do, after all; even unto the last pony.

Not today though, “fall back!” I screamed at the top of my lungs so that I could be heard over the din of the battle raging around me, “upstairs, now!”

I hopped up into the air and commanded my own weapons to load my preciously scarce explosive rounds as I took up position to cover the retreat of the Republic ponies. Overlayed at the bottom of my vision was a scattering of crimson blips that corresponded with the armored figures charging towards me. I was committed now, it seemed. With a grimace at the wastage, and a sharply issued order, I swept the ground in front of the line of advancing Steel Rangers, creating bright green geysers of explosive energy to erupt in front of them. Many of those armored ponies balked at the sudden appearance of the strange new weapon, which bought us the precious seconds that we needed to get up the stairs.

Arginine and I were the last up, the large gray stallion erecting his shield once more as the Steel Rangers recovered from their initial shock and resumed shooting. The otherwise invisible barrier shimmered and sparkled with such ferocity that I was certain that it would give out at any moment. Judging from the strained expression on the unicorn’s face, it very well might have. Finally the Republic soldiers ascended to the second floor, and the pair of us were able to follow after them.

We charged up the stairs, only to find that the uniformed ponies had set up a small firing line, much like Ramparts’ original plan had called for. I snarled in frustration, “we have to keep going!”

The lieutenant’s head popped out into the hallway, followed soon by the rest of him, “the charges on this floor aren’t done being set yet,” he explained, “they have to be placed right, or it’s not going to work,” he quickly checked the magazines feeding into twin automatic rifles mounted to his battlesaddle and took up a position with his other ponies.

This hall was so narrow, and the Republic ponies so exposed, that there was no way most of them weren’t going to be obliterated by the first Steel Rangers to run up the stairs. I looked back around at Arginine, “put your shield up again and protect them,” I told the slate gray stallion.

His golden eyes narrowed at me and he said, “I care nothing for these invalids,” a sneer creased his features, “it’s your own death that affects me, not theirs’.”

I blinked at the stallion and then glared back at him. Without saying a word, I slowly and deliberately fluttered in front of the line of ready soldiers, placing myself between them and the soon-to-be-appearing Steel Rangers. The Republic ponies looked concerned and confused, while RG favored me with a baleful expression of his own. However, I did see his horn begin to glow. Satisfied, I nodded my head and fixed my gaze down the hallway, straightening up and throwing my wings open to either side.

“The rest of you should pull back as far as you can,” I warned, “this might not last very long.”

There was a long pause, and then Ramparts’ voice spoke, “into the cube farm,” he said in a low tone, “stay out of sight until it’s time to move up to the next flight.

“Are you sure you’ll be alright?” I heard the lieutenant ask in a louder voice meant for me.

I turned my head back and flashed the group of soldiers a wry smile that didn’t accurately reflect at all how I was feeling about this moment, “um, professional Wonderbolt here? I know what I’m doing,” I have no idea what I’m doing. This is so stupid.

“Let’s move, ponies,” Ramparts barked, and the group of soldiers cantered quickly out of sight, leaving only me and the large white-maned stallion standing in the hallway.

“Even my own powers are limited against the weaponry they can bring to bear,” RG cautioned me through gritted teeth, “I can hold the shield for only a few seconds if they start shooting.”

“‘Perfect pony’,” I scoffed at the stallion, though I was keen to keep his warning firmly in mind. To that end, I plucked one of the blue-banded grenades off of my barding and held it firmly in my mouth so that the Rangers wouldn’t miss sight of it. If anything should give them pause, it should be one of the few weapons that could quickly and effectively render them impotent in their magically-powered barding.

A pair of the armor-clad ponies charged up into view, energy weapons poised and primed to fire as they emerged into the hallway. However, they quickly skidded to a halt when they found a sight they hadn’t quite expected: a lone filly and an unarmed unicorn standing calmly in their way.

“This is your last chance, fellas,” I said around the stem of the apple-shaped grenade clutched in my teeth, “turn back now, or things’ll go bad for you.”

Another pair of Steel Rangers appeared from the lower floor, followed almost immediately by the uniquely proportioned Star Paladin Hoplite in his green accented helmet. He seemed rather curious why his other Rangers weren’t shooting at anything, and then he spotted me.

“You were foolish to remain, little filly,” the augmented voice grumbled as the barrel of the grenade launcher trained itself on my head, “and you should not have thrown your lot in with these Republic fools.”

“I haven’t thrown my ‘lot’ in with anypony,” I insisted, shaking my head before returning a defiant gaze at the towering armored figure, “I’m here to try and keep everypony alive. Go away, and you can help me do that, Hoplite. I don’t want to hurt any of you.”

“The feeling is not mutual.”

Oh, horseapples!

I flinched away as the Star Paladin’s weapon opened up, raking Arginine’s defensive barrier with a hail of fire. While his shield may have stopped the explosive rounds and kept the more lethal effects of their detonations from shredding the pair of us into pony mulch, they did shake the entire building. A wall of dense smoke formed, borne from the myriad of grenades. This cloud of smoke began crackling with red lightning shortly afterward as the other rangers opened fire with their energy weapons.

Then, with only a pained grunt as my warning, Arginine’s barrier disintegrated. A grenade whistled past me, missing my head by only a fraction of an inch. The cavitation of the air made me flinch all the same as my breath caught in my throat. That instinctive reaction may well have saved my life, as the sudden change in the position of my head meant that the bolt of crackling scarlet death that would have struck me squarely in the center of my forehead instead merely seared the right side of my face.

Even though I had not been directly struck by the lance of magical destruction, several scalding tendrils of the bolt reached out and raked themselves along my cheek and brow. My teeth clamped down as I snarled with the pain of it all in an effort not to openly scream and drop the spark-grenade clutched in my teeth. I flicked my head, my right eye squinted shut, as keeping it open caused only further pain, and felt the blue-banded grenade fly free of its stem.

“RG, go!” I yelled even as I let my body continue to spin with the throw of the grenade and flapped my wings fiercely to propel myself down the hall. Explosions rang out all around me as Hoplite’s grenades ricocheted off the walls and ceiling and eventually careened into something else at an angle sharp enough to trigger their detonators.

A low-frequency ‘THRUM’ and the sensation that every single strand of fur on my body was suddenly standing erect announced the detonation of the spark grenade, and for one blessed moment, the maelstrom of thunder and ruby lights abated. It lasted long enough for us to whip around through the same doorway that the rest of the Republic soldiers had used, and then I could hear Hoplite yelling out orders for additional Rangers behind him who had not had their barding momentarily disabled to advance onward.

I darted around the twists and turns or the maze of office desks and cardboard walls in what I sincerely hoped was the direction that the soldiers had gone in, Arginine cantering hot on my heels. His efforts to stay out of sight were laughable, of course, as the broad stallion towered over everything in the open area. It explained how the Rangers were able to so easily concentrate their fire on us as we ran.

Cubicle walls disintegrated, and computer terminals erupted into fountains of sparks and molten plastic as crimson bolts or energy sought us out amongst the office furniture. This was quickly answered by the familiar rattling of rifle rounds. The speedy orange darts of tracer rounds arced back over out heads in response to the Steel Rangers’ energy weapons, causing their shots to abate somewhat.

“Wonderbolt!” I heard Ramparts’ gruff voice yelling above the din, “this way!”

Taking a pretty significant risk for the sake of time, I leaped into the air and darted over the tops of the remaining cubicle walls. Arginine’s efforts to expedite his own withdrawal were just as effective, if far less graceful, as the large stallion simply charged through the aging barriers, tearing cleanly through them as he followed me.

The three of us galloped up the stairs in quick fashion as I fished the second of my two spark grenades from its retaining pouch on my barding. I then flipped out my wings and hopped back up into the air, flipped upside down and crouching down against the ceiling. Don’t ask me how exactly this worked, because I wasn’t an expert on what pegasi were capable of, oddly enough. I just sort of had the ability to ignore gravity when I placed my feet against a surface and put my mind to it. More than a few raiders had fallen victim to the concept of never bothering to look up when they were sure everypony would be at ground level.

I silently urged everypony else on ahead as I prepared the grenade and waited.

Two armored figures came into sight, charging up the stairs. I pulled the pin on the grenade and held it aloft, ready to drop. Then I was keenly aware of somepony’s head being very close to mine. Taken aback, I looked to the side, and saw the painted green helmet of Star Paladin Hoplite looking back at me. Right. He was a big pony.

“Uh...hi!” I waved the tip of my wing at the Steel Ranger, feeling my lips spread out in a strained grin even as I noticed the automatic grenade launcher pivoting in my direction, “You are, like, really tall,” he wouldn’t really fire that thing at this range, would he? He’d have to be crazy to―

Oh, right, the spark grenade!

The thought had barely formed in my head when the blue-banded bomb erupted while still being cupped in my wing. My whole body jolted from one end to the other and I found myself no longer able to maintain my precarious perch upon the ceiling. I tumbled down to the stairs below and managed to somehow not shatter my spine when I landed. I did hurt though, all over, and the scent of singed feathers filled my nostrils. I gave my wings a cursory glance with my good eye and confirmed that my previously pristine plumage was charred and blackened. Whether this was a superficial condition or a more serious injury was a determination that I was going to have to make much later. Right now, it was time to run!

The armored ponies around me remained motionless, sealed in their temporary steel-plated statues. I scrambled to my aching and tingling hooves and skittered down the hall in the direction of the others, whipping around into this floor’s array of small offices. Once more, I saw several ponies with their weapons trained on the doorway as Ramparts and another unicorn busily went about attaching what looked like bricks of clay to several columns.

I caught Arginine gaping at me and cocked my head, “you are injured.”

I arched my wing around and looked it over. It really didn’t look all that bad, and it barely hurt at all past what I could feel through my tingling nerves, “eh, I’m sure it’ll buff out. At worst I’ll just preen them and let new ones grow back in,” I said with a shrugged, tucking the blackened limb back into my side, “I’ve had worse.”

“Not your wing,” the unicorn corrected, shaking his head, “your eye.”

It was then that I recalled the near-miss with the magical energy beam. Cautiously, I tried to epon it, and almost immediately clenched my jaw and hissed as even that modest effort sent tendrils of pain radiating throughout my entire head. I reached up with a tentative hoof and began to gently prod around my right eye, noting the faint crackling sound, like wrinkling paper, that the touch created. There wasn’t any pain caused by my hoof brushing the surface, but the moment I applied even the slightest pressure, it was as though my face was on fire. I dipped my uninjured wing into my saddelbag and took out a healing potion. The pipbuck’s indicator didn’t suggest that I was all that badly hurt, but the purple fluid should help with whatever was wrong with my eye all the same.

I downed the potion, and I felt the discomfort ebb significantly. However, I still wasn’t able to open my eye successfully. Frowning, I grunted and put my mind to other things. There would be time enough later to worry about the damn eye. For now, I had more pressing concerns: like an squad of very pissed off Steel Rangers who would be coming into the room any minute.

“Not to put too fine a point on it, Ramps, but sooner would be better than later,” I called out the the earth pony lieutenant, “I’m out of spark grenades.”

“We’re going as fast as we can,” the Republic officer snapped, turning to glare at me. However, when he saw my face, whatever else he might have been about to say died away and his expression shifted to one of concern. Did I really look that bad? It was just a graze, I was fine. The earth pony swallowed, “almost done,” he nodded, turning back to help the unicorn he was working with place the finishing touches on that explosive and run over to another column.

I looked to Arginine, “put up one of your barriers over the doorway,” I jabbed my hoof back the way that we had come. The stallion frowned and shook his head, which prompted a growl from me, “do I have to stand out there in front of Celestia and everypony again? Because I will if you don’t cooperate and―”

“It is not a question of my unwillingness to cooperate,” the large gray pony said with a sharp sneer that curled his lip back, “my magic is exhausted for the moment save for the simplest of spells. Even my superior arcane abilities won’t last long against firepower of that magnitude!”

I grunted in frustration as I looked around the office for other options. My eyes swept over the collection of desks, chairs, and filing cabinets, “the furniture,” I said, “everypony pile the desks and stuff in the doorway, now!” it might not be magical, but enough outright crap in their way should at least delay the Rangers for a short while.

I hope…

We had only precious seconds to throw as much junk as we could get our hooves on at the opening leading to the corridor before the Rangers managed to reinitialize the powered armor that their peers wore. Once that happened, those mechanically assisted suits of steel were going to have little problem ripping through the mass of half-rotted wood and brittle plastics that we were cobbling together. It didn’t need to keep them out forever, of course. In fact, my plan sort of required the Steel Rangers to make it through and keep chasing us up at least the one more story before we could put them out of commission in a more permanent fashion.

Once the impromptu barricade was in place, the Republic soldiers took up firing positions further back. I joined their ranks, and reluctantly loaded those precious steel-cored rounds into the pair of submachine guns at my sides. Thus far, I had counted it as a small moral victory to have not killed any of the Steel Rangers thus far, and I was fairly confident that my plan to drop them down to the bottom of the building wouldn’t be especially lethal either. I wanted to get everypony out of this alive.

My ears perked as I heard the now all-too familiar whine of magical energy weapons discharging from beyond the pile of office furniture. I could feel the ponies to my left and right tense up noticeably, their mouth chomping at the triggers attached to their battlesaddles in anticipation of the impending firefight.

Then one of the ancient desks blew apart in a shower of splinters and smoke. Gunfire erupted to either side of me as the Republic ponies poured fire into the hole that had just been created. Flares of bright sparks announced the dozens of lead slugs that found their mark on the steel barding of the armored Rangers beyond. Lances of crimson light responded in kind, briefly illuminating the dim office interior with piercing ruby light before those deadly bolts gouged divotes in the wall behind our firing line.

For several long seconds, I simply stood there, watching it all happen. The raucous din of the automatic rifles to either side of me all but deafened my ears. Staring into the brilliant flashes of the energy weapons momentarily dazzles my vision with every bolt. It was one of the most disorienting moments that I had ever experienced in my entire life, and the anxiety was palpable. I was trapped inside of the cramped building, ponies to either side of me, and the threat of certain death darting past us, missing by mere inches, every half second. All it was going to take was for one of those bolts to strike a warm body, and it would all be over.

I engaged SATS.

The world around me slowed to a crawl. Scarlet beams of energy that would have normally crossed the room in less time than it took a pony to blink now moved at a leisurely trot. Brass casings tumbled casually through the air one after the other in some sort of oddly mesmerizing ballet. I moved my head slightly to the left as a bolt that arced particularly close to me meandered by, and I watched it etch a blackened divot into the plastered wall behind me.

Then I directed my eyes back at the Steel Rangers that were only barely visible through the smoky haze of the barricade’s remains. Ineffective orbs of semi-molten lead smeared themselves over their barding before sliding around and deflecting into the floor or ceiling, their barding completely unimpressed with the soft metal’s attempt to inflict harm. My own hypersonic pointed slugs of hardened steel would reap significantly different results if I used them on the Rangers. Those armored ponies were standing brazenly in the line of fire, in defiance of the efforts of these Republican ponies. There was every chance that the heavy rifle rounds could find the less well protected articulated joints, or even the anti-ballistic glass of their helmet’s visor; but those chances were small on the best of days. In this dimly lit room, through the obscuring haze that existed here and now, they were right to feel invulnerable.

But I could end more than a few of them. Under these same circumstances, I estimated that I had the rounds available to me to kill at least four of those Rangers. Nearly a third of Hoplite’s whole group. Killing was what I was good at, after all. Killing ponies was what I was born to do. My cutie mark told me so.

I queued up as many rounds as my pipbuck’s targeting system would allow me to. Then I paused for half a heartbeat...and fired.

Next to the thunderous pounding of the high-powered rifle rounds of the soldiers nearby, the higher pitched popping of my own weapons sounded positively anemic. Of course, it wasn’t the volume of your ‘boom’ that mattered, it was how sharp you ‘stick’ was; and mine had quite the point indeed. I watched, grimly, as my guns fired, tracking the ripples of cavitated air that the discharged rounds left in their wake. I watched as those steel cores shucked their softer copper sleeves as they hit and continued on through their targets as though nothing had been there to stop them at all.

Ravaged steel and plastic housing exploded outward. Gemstones shattered and spilled to the ground. In a few instances, there were even small magically charged eruptions that left little more than dust behind in their wake. In all, I succeeded in either completely destroying or at the very least disabling five of the Rangers’ energy weapons.

My destiny be damned. Today, I was going to be The Wonderbolt, and not Windfall the Born Killer.

The suddenly silenced energy weapons, and the couple of outright bursts of energy seemed to give the Steel Rangers pause enough to pull back out of sight while they sorted themselves out. I very quickly ordered my weapons to swap over to my sapphire tipped ammunition. I had very few of those rounds left, and they’d only inconvenience the power-armored ponies, but I was completely out of my explosive rounds, and now I had only a couple dozen of the armor-piercing variety left. Once these spark round were exhausted, I’d be left with only my own ball rounds and some hollow-points. Both of which would do less than nothing against the barding that I was up against.

“We’re good!” Rampart’s voice announced over the now more sporadic suppressing fire from the Republic soldiers, “everypony move out!”

We pulled back up the stairs as quickly as we could. I felt an immense wash of relief as we made it to the top floor of the office building. We would soon be done with the fighting.

Unlike the other floors, this one was not a collection of cubicles and communal offices. This was the floor that had been reserved for the company’s bigwigs. Spacious personal offices with placards that boasted impressive sounding titles ringed a massive conference table that was surrounded by what had once surely been very plush and comfortable chairs. Though, after two hundred years, a significant amount of rot and decay had set into the upholstery.

The earth pony officer barked out orders for his ponies to spread out and make certain that they stayed clear of the middle of the room. Most of them took shelter in the enclosed personal offices. This included myself, RG, and Ramparts, who sequestered ourselves in the office that was placed opposite the entrance to the floor. I glimpsed the placard on the door as we darted through it: LIGHTNING DUST, CEO

We closed the door behind us. Ramparts leaned up against it, craning his head so that he could peer through a gap in the frosted glass of the door. In his hooves I could see a device with a glowing red light that reminded me of the detonator associated with Arginine’s collar. All we had to do now was wait for the Rangers to charge up here, and then bury them in the building’s rubble.

I let out a breath that I hadn’t realized that I’d been holding and felt a lot of tension flow out of my joints. I could leave everything else in the hooves of the Republic soldiers from this point on. My eye wandered over the interior of the office that had once belonged to the pony that run this place. It had the expected trappings of a sedentary work environment that weren’t all that surprising. However, there was one particular item that did grab my attention.

At the far end of the office was a tall glass enclosure which contained what appeared to be a set of robotic wings with what I could only describe as rockets attached to them. They looked utterly ridiculous. Naturally, I needed a closer look at them. On my way to the display case, I noticed several framed pictures that had been prominently hung on the wall nearby. Every single one of them featured a teal pegasus mare with a golden streaked mane grinning at the camera, and she was frequently holding up some award or medal of some sort. I had to stop and stare more closely at one of the pictures, which showed the mare wearing Wonderbolt barding. There was only the one though; she was without the uniform in all of the others. In fact, now that I was looking more closely at them, I noticed that the pegasus appeared much younger in nearly every single one of those pictures than she did in the one where she was a Wonderbolt.

Only one other photo pictured her at around that same age or older, and it was an image of the mare standing with a group of other ponies in business suits above a headline that announced the opening of the factory that we were all currently standing in. There was also one other detail I noticed about that teal pegasus in the photo: she had only one wing.

My eyes went to a glass cupboard located behind the spacious desk which held all of the physical awards which were pictured in these frames. After a brief scan, I found what I had half expected to see: a purple heart with the embossed golden portrait of Princess Celestia, ‘For Wounds Received in Service to the Princesses’. I could only guess at how short Miss Lightning Dust’s military career had been. It seemed that she had at least moved on with her life though. Good for her.

Again I looked to the metal wings which held a place of prominence in the office. This was surely the culmination of a great undertaking by this company to be featured like this. I stepped closer and examined them, noting a simple engraved placard at the bottom: ‘Gale Force X2000WP’. I presumed that was the name assigned to the contraption before me. The I noticed that there was a picture near that placard showing Lightning Dust herself with this device strapped on.

So, these were supposed to be something that allowed an otherwise flightless pony to get into the air, huh? I frowned and narrowed my gaze at the device. No, that wasn’t...entirely accurate. There were clearly visible straps on the underside of the steel pinions which clearly could only have been meant to be attached to the natural wings of a pegasus or maybe even a griffon. In any case, this wasn’t explicitly for earth ponies or unicorns. It wasn’t just a set of wings either, there was a whole lattice of claps and wires that were intended to be attached to a pony’s forelegs. What they were for, I could only guess. It was clear that this had been intended as more than a simple prosthesis though.

My attention was suddenly drawn to Ramparts as I noticed the earth pony suddenly grow more tense. His hoof hovered over the button for the detonator, his eyes glued to his peephole. My ears perked as I heard the heavy metallic sounds of the Steel Rangers outside walking around.

Then Hoplite’s deep voice drifted through the door, “spread out and find them! Bring that damn pegasus to me; I’m going to pluck that filly myself!”

I frowned. Seriously? ‘Plucking’? Why did that seem like the go-to threat that ponies used when plotting ways to torture me? I could think of, like, a dozen other things that would be a whole lot worse than having my feathers ripped out. It’s not like I didn’t lose most of the damn things every year when I molted anyway. If they really wanted to hurt me, they could―

“Then I’ll rip her wings off and make an earth pony out of her!”

...yeah. That would do it. I would definitely not like that very much. Well played, Hoplite. Well played.

Mister Hoplite was not doing much to endear themselves to me right now, “any time you’re ready, Ramps,” I murmured to the brown earth pony, drawing a brief look of annoyance from the stallion before he grunted and depressed the button on the transmitter that he was holding.

There was a deafening explosion, that shook the building, and I felt the whole floor beneath my hooves heave. Then there was a half a heartbeat of silence and stillness that lasted just long enough for me to begin to wonder if something hadn’t gone wrong with the detonation. Then there was a second, much more violent, explosion that threw wood and plaster and bits of conference table into the air around the Steel Rangers. The floor beneath them vanished, swallowing the armor-clad ponies down into a dense cloud of debris. It wasn’t just the Rangers that were drawn down either.

The three of us scrambled back away from the door as the office floor beneath us began to sag. The door and most of the wall leading to the conference area outside disintegrated and collapsed, leaving us to stare into the cavernous emptiness that now existed where the interior of an office building had been. Ors was not the only hiding place to suffer either. The face of nearly all of the enclosed offices had been peeled away, allowing us to see the surprised and concerned expressions on the faces of all of the Republic soldiers.

What I couldn’t see were any Steel Rangers. Cautiously, I crept to the edge of the abyss that had just been created and peered down. The air was still churning with so much dust that I couldn’t actually see anything of note through it, but my pipbuck’s overlay allowed me to glimpse the status of the Rangers that had fallen. I had never bothered to take a hard count before, and a couple of the blips were too close together to even get a firm number now; but it was clear that at least most of the ponies had indeed survives. I couldn’t fathom any of them getting up anytime soon though.

“I think that did it,” I noted, glancing back briefly at Lieutenant Ramparts as he joined me at the lip of the casm.

“You might be right,” the stallion nodded. His eyes scanned the scene below with a scrutiny that suggested he could make out a lot more detail than he should have been. Then I recalled that this pony also wore a pipbuck. He could see the blips just as clearly as I could.

“This is your chance to get your ponies out of here,” I pointed out, “they won’t be down for long. If you’re far enough away, they probably won’t go after you.”

“Probably,” he nodded. Then he glanced across the gaping hole, “Picatinny! Find Cypher’s radio and see if you can get a message out to Watch Tower. The rest of you, get down there and secure those prisoners!”

“Prisoners?” I gaped, caught off guard by the order he had given, “hey, wait a minute, I didn’t do this so you could take prisoners! You’re supposed to get away and go back to Seaddle!”

The brown stallion looked at me, “I’m grateful for your help, but I’m not going to throw away an opportunity like this. One of those Rangers is a Star Paladin. Their barding will have the latest encryption codes for their comms and their most recent deployment plans. That’s in addition to whatever they may know personally. I can’t let this chance slip through my hooves. It could turn the tide in the war,” he edged closer to the hole and searched for a way down, “you had a good idea there, kid. The Republic owes you a great debt.”

My heart sank as I watched the stallion leap down. This wasn’t what I had intended. Nopony was supposed to be anypony’s prisoner. Everypony was supposed to get back home.

“You do not looked pleased.”

I glanced back at the large gray stallion standing behind me, “I’m not. This wasn’t how it was supposed to go.”

“You achieved victory over a superior enemy force and sustained no casualties and only moderate injury to yourself,” Arginine noted, “this was a commendable achievement. It could not have gone better, in my estimation.”

“The Republic soldiers were supposed to go home,” I said, “not take the Rangers prisoner.”

“They seek to learn from their foe.”

I winced, recalling how the stallion’s own kind sought to ‘learn’ from the ponies who dwelt in the Wasteland. Given what I’d learned from Foxglove of the state that she’d found Jackboot in when she’s rescued him from Republic captivity, I idly wondered how differently these soldiers were likely to go about ‘learning’ from the Rangers.

My head hung low. I’d just...I’d wanted things to be better for everypony. Why couldn’t they be better…?

“Hey, watch out!”

The surprised outburst was followed almost immediately by a few sporadic gunshots and then the sound of something soft and fleshy being dropped from a tall building. I snapped my head up just in time to see a Republic mare go sailing through the air, vanishing beyond my line of sight into one of the offices, followed by the shattering of glass and furniture. My eyes wide with surprise, I looked back down into the cavernous opening that had been created. The dust had since settled, and I could now clearly see three uniformed Republic soldiers circling around a lanky figure clad in power armor, wearing a painted green helmet.

Hoplite was not the sort to be kept down for long, it seemed.

His barding was scuffed and dented in ways which it had not been before, and the Ranger’s automatic grenade launcher was a complete wreck. However, that did not seem to be of any concern to the absurdly tall pony, who was taking full advantage of the close quarters and his hydraulic-assisted limbs. The three soldiers with him, which included Ramparts, were scrambling to get out of his reach, but the uneven terrain presented by the mound of rubble the collapse had created was severely hampering their efforts. As I watched, one unfortunate stallion was swept aside, their body colliding heavily with one of the few remaining intact columns holding up the building. He fell limply to the floor and did not make any move to get back up.

They were going to be torn apart, I realized.

I had to act fast, “load spark rounds five round burst both barrels fire!” the servos of my weapons whirred and whined as they worked to comply with my orders, and then ten tiny sapphire motes of light splattered themselves all over Hoplite’s right hindquarter. The joint seized up for a brief few seconds, instantly hobling the lanky stallion.

Ramparts seemed to have recently acquired enough discretion to not want to push his luck any further than he just had. He and the other soldier scampered out of the Steel Ranger’s reach, collecting their fallen comrade as they went. Meanwhile, the Star Paladin turned his helmet’s stern gaze up to me.

Well, at least I was up here, and he was all the way down there. Realistically there shouldn’t be any way for him to get up here―

Hoplite raised an armored hoof. A moment later, a quartet of articulated digits sprang out from well-hidden recesses in the barding. Every other limb followed suit, and then he launched himself at the side of the casm, and began to claw his way up to me.

“Oh, come on!” I cried out in consternation. That was cheating!

My outrage was short lived, however, as it seemed that the Star Paladin could move in this fashion with startling speed. I had only enough time to process my sense of aggravation at the discovery of the previously hidden ability before the armored pony’s head and upper torso shot up in front of me.

“Your interference stops here, pegasus!” the distorted voice snarled just as one of them articulated hooves shot out and wrapped their strong steel digits around my throat. Another arced out and took hold of my scorched wing, twisting it up painfully. He really was going to rip off my wings!

“Furlarughfur!” I gurgled in an effort to issue an order to my guns. Of course, even as I got out the garbled words, I knew that the command would go unheeded. Before my panic could overwhelm me, I engaged SATS and bypassed the need for audible orders by using the mental ones that the pipbuck processed instead. I wasn’t going to be able to empty the magazines like I had initially intended, but a couple dozen bullets were better than none!

Indigo bursts peppered the Star Paladin’s chest, but it did nothing to release the grip that he had on me unfortunately. I did notice that most of his body seemed to have seized up though. The muffled screams of outrage that were echoing from the confines of the green helmet without the aid of the speaker system suggested that I had disabled quite a few of the Ranger barding’s systems.

I mentally cocked my head. Was it me, or did Hoplite’s voice not sound nearly as deep as I had expected it to?

The floor started creaking, which drew my thoughts back to more pressing concerns. The Ranger might have been frozen still, but it seemed that they were still going quite a bit more moving than I would have liked. Specifically, the floor was about to give way and send us both off the edge. While Hoplite would certainly be relatively unscathed, encased in his armor like he was, I was less optimistic about how I would fair from the experience.

I backpedaled as best I could, but there was simply no way that I was going to be able to hold up what was more than likely over a thousand pounds of Steel Ranger power armor all on my own. This...was going to be painful.

My vision filled with a golden aura. Metal screamed and protested as those articulated digits were folded back off of my throat and wing. Then a brilliant topaz ball slammed into the Steel Ranger’s chest and sent Hoplite tumbling back down the chasm. I looked back in the direction that the large glowing orb had come from, and spied Arginine, panting and glaring in the direction of the hole.

“Thanks,” I nodded. I bit my lip, looking out to where Hoplite had fallen. He wasn’t going to be down for long. I needed to get down there while I could and―ouch!

I hissed, looking sharply at my contorted wing, which had sent spasms of pain through my body just as I’d started to flex it in anticipation of gliding down to the rubble below. I wasn’t going to be doing any flying on this thing, and there was no way that I intended to fight Hoplite without being able to dart through the air. This wasn’t the sort of thing that a healing potion was going to be able to cure either. The amount of Med-X that I’d need to dull the pain enough to be able to use my wing would also make me too numb to be able to fly, so that was out. Unless I could locate a new pair of wings around here somewhere, I was grounded!

I looked back at the glass case. Gale Force X2000WP, huh? Well, I sure hope those things went through some product testing, “RG, help me get into this thing,” I trotted over to the display and shattered it with a deft punch.

“Do you even know how to operate it?” the large gray stallion asked as he stepped up beside me and picked up the contraction with his telekinesis.

“They’re wings, I’m a pegasus, I can figure it out,” I assured him, though Arginine’s expression suggested that he was less than sure about my line of reasoning. Seriously though, this thing should be simple enough to figure out. It used magic or technology or some combination thereof to help ponies fly. Considering that they seemed to have been designed by a pegasus to be used by other pegasi, I could only assume that she would make it a fairly intuitive process.

I had to sacrifice my submachine guns to fit the thing, but considering I was just about out of all of the varieties of ammunition that would help me in this fight, it wasn’t a huge loss. I hadn’t quite figured out how I was going to fight Hoplite without guns, but that was a problem to solve once I was airborne. When the last of the straps was tightened, and everything seemed to have been fitted properly, I looked around to appraise the setup. I had initially thought that the wings were made of steel, but they felt way too light for that to be the case. Foxglove would probably be the pony to ask if I wanted to know what they were really made out of.

The two rockets or engines or whatever were nestled up on my back, cradled between the joints of the metal wings. They seemed to be mounted on some sort of pivot as well, and not fixed in place. I wasn’t perfectly clear on how I was supposed to control them, and I didn’t see how actually flapping these wings was supposed to be any better than using my own natural wings. Never mind that the whole idea was that I couldn’t flap one of them. Come to think of it, that Lightning Dust mare couldn’t have either. So then how…?

“Are you ready for it to be turned on?”

I blinked at the stallion, “it needs to be turned on?” yeah, okay, that sounded a lot more stupid out loud than it had in my head. I winced and nodded, “go for it,” I locked my gaze straight ahead and spread out my legs to give myself a more stable platform. I wasn’t entirely sure what was going to happen after all.

The moment Arginine activated the device, I felt the metal wings stiffen and spread out to their full width. At that same moment, there was a hushed whining sound that grew louder and louder until it had nearly passed beyond a frequency that I could hear.

That was it.

Nothing else happened. Frowning, I craned my head around and examined the contraption. It was illuminated with a lot of flickering lights now, suggesting that it was powered up. Whether or not it was working properly, I had no idea. I reached up with one of my forehooves to pat down the straps and make sure everything was in place. This thing might have some sort of safety or―

My right wing curled around in front of me. I froze in place and blinked. Cautiously, I put my hoof back on the ground again, and watched the wing slowly straighten out once more. Okay. So that explained how they moved, I thought, looking down at the harnesses encasing my forelegs. But how does it actually fly…?

Experimentally, I hopped up into the air. Instantly, the metal wings were enveloped in blue light and those engines on my back thrummed to life like they hadn’t before. Arginine took several prudent steps back, looking rather concerned, “I would appreciate it if you would see fit not to get yourself killed,” I looked back at the stallion and cocked an eyebrow. Was he concerned about me? “It seems unfair that I should die because you are inexcusably reckless,” nope.

I grinned at him, “relax, I’ve got this!” I raised my hoof and threw a mock salute at the stallion...which promptly set me rolling in place as my wing folded in and one of the engine’s pivoted. I immediately shot the leg back out into a neutral position, but even in that brief second, I had managed to roll myself nearly a half dozen times. The rest of the world took a little longer to settle down again. I smiled sheepishly at Arginine. The stallion swallowed and went to go sit down.

In any case, I had an absurdly lanky pony to take down before he killed everypony. Now…‘forward’ should work like...yup!

I slowly extended my hooves in front of me and felt myself moving forward. Sure enough, this was going to be a sinch! I put my legs out fully straight ahead―and very quickly regretted it.

That Lightning Dust had either been completely insane, or else she’d had a fucking death wish! Before I had time to realize that I’d made a aeronautical error, I was on the other side of that damn gap in the building and heading for a wall at the speed of ‘SPLAT!’ It was a straight up miracle that I’d managed to get myself turned around and tuck into a ball before impact, forcing the flight suit to take the brunt of the impact. When I was brave enough to open my eyes again, I was cradled in a newly formed nook in the drywall that was perfectly Windfall sized. With only a moderate amount of struggling, I was able to popped myself out of the impromptu cubby and get back onto my hooves.

Okay. So...never do that again. Got it.

The sound of straining hydraulics and shifting rubbled rumbling up from below suggested that Hoplite’s barding had finished sorting itself out. I could have done with a few more hours―or more preferably weeks―of learning how this damn death trap worked, but it turned out that I lived in an imperfect Wasteland.

“Alright. Let’s try this again, and without the crashing this time…” I grumbled as I hopped up into the air once more and felt the wings engage to suspend me above the floor. I prodded my forelegs forward and was gingerly propelled out into the open area where an office building’s interior had once been.

Hoplite was indeed once more mobile. His long neck craned around and the Star Paladin peered up at me. Even through the opaque visor, I could feel the pony’s raw hatred for me. Well, I’m not feeling particularly fond of you either, asshole! In fact, a lot of ponies had pissed me off recently, truth to tell. Time to take out a little of that mounting frustration.

I tucked in my wings and dove at the Steel Ranger. He lunged for me with those articulated hooves of his, but it was filly’s play to weave in between his cumbersome thrusts. I zipped past him, delivering a couple of bucks to his barding as I swooped past. I cringed, feeling the reverberations in my bones and knowing already that simple hoof-strikes weren’t going to me enough. I whirled around and my expression blanched as I saw an armored hind hoof coming at me. Right. Really lanky pony. Really long reach. Oops.

Reflexively, I brought my forelegs up in front of my face to fend off the blow. Looking back, the instinctive block would just have meant that all of the bones in my arms were going to be broken when the strike landed. Fortunately, I had a new set of metal wings that moved to curl in front of me as well. They resisted the impact with a resounding ‘CLANG!’ and I felt the thrusters on my back flare up as they poured on the extra power needed to keep me soundly in place. The result was that it was Hoplite who was staggered by the blow instead.

I blinked, lowering my hooves, and looking out at the consternating Steel Ranger in front of me who was struggling to regain his balance, “this is awesome!” I said, executing a brief twirl as I looked at my new wings, “I am so keeping these thi―uh oh!”

Hoplite went sailing through the air where I had been only a second before. I, on the other hoof, ended up embedded in the ceiling amid a collected of foam tiles and light fixtures. Alright, so these wings weren’t perfect. The accelerator was a little touchy, for one thing...but, beggars couldn’t be choosers, could they? I pried myself out of the drop-ceiling and peered at the ground. Hoplite had recovered from the near-miss as well and was currently clambering up the side of the chasm with startling speed. What the hell kind of pony was he, anyway?!

More importantly: how was I supposed to stop him?

I darted down and zipped away from the Star Paladin. My hooves weren’t going to do anything at all, but I couldn’t just keep this up all day either…

Hoplite stopped mid-climb, turning their head to glare at me through their helmet, “you can’t keep this up forever, little filly!”

“Stay out of my head, creep!” I shot back. To further accentuate my point, I cocked my hooves back in the fighting stance that I had developed for myself, based off of the many lessons that Jackboot had taught me, but tweaked for an airborne pony. A pair of servos engaged to either side of my head, and I felt something move through the wings. I glanced out of the corner of my eyes and felt my expression shift slowly from curiosity, to surprise...to mirth.

“Sooo...awesome!”

I shot my hooves out and darted at the armored pony. He lashed out with a hoof, but I rolled casually around it and drew up just short of his chest. Then, with a deft twirl, I raked his barding with the edges of those alloyed wings...and the foot and a half long razors that had extended along their edges. Metal screamed and sparks flew as those honed edges met the sturdy power armor. Hoplite made another grab for me, and I looped around the steel-encased leg, gouging it as I did so.

Unfortunately, the effort to damage the Ranger’s barding meant that I was improperly positioned to evade the third strike. Something big, heavy, and metal, caught me in my side and sent me tumbling through the air. I skipped off the rubbled twice before I was able to right myself. The engines on my back flared, holding me aloft and I spun to face Hoplite once more. I could taste blood beginning to pool in my mouth. Hopefully, it was just from a split lip.

My eyes studied the Steel Ranger’s barding. I could see the grooves that I had carved into their armor with my cuts, but they didn’t look particularly deep. Judging by the glistening cloudy fluid trickling down their left leg, I had at least managed to nick something mechanically vital there. I couldn’t keep up this sort of exchange though. I was hurting pretty good.

“It’s over, Hoplite!” I snarled at the armored pony, “you’re squad’s buried under a whole damn building, and the Republic soldiers are escaping!” I really hoped they were, at any rate…

“Just stop!”

“Never!” the Ranger screamed. He charged at me, his stride hobbled slightly as the damaged limb of his power barding refused to function properly. He was still frightfully fast in this crippled state though, and I was hard-pressed to evade his lunge. I delivered a couple of passing cuts as he passed, and only just managed to duck beneath a kick that could have put me out of the fight, “I won’t be defeated by a mere filly who thinks she is something she’s not!”

“And what do you think you are?!” I snapped back, soaring up as high as the confines of the building’s interior would permit, “that looks like the symbol of a dead relic from the Old World on your flank. You don’t actually think you’re fighting for what they represented, do you?”

“We are rebuilt,” the Star Paladin snarled, glaring up at me, “with a new purpose! We will prevent the Wasteland from making the mistakes of the past. You wear one of those mistakes even now,” he chided, launching himself up and grabbing onto the crumbling walls as he climbed higher towards me, “do you even realize what it is that uniform represents?”

“They were heroes,” I said defiantly, floating carefully out of reach of the ascending stallion, “they pledged their lives to protect ponies. They’d never fight a war against them, like you’re doing!”

“Pfft!” the armored pony scoffed derisively, “they were fools! They cared more for flashy suits and acrobatic prowess than skill at arms. When it came time to save ponies from even the most basic of threats, they faltered at every turn! They had to be disbanded because their name was so tainted with failure in the opening days of the war!”

Hoplite leaped up at me, and I slipped out of the way. However, they did not arc back down towards the ground immediately, instead latching onto the ceiling. They kicked out with their hind legs, and I only just barely managed to cover myself with my alloyed wings before the blow landed. It glanced off, sending me twirling through the air, and I only managed to stop myself just before I hit the ground.

When I looked up, the Star Paladin was falling straight at me. For half a heartbeat, I thought about evading, but dismissed the notion. I wasn’t going to win this fight by running. Instead, I covered myself with my wings and threw out my hooves. The engines mounted on my back roared and I shot up to meet the incoming armored pony. We collided in midair with a deafening ring of metal on metal. The straps holding my into the harness strained audibly as momentum worked against them.

We fell as a single entity, crashing into the rubble below. I groaned, and tried to stand up and depart so that I could reform a strategy to use against the stallion. Unfortunately, I didn’t make it very far. While Hoplite had clearly suffered for the blow as well, he was able enough to latch onto one of my hind legs with his left hoof and keep me from getting far.

I turned my head around to glare at the armored stallion, “then I guess I’m just ‘rebuilding’ them,” I said through clenched teeth, With a few desperate swings of my alloyed wings, I slashed at the exposed and slightly more thinly armored belly of the lanky Steel Ranger. Gouges appeared, but I still wasn’t able to fully penetrate through to the pony beneath the barding. Then another limb snaked around me and clutched me up against the armored chest, restricting my movements.

“You, like they, are a failure, little filly,” the distorted voice whispered in my ear, “you will rebuild nothing!”

Any retort I might have come up with was killed in my throat as the Star Paladin compressed my chest too tightly for me to breathe. He was going to literally squeeze the life right out of me, i realized! I struggled and squirmed as best I could, but I couldn’t hope to overcome the mechanically assisted grip of the Steel Ranger. It wasn’t very long at all before I felt my vision starting to blur and darken due to the lack of air. The pipbuck’s overlay was starting to flash with all sorts of warning as well. There just wasn’t anything I could do though! Hoplite had me dead to rights, pressed with my back up against his chest like it was…

...the engines!

I threw out both of my hooves.

There was a roar, and my backside suddenly felt very hot. Behind me, Hoplite let out a scream and the arms that had been holding me immediately released me. I was free to make my escape!

Or I could end this fight, I realized.

I latched onto the Star Paladin’s foreleg, much to Hoplite’s confusion, I’m sure, and extended only a single hoof. The left engine thrummed to life and I heard the Ranger cry out once more through the speaker system of their helmet, even as it was enveloped with blue fire from the powerful thruster mounted to my back. I maintained my grip as long as I could; all the while Hoplite made numerous attempted to scrape off the little annoying filly that was roasting his face. An alarm started the blare in my ear. I idly pondered what it could mean when, a moment later, the engine died out and the wings suddenly felt a lot heavier.

My pipbuck flashed a massage in the upper right corner of my vision: ‘GALE FORCE X2000WP: POWER DEPLETED’

Well, horseapples.

One of Hoplite’s hits finally dislodged me while I was distracted by the unhappy message. A solid strike to the side of my face concussed me enough that the Ranger was able to throw me aside. I didn’t even manage to prevent myself from tumbling through the rubble. Groggily, I clambered back up onto unsteady hooves and shook my head, wincing at the pain that caused. I took up a defensive posture and glared in the direction of the Star Paladin.

He didn’t seem to be particularly interested in fighting me at the moment though. Instead, he was busily clawing at his helmet with his hooves. I could imagine why: that thing was glowing orange in a few places, and looked considerably warped from how it had appeared before. Those thrusters seemed to have done a number on it. Too bad I wasn’t going to be able to repeat that performance. It looked like whatever it was that had powered all facets of these wings was done for. They didn’t even move with my hooves anymore. The blades were still extended though. I guess there hadn’t even been enough juice left to retract them.

Only the one wing would move without painful protest though. I let it hang limp at my side while I kept the other ready to shield me from Hoplite’s next attack. Grounded and crippled. This was not an ideal tactical situation.

The Star Paladin finally managed to get their destroyed helmet removed. This was my opportunity, I realized! I finally had access to the vulnerable pony within the armor! As their helmet came away, I charged ahead. By the time to useless hunk of slag that had been protecting their head was tumbling along the ground, I was at their side, my good wing pressing the sharp blade of my alloyed wings against the throat of the…

...huh.

I blinked several times as I stared at the face of Star Paladin Hoplite, who, it turned out, was not a pony stallion like I had initially thought. Indeed, I got the impression that they weren’t actually even a stallion.

“You’re a ghoul…”I found myself saying quietly. For now that I had a look at the being beneath the armor, there was no doubt as to what the leathery flesh and scattered patches of fur around those milky brown eyes could mean.

“And you’re very observant,” Hoplite responded in the gravelly voice typically associated with her dedicated ilk, but it was too high a pitch to have been from a stallion, “any other ‘revelations’ you’d like to share?”

“You’re a mare.”

“Two for two,” she answered caustically, “though I think I should feel insulted by that one,” her hard milky gaze shifted slightly, “care to go for the hat trick?”

“You’re...not a pony,” for there was no way that she could be one. If anything, her ghoulish looks confirmed that beyond any doubt. The proportions of her face were all wrong. Her muzzle was too long, and her cheeks too narrow. Either she was more of a mutant than Arginine was somehow, or Hoplite simply wasn’t a member of any of the pony races.

The Star Paladin snorted, “that’s a foul tip, at best, filly. Too bad; you were on a roll,” her eyes darted briefly to the keen blade that was being pressed rather pointedly up beneath her jawline, “so...now what?”

I still had more than a few questions, but they could wait, “now it’s over,” I said simply, “you lose, I win. Now I get to set terms,” Hoplite’s eyes narrowed, but she raised no overt objections to any of those statements, “you, and all your Rangers: leave. Agreed?”

The not-a-pony took several long, deep, breaths, her eyes looking between me, the honed blade against her throat, and the ruined office building around her, before she finally sighed and nodded her head slightly, “...agreed.”

I retracted my wing from her neck and took a few steps back from from the lanky ghoul. Then my hackles shot up on end as the sound of a rifle cocking echoed across the rubble. I cautiously turned my head to see Ramparts and one of his soldiers standing a few yards back, their weapons trained on us. No, that wasn’t right. They were trained on Hoplite.

“The Republic thanks you, Wonderbolt. Now, please, step aside. We can take it from here.”

The Star Paladin stiffened, and I could feel her baleful glare upon the three of us. I hadn’t said anything about surrendering to the Republic, and now she was feeling rightfully betrayed. Given the position I’d had her in, I could likely have gotten her to agree to an unconditional surrender, but that wasn’t what I had asked for, was it? I turned around and stepped directly in between the pair of uniformed soldiers and the Ranger, narrowing my gaze at Ramparts.

“Drop your weapons,” I growled at the pair of soldiers, “now!”

The earth pony officer balked at the command, “...what? No,” she shook his head, returning a stern look of his own, “the Republic has jurisdiction here. We are taking these prisoners back to Seaddle. Now, stand aside, or we’ll have no choice but to take you into custody as well.

“I don’t want to have to do that.”

To Ramparts’ credit, that last comment at least sounded like it could have been sincere. I sneered at the pair of Republic ponies, “‘take me into custody’?” I snorted, “after everything you just saw here, do you really think you could?” I noticed the mare beside the lieutenant shift uneasily on her hooves at my words. I seized the opportunity.

I charged ahead at the pair of armed ponies. The mare bit down on hit trigger bit, more as a gut reaction to danger than in any sort of malice directed at me specifically. I flipped an armored wing in front of my face, and felt the copper-jacketed slugs ricochet off of the alloyed metal and go zipping harmlessly off into the distance. The moment the burst of gunfire ended, I flung both of my wings out to either side, the adrenaline rushing through my veins dulling the pain in my injured wing down to barely tolerable levels. I hopped up and flipped over the mare, slicing at her withers with the blades attached to my wings. I continued the acrobatic maneuver, rolling up into Ramparts’ side in a singular fluid motion that ended with my right wing curled around the back of his neck, and the edge of the keenly honed edge digging pointedly into his jugular.

I jabbed a pinion at the mare, who was looking blankly at the pieces of her battlesaddle and the rifles that it had held laying at her hooves, “don’t move a muscle!” I snapped. The mare closed her gaping mouth with an audible chomp, and nodded curtly. Then I leaned in close to Ramparts, who was starting to angle his chin up into the air to relieve the pressure from the sharpened edge poking into him. I simply tightened the grip with my wing and made sure he stayed mindful of the threat, “are you ready to talk about this like a rational pony now; or do we have to do this the hard way?” I asked through gritted teeth.

Ramparts’ throat visibly bobbed and he choked out a, “we can talk,” he did not sound particularly happy. Tough. I wasn’t happy with anypony here either.

“Good,” I loosened my grip, but before I stepped away completely, I swiped at his side with my wing and watched the battlesaddle fall away. I heard the crumbling of wood and plaster, and saw that a couple of the other Steel Rangers were just now starting to recover from their ordeal. A few, I noticed, seemed to have their own armaments intact.

“Hoplite, are you’re Rangers going to be a problem as well?” I asked, pointedly flexing my bladed wings.

The Star Paladin flashed a wry smirk, as though she was tempted to capitalize on her forthcoming reinforcements. Fortunately, she seemed to at least have a modicum of honor about her and she raised up an armored hoof, “Rangers, stand down,” the few armored ponies that had pried themselves from the rubble seemed unsure at first.

“Why don’t you help the rest of your buddies while the grown-ups talk,” I snarled at those uncertain Rangers. That seemed to do the trick, and they diverted their attention to sifting through the rubble for their comrades. I looked between Ramparts and Hoplite, “can we talk like grown-ups now? Is that a thing we can do?”

I was met with silence from both ponies, which I actually took as a good sign. As vocal as this pair had been up until now, I was fairly confident they’d speak up if they felt I was treading on sore hooves, “alright then, here’s the deal: I get that none of you likes the idea of surrendering to each other. Fine. The way I see it, you both just surrendered to me anyway. Which means I get to set the terms of your release.”

“Now wait just a―” the mare beside Ramparts began to protest, but it was actually her own lieutenant that raised a hoof and silenced her.

“We did just sort of surrender,” he nodded back at their discarded weaponry. The mare huffed but said nothing else. The earth pony stallion nodded for me to continue, as did Hoplite.

“Awesome,” I said in a flat tone, sparing a brief glare at the mare that had interrupted, “here are my terms: you both leave. Each of you collects your respective ponies, and you go to your respective homes. Full Stop. End of story,” I didn’t see any particularly rebellious looks from any of the ponies, not even the Republic mare. Now let’s see if that held true for the second part of my ultimatum.

“Furthermore,” already I had drawn a couple of frowns, “this little war of yours? It stops,” oh yeah, there was some serious frowning going on now, “this valley has enough problems without you two going at each other’s throats,” I shot a piercing look at Hoplite, who looked like she was going to be the first to voice an objection, “yeah, I get it, they stole something very important from you,” I jerked my head in the direction of the Republic soldiers, holding up a pinion to forestall their own rebuts. I’d get to them soon enough, “and like I said before: I’ve got some pull in Seaddle, and I’m going to see what I can do about it. Tell your boss or whoever that the Rangers need to stay away from Seaddle until they hear from me, okay?

“And you,” I turned now to look at Ramparts and his subordinate, “you’re going to tell Ebony Song that my price for the mission he sent me on just went up! We’ll work on the details when I get back, but if he wants his ‘special weapons’, that audience with Princess Luna isn’t going to cut it anymore. And, just like the Rangers, the Republic is staying put in Republic territory, got it? No more of this recon bullshit!

“This valley has much bigger things to worry about than this little squabble you two have going on, got it?!” I favored all three ponies with a glare, “the fighting will stop, and there will be peace; even if I―”

The high-pitched whine of a discharging energy rifle ripped through the building. My head whipped around just in time to see the brilliant crimson bolt streaking towards me. Moving at the speed of light, I wasn’t going to be able to avoid it in time.

It turned out that I didn’t need to. A veil of gold descended in front of me, and that deadly lance of magical light dissipated harmlessly into the ether. From his high vantage point, still overlooking the rubble pile below, Arginine must have seen what was about to happen long before I did.

My cold gaze fell onto the Steel Ranger that had fired the shot. Why? Why would you do that? I was standing here, talking with both your leader, and the leader of the enemy force that you’d been fighting with, trying to get everypony back home to their loved ones safe and sound. I was trying to help you, asshole! I was trying to create peace! Peace in this valley, even if I…

Even if I, “...have to enforce it myself!” I snarled.

“No!”

Hoplite might have been yelling at her own Rangers, or perhaps even at me. I didn’t care to check which. My world, at that moment, contained only me and the Ranger who had been stupid enough to piss off a pony whose talent was dealing out death to anypony she felt like.

The tip of his rifle glowed with a crimson pinprick of light. I saw no golden aura materializing to surround me again, which suggested that Arginine was still hitting the limits of what his magic was capable of today. That was fine. Something told me the alloy in these wings was good for deflecting more than just bullets. The Ranger’s weapons spat out another bolt of energy, and I threw my right wing in front of me, waving the shot aside. My wing felt suddenly hot, and then it got really cold. I could smell charred feathers. Okay, maybe not as laser-proof as I hoped, but it hadn’t penetrated and killed me.

A third shot, and this time my left wing took the brunt of the hit. The armored pony didn’t get a fourth shot off. I was on top of him now. I delivered two rapid left crosses, bending their head down in preparation for the uppercut with my right. It wasn’t a particularly comfortable feeling, striking metal like this, and the braces on my forehooves didn’t do much to abate the discomfort I was feeling as a result, but I was willing to endure it right now.This pony had just tried to kill me after all.

The Ranger’s head snapped up at the third strike. I spun around, extending my wing and its bladed edge. This was a part of Hoplite’s barding that I hadn’t ever gotten a clear shot at: just below the jaw line. The armor there wasn’t much tougher than standard anti-ballistic barding; which did almost nothing to stop knives and similar weapons. I could feel, and hear, the alloyed edge biting deep into the thin metal of the Ranger’s neck. It cut deeper than just the barding.

Something warm splashed across my face and dribbled down my neck. The armored pony staggered, their hooves clawing uselessly at their severed jugular that was out of reach of their armored hooves. I stood there, in silence, watching the Ranger collapse to their knees, and finally fall over onto their side. One of the other armored ponies whose weapon I had destroyed earlier, or was destroyed in the collapse later, took a step to help their comrade, but I shot a glare their way and arched the bloodied wing that had killed their fellow Ranger. They froze in their tracks and looked on helplessly as the downed pony eventually stopped moving.

I looked around at the other Rangers, and even at the Republic soldiers, resting my eyes finally on Hoplite. The ghoul Star Paladin’s face was a mask of grief, and her murky eyes regarded me with a cold mixture of loathing...and acceptance. Her Ranger had disobeyed her order to stand down. Why? I would probably never know. They probably thought that they’d be doing their commander a favor by removing the only thing stopping them from carrying the day and capturing the rest of the helpless Republic soldiers.

Again I glanced down at the dead Ranger. I tried to be nice. I tried to be a good pony.

Is this what I get for ignoring my destiny? Do I have to kill to get my way? I looked down at my barding, and the crimson stain that was already darkening as it seeped into the once brilliant blue fabric.

“Like I was saying,” my voice was cold and gruff. I cleared my throat and proceeded to shake some of the blood that hadn’t yet dried off of the alloyed wing. I wonder if this stuff rusts? “You can either stop fighting on your own, or I can stop it for you.

“As you can see: my way can get messy,” I flipped my wings closed and tucked them into my sides as I headed for the exit of the building. I’d done what I came to do here. Frankly, I was fed up with all of these ponies, and it was best I got them out of my sight before any more of them tempted fate like that, “spread the word.”

I paused as I was passing Ramparts, “ah, right, I have a message for you from Yatima,” the stallion’s eyes widened at my mention of the name, “congratulations, ‘Dad’. It’s a colt. They’re in Santa Mara when you get a chance.”

I continued walking, leaving the stunned lieutenant in my wake to finish pondering my words, “RG! Grab my shit, we’re leaving!” it was a few minutes before I heard the large white-maned stallion cantering up to me. I suppose that he’d had a harder time getting down from the top floor than I’d had, “help me get this damn thing off,” I told him, extending my wings so that he’d have an easier time of undoing the straps that were holding the whole thing in place.

Arginine frowned, but he complied with the task. I suppose it wasn’t wholly proper for me to treat him like he was my servant or whatever, but I didn’t have anypony else around to help me, and he and I weren’t exactly ‘friends’, so…

I hissed as the alloyed wings and their associated engines were removed from my body. I could even hear the sickening sound of tearing flesh as those portions of the wings that had been struck by the Ranger’s energy weapon were pulled away. I gave the wings themselves a cursory look to see how they’d fared through that onslaught. There was some scoring, and some mild discoloration which suggested the metal itself had been warped or damaged, but nothing had penetrated all the way through. It had certainly done a number on my own personal fleshy wings though…

“Healing potion and Med-X,” I said to the stallion. He rolled his eyes, but obediently fetched these from my saddlebags as well. The potion I drank, and the numbing agent I had him spread between both wings. I wasn’t going to be flying with these for a day or two, that was for sure. The damage was all superficial though, so I at least had that going for me.

It seemed, however, that I wasn’t going to be able to say the same for my eye though. I’d figured that it was just swollen or irritated or something, but that wasn’t the case after all. Arginine was ‘gracious’ enough to conduct an examination of the damage that had been done, and the verdict that he’d delivered was less than uplifting.

“Your eye is irreparably damaged,” he concluded, “the thermal damage to the conjunctiva and sclera is such that…” it was at about this time that the stallion must have noticed my blank stare and sighed, “the front of your eye got too hot and scarred over. It doesn’t work anymore.”

“Can you fix it?”

“My ‘medical’ training primarily involved dissection and examination,” Arginine responded with the tiniest hint of sarcasm, “I can easily extract your eye. However, even if a suitable replacement could be located in good condition, I have never before had the need to reattach one before. Success would be...unlikely.”

Great. Hopefully Doctor Lancet would be able to do something about it, “does it look bad?”

“The injury is quite noticeable.”

In the interests of keeping Foxglove from freaking out too much when we got back, I opted to have the wound wrapped up with some gauze that we had. The violet unicorn mare was sure to be a little concerned about the need for the bandage, but it would at least spare her having to see the wound and hopefully mitigate the worst of her fretting, fawning, and ‘I-told-you-so’ing. I just managed to keep well over a dozen ponies from killing each other. In my book, that level of success was worth what could, in the fullness of time, prove to be only the temporary loss of one of my eyes.

“Do you truly believe that they will stop fighting?”

“Hmm? Oh,” I glanced back towards the factory briefly, “those ponies in particular? If they know what’s good for them, I think they’ll abide by the ultimatum I gave them. As for anypony else involved in the war? Probably not,” I shrugged, “but I bet they’ll think twice if I disrupt a couple more of their fights and word starts to get around,” I idly wondered if there was a way to get word to Homily so that she could have ‘Miss Neighvada’ broadcast The Wonderbolt’s terms to the valley at large.

“Are you not concerned that all you will accomplish is to get them to band against you personally?”

I found myself letting out a mirthless chuckle as I recalled the about the fate of the Lone Ranger. That was how he’d gone out, wasn’t it? He’d pissed off enough ponies to the point where they all worked together to take him down, “at least they’ll be working together,” I replied, flashing a wry smirk at the stallion, “that’s a kind of peace, when you think about it.

“After all: I just want to get them working together long enough to stop your stable anyway. After that?” my wan smile died away, and my tone became more dour, “they can wipe each other out to the last pony, for all I care.”

“That is odd to hear you say, considering how hard you worked to keep both parties alive just now,” Arginine pointed out.

“Oh, yeah, I worked hard alright,” I nodded, not bothering to veil my sarcastic tone, “risked my life a dozen times over―yours too―to make sure everypony got to go home.

“How’d they repay me again? Oh, right! One of them tried to murder me when my guard was down.

“Fuck ‘em.”

The stallion was silent for a long while. Then, “data scatter,” I cocked my brow and frowned at the pony, “I counted seventeen ponies between the Republic and Ranger forces. Only one of them broke faith with the truce you’d imposed. It appeared they also did so against the will of their leader, and without the aid or consent of their peers.

“They were data scatter: their actions should not be considered when judging the results of your efforts.”

I had no reply to this. He was right, I suppose. Only that one Ranger had taken a shot at me, and even after I struck him down none of the others tried to stop me again.

“I recovered these from the office we were in,” Arginine went on, changing topics of conversation so quickly that he about lost me, “I suspect they are related to this device, and may give you insight into its operation, capabilities, and...limits,” he added, eyeing the scoring where I’d tried to use it to deflect energy bolts. I rolled my eyes, by took the data records all the same to review them later in my pipbuck.

“This was with them as well. I am not aware of it having any intrinsic relevance, but I assumed its association through proximity.”

I looked over, and very nearly tripped over my hooves when I saw what the stallion was holding out now. It was a tiny statue of a pony, of the sort that I was familiar with. Exactly how many of these things were there? I reached out with one of my aching wings and took possession of the little cerulean figurine. This one was a pegasus, and her I instantly recognized from the many billboards encouraging pegasus enlistment: Rainbow Dash. Engraved on the base of the smugly posed flier were the words: Be Awesome!

I stared at the figurine as I continued walking. This was the pony that had led the Ministry of Awesome through the Great War. She had been a Wonderbolt, and eventually went on to found the Shadowbolts, the premiere pegasus strike group in Equestria’s war against the zebra threat. This mare was everything that I aspired to be...and she was a testament to how far I fell short. My gaze shifted to the rusty stain of the dried blood on my Wonderbolt barding. Perhaps Hoplite had been right: I didn’t know what I was playing at trying to be one of them.

Sorry, Dash. I promise that I do try to be a good pony sometimes. It’s just...it’s just really hard fighting your own destiny sometimes. If you’re the kind of pony who has a cutie mark that tells her she’s supposed to kill, well, it’s impossible to really be ‘good’, isn’t it?

You can’t fight fate.

My ears were drawn by the sound of hooves clattering along the hard scrabble of the Wasteland. Oh, you have got to be kidding, I sighed. Was I really going to have to kill somepony else already?

I drew out my compact pistol and wheeled around to confront the pony bearing down on us. A brown stallion wearing the barding of one of Luna’s Coursers and carrying the tattered remains of a battlesaddle across his spine drew up short, skidding to a halt, “whoa, whoa! Peace!” his rump slammed to the ground hard and he threw both of his hooves up into the air in surrender.

I blinked, “...Ramparts?” I heaved a heavy sigh and holstered the weapon, “what do you want?”

The stallion relaxed noticeably once the pistol was tucked away again, “first, I want to apologize. You saved our flanks back there...twice, and I tried to take advantage of it...twice,” his soured expression suggested that the lieutenant wasn’t feeling all that good about himself now that he’d had a chance to review what had happened, “that was wrong of me, and it almost got me and my ponies killed.”

“Twice,” I added with a wry smirk.

Ramparts winced slightly, “...yeah. So that was the first thing. The second―”

“Really, it’s sort of the third time if you count Jackboot and I saving you from the Rangers back at my old house.”

The brown earth pony took a deep breath, “...the second thing, is that I wanted to thank you. Those Rangers had us dead-to-rites, and you pulled our flanks out of the fire. We owe you. Not the Republic,” he stressed slightly, “but me personally―I owe you―and so do the other ponies you saved.

“It’s not the first time you’ve done that either.

“Which brings me to the third thing: I’d like to come with you.”

Arginine and I exchanged glances. I regarded the earth pony carefully, “don’t you have a newborn colt to go see?”

Ramparts smiled sadly, “I care about Yatima, I really do; and I can’t wait to see my foal,” he nodded, “but if I went to them without doing...something to pay you back for everything you’ve done...I’d resent being with them while I knew you were out here on a mission for the Republic. You’re the whole reason that colt still has a father, after all!”

“I can’t promise you’ll make it home to them if you come,” I said to the stallion, “I don’t have a habit of going to anywhere peaceful and quiet.”

“I’m a Courser,” he smirked, “my whole career is about going places that aren’t ‘peaceful and quiet’.

“Besides, Courser or not, I’m just a lieutenant. If I go back to Seaddle and report that some crazy pegasus filly is insisting that the Republic and the Rangers maintain an indefinite cease fire because she says ‘or else’, nothing’s going to change,” I honestly expected as much, “but,” Ramparts added, “if I get this weapon or whatever with you, and go to that audience with Princess Luna? I can personally vouch for you and maybe it can really happen.”

Having a member of Princess Luna’s military at my side sure couldn’t hurt my efforts, I decided. Of course, if this stallion really was going to come along, then he was going to have to abide by a few conditions, “Alright. However, ‘Lieutenant’: keep in mind that I’ll give the orders around here, and you’ll follow them,” I said, holding the brown stallion’s gaze with my remaining good eye.

He returned the steady gaze for a few long seconds before finally cracking a smile and nodding, “that’s fair enough,” Ramparts admitted, “alright, Wonderbolt, it’s your rodeo. After what I saw today, I can’t question your abilities.”

“Cool. Oh, and feel free to call me ‘Windfall’,” I reached out a hoof to the stallion, and he took it.

Footnote: Level Up!
Perk Added: Demolition Expert - Explosives do more damage and always detonate on time.
Explosives skill at 50.

Author's Note

Thank you so much for reading! As always, a thumbs up and comment are always greatly appreciated

I've set up a Cover Art Fund if you're interested and have any bits lying around! You can see what I'M capable of, heh; professional assistance is clearly needed here!