"It's a little gift from me Da and Mum. Actually, a few generations before that. Do you like it?"

It was amazing how much bigger the little one-room apartment that Jackboot and I had been living in all these years had felt when it had just been the two of us. It was certainly feeling a lot more cramped now though!

The closest thing to a silver lining that there was was that Ramparts wasn’t here too. He’d taken his leave of us at the gate and instead had gone off to talk with his superiors to get official clearance to come with us and get what supplies he could to aid us on our future trip into Old Reino. That still left four grown ponies trying to make themselves comfortable in a room that had been admittedly ‘cozy’ when there’d only been two of us.

Starlight was certainly less than impressed with the accommodations. Indeed, the pink unicorn had been quite thoroughly underwhelmed by the whole of Seaddle when she’d first seen it. I suppose that when you looked at it in comparison to what must have existed here when all of those surrounding ruins hadn’t been, well, ruins, then, yes, it was a very paltry excuse for a ‘city’ of the sort that she was accustomed to. Still, it was the biggest collection of ponies in the entire Neighvada Valley, and was home also the the most technologically sophisticated society as well. Even New Reino didn’t have the sorts of medical facilities that existed here.

This was Princess Luna’s ‘Seat of Power’ for crying out loud!

Now that was something that had grabbed the pink unicorn’s attention, and Starlight Glimmer had been very boisterous about getting an audience with the Republic’s ruler.

“She’ll know who I am,” the unicorn had insisted, “she may even know where the local MoA hub is, so that we don’t even have to go to Reino.”

That was certainly an avenue that I was willing to try out. If Starlight was as highly placed in the Old World ministry as she was suggesting, then it was quite likely that the Princess might even be willing to give us some real support. Unfortunately, getting a face-to-face meeting with Princess Luna wasn’t exactly as easy as going to her palace and knocking on the door―as I had learned earlier. We’d have to at least wait for morning, at which point we could go and have the staff pass along Starlight’s name to the Princess.

That was for the morning though. Tonight, I was eager to get some sleep.

Foxglove helped me to remove the Gale Force harness, carrying it over to the little corner of the apartment where she’d set up a workshop of sorts so that she could begin making at least some of the repairs that it needed after the trials that I had just finished putting it through. Once it was out of the way, I very carefully peeled myself out my Wonderbolt unitard, so as not to aggravate my wing now that it was no longer supported by the metal framing of the Gale Force rig. I peered closely at the uniform’s right leg, where I had taken the wounds from the shotgun-wielding Viper, and frowned. The uniform had been pretty torn up by the smattering of lead pellets that had managed to reach me.

I glanced over at Starlight, who was munching on some dried apple chips that we’d picked up on our way through the city at a small cafe that had been open late, “I don’t suppose that you can magic this thing back together again?” I asked sheepishly.

The pink unicorn cringed at the sight of the bloodied barding briefly, and then her horn flared. In a flash, the uniform was its brilliant, unblemished, self again. I stared at it for several long seconds, “can you do that with bodies?” I asked hopefully, nodding in the direction of my wing. It’d be nice if she could do something about my eye too, come to think of it.

“Medicinal magic, I don’t know,” Starlight admitted with a wan shrug, “I’m not sure a spell like that even exists. Manipulating ponies’ bodies is something that is very difficult to do at all; and making permanent changes is just about impossible as far as I know. With standard unicorn magic anyway,” she added after a moment’s thought, “I recall some research being done involving Taint and Poison Joke, but I wasn’t part of those projects, so what I heard was mostly rumors and hearsay, so I don’t put much stock in it.”

“Too bad,” I sighed. I laid the barding on the bed and headed for the bathroom. Now that my garments were in pristine condition, it was high time that I did something about my own cleanliness.

Seaddle was one of the few places in the valley with widespread indoor plumbing. Even our relatively spartan apartment came with a toilet and shower. Admittedly, it hadn’t come with hot water at first, but Jackboot had quickly corrected that oversight by acquiring a talisman to heat the water from one of the spigots during an early foray into the Seaddle Ruins. Standing here now, with the refreshingly warm water cascading over my back, I found myself very much appreciating that addition. I didn’t engage in much actual ‘washing’ at first, I just sort of stood there, letting the heat get absorbed into my aching muscles. Meanwhile, I just stared into the mirror nearby.

I was a mess. No wonder everypony had been concerned when they’d seen me after the fight with Star Paladin Hoplite. The scar tissue over my right eye was...significant, to say the least. Something told me that there wasn’t going to be much that even somepony as skilled as Doctor Lancet was going to be able to do for me this time.

My remaining eye stared long and hard into that mirror, tracing over my face and chest. While this newest blemish was certainly the most glaring testimony to the trials that I had faced in the Wasteland over the years, it was far from the only scar I had. An uncountable number of smaller marks dotted my body, creating a great many minor irregularities in what should have been an otherwise silky smooth ivory coat, of the sort that I’d seen on young ponies who’d spent their whole lives living in places like Shady Saddles and New Reino.

Like Starlight Glimmer’s coat, honestly. She hadn’t seemed to have had so much as a single mark to muss up her appearance. I, on the other hoof, looked like...well, actually I kind of looked a lot like some of the raiders that I’d killed in my life: rugged and scarred. It was fitting, I suppose. I’d probably killed a lot more ponies in my time than the average raider, after all.

I thought back over what the pink unicorn mare had told me earlier, regarding her ability to rid me of my cursed destiny and finally free me from this murderous fate. If that was something that was really and truly possible, then maybe that meant that I could give up this way of living and do something besides killing ponies; not that I’d ever given that much thought to what it might be that I would do. I’d sort of made peace with dying doing this kind of thing someday, as much as I might have liked to believe I could move onto doing something else.

Sure, there was always that idea in the back of my head that someday I’d rebuild my family’s ranch and raise brahmin, but I’d never really believed it would happen. Ponies with a talent for killing didn’t run ranches. They just went on killing, until the day they were eventually killed themselves.

If Starlight succeeded though, and lifted my curse, then maybe there was a real chance of living that sort of life someday. It would still have to take care of a few other things first, of course, like stopping Arginine’s Stable from murdering everypony in the Wasteland. Once that was settled though, then I could hang up my Wonderbolt barding and just become ‘Windfall, the Rancher Mare’. Maybe it wouldn’t be as exciting as being some sort of Wasteland heroine, but I wouldn’t have to kill anypony anymore.

That was actually a rather comforting thought, and I kept it in the forefront as I finally went about the task of washing the dirt and grime out of my coat and feathers.

“So what’s the verdict, Doc?”

The black unicorn physician’s face was all of the confirmation that I really needed to know that his assessment wasn’t going to be encouraging. His expression when he first saw me in the Seaddle clinic’s waiting room had hardly been encouraging to begin with. Between the wrap covering my eye and the splint that Arginine had improvised for my wing, he’d had a good indication that I’d had a rough time since my last visit. He’d started by fitting my wing with a proper cast, and a verdict that I would be grounded for a period of no less than three weeks if I wanted to ever fly again. When the bandages came off and he got his first good look at the state of my eye though, I’d seen a little bit of the light go out of him.

Lancet had never been happy about my association with Jackboot, or the sorts of situations that the two of us tended to get into. At first, I had simply assumed that his disapproval had been based entirely on my youth. Now I was a good bit older, and he still gave me a stern lecture during each of my visits. He didn’t remark on my age as much any more, at least, but I suspected that he was just tired of seeing somepony making such frequent visits to his office. In the doctor’s perfect world, I guess he’d rather ponies stayed away from needlessly dangerous situations.

“You drank a potion after this happened,” he was stating a fact, and not asking for confirmation.

“Well, I mean, yeah. I was hurt,” I pointed out, a little curious about why I felt like I was going to be reprimanded for taking medicine.

Lancet sighed, “healing potions aren’t a cure-all,” he informed me, which was information that flew in the face of everything that I’d come to know concerning the nature of healing potions. Predictably, I furrowed my brow in confusion, “you can’t just guzzle them down and expect them to fix everything. In an emergency, yes, they can mean the difference between life and death, but you shouldn’t take them for every little thing.”

“Why not?”

“Because a potion doesn’t always know what’s best for a wound,” he pointed out, “the magic that they are imbued with is simple and direct: heal the flesh. It doesn’t do much for organs and bones in most instances. Case in point: your eye,” he turned away and began to rummage through a drawer in the small examination room, “the potion’s magic sensed that you were injured, and so it did what it could and accelerated the formation of flesh to seal the wound.

“This created a good deal of scar tissue, which doesn’t matter much on legs and bellies, or even livers and kidneys; but affects sensitive organs like eyes a great deal,” when the unicorn doctor turned around again, he was levitating a piece of dark cloth in front of him, “it will never work again, Windfall. There’s nothing I can do.”

I felt my wings slump limply down my back, “nothing at all?” I thought for a brief moment, “but, wait, I remember Jackboot telling me about ponies back east who had mechanical body parts! Cider...nets?” I frowned as I tried hard to recall the unusual word that the older earth pony stallion had used when telling me the stories.

“Cybernetics,” Doctor Lancet supplied.

“Yeah, that’s it!” I perked up, “let’s do that!”

The physician snorted, “I’ve certainly heard of those sorts of procedures. Those medical files that you and Jackboot brought us years ago even mentioned a few of the more basic techniques,” I felt myself getting a little more hopeful, despite what had sounded like a profoundly negative snort there at the beginning, “but there’s no possible way that anypony here could do them.”

“Why not?!” If they already had the files explaining how to do it…

“For one thing: we don’t have any of the actual implants,” Lancet informed me. Okay, that was a good point, “and even if we did, nopony here has ever even attempted that sort of surgery. The risk is too great that we’d do more harm than good. I’m afraid that it simply isn’t a viable option.”

“What about....um, there was a drug that Jackboot told me about that was supposed to regrow whole limbs…” I tapped my head, wracking my brain for the name.

“I assume that you are referring to Hydra?”

“That’s it! Wow, you are really good at this...”

Lancet smirked wryly, “it is my job, you know?” That was fair, “but again that is something that only exists in books and old data files. I know of no source of that substance in the Neighvada Valley. Given what data we have on the Hydra creatures that the primary agents are extracted from, they were a swamp-dwelling species. The Valley isn’t the sort of place you’re likely to find them. Perhaps if it were possible to trade with these distant eastern regions that Jackboot spoke of, there might be a way to obtain some.

“However, I’ve never known anypony who has ever tried to find a way there and returned.”

“Jackboot did,” I pointed out.

Lancet offered a curt nod, “so he claimed, yes. It’s a shame he never brought any proof with him. Say, in the form of these miracle drugs he spoke about…”

I glared at the doctor for a long moment before snatching the eyepatch he was holding out of his magical grasp, “he was a good pony,” I said in a level tone, “he wasn’t a liar.

“He helped you often enough,” I pointed out as I slipped the patch over my face and adjusted it carefully.

Lancet took in a deep breath and issued a reluctant nod, “he did. Forgive me,” his features softened considerably when he looked back at me, “I won’t pretend that I ever liked him much,” the unicorn went on, “but that was more out of concern for you than anything personal. I always felt he was reckless to take a little filly out into the Wasteland like he did. He was putting you in danger.”

I turned my head in search of a mirror, and studied my appearance in the reflective surface. My lip curled in a wan smirk. Between the single piercing blue eye and the black patch, I found myself looking much more like a raider than I had thought last night. Great.

“When he found me,” I said, turning back to look at the unicorn, “my home had just been destroyed by White Hooves. I’d only just managed to get hidden in time.

“Nothing that they would have done to me if they’d found me could have been worse than any ‘danger’ that I was put in while I was with Jackboot.”

Lancet only grunted. Then he cleared his throat, “I see that you’ve taken up traveling with other companions,” he noted. It took me a moment to realize that he was referring to RG, who was currently waiting just outside the room, wearing the scarf I’d gotten him to keep ponies from being nervous about the bomb around his neck. As a consequence of his collar’s relationship to my pipbuck, it had been necessary for him to come with me to see Doctor Lancet. Foxglove and Starlight were out shopping with Ramparts, who was going to take the pair of them out of the city later that day to help improve their capability with firearms.

“RG? Yeah, he’s…um,” my words trailed off as I searched for a way to categorize the large stallion that didn’t raise additional concerns with the doctor. He hadn’t liked it much when I’d been traveling with an older pony like Jackboot. I could only imagine what he’d have to say about my wandering around with a genetic mutant bent on the destruction of ponykind who was being kept in line by an explosive collar I had wired to the pipbuck on my fetlock...

“I do have some simple contraceptive implants, and that’s a rather quick and not-too-invasive procedure,” Lancet offered, sounding surprisingly unabashed about the topic. I shot up and gaped at the physician pony, my remaining eye wide, “not that I’m condoning anything, mind you, as young as you are,” he added with a stern look of disapproval, “but you’ve never cared much for my advice in the past, so I don’t know why you’d start listening now. But I can at least keep you from doing anything more reckless, like getting yourself pregnant while―”

“WHOA!” I exclaimed, feeling that it wouldn’t actually have been possible for me to have said the word loud enough to get across exactly how monumentally wrong the doctor’s assumptions had been, “we are―no! Absolutely not! There is―no! He and I―no! Never,” I asserted, jabbing a wing at the unicorn’s chest, “that is not. Ever. A thing that is going to happen between us. Ever. No,” I took a deep breath and flipped my wings back into place along my withers. I composed myself and cleared my throat, “so, yeah. No implant necessary.

“No.”

Lancet stared at me for a long while before he finally spoke, “...okay. Is there...anything else you do need?”

I thought for a brief moment, “how are you stocked for Rad-X and RadAway? I might need to buy all of it.”

Lancet frowned.

“I heard yelling,” Arginine remarked when I finally came out of the exam room. My heckles immediately went up as I recalled what the yelling had been in relation to, but I calmed myself quickly, “is everything alright?”

“Everything’s fine,” I answered tersely, not remotely inclined to discuss with the large gray unicorn stallion what the increased volume had been about, “we’re going shopping.”

That wasn’t some sort of excuse to change the topic either, there was a genuine need for the pair of us to go shopping. While I trusted Foxglove to acquire the more essential hardware that was going to be necessary for our trip into Old Reino―providing that Starlight was unable to secure a meeting with the Princess―there was one other item that I needed to pick up, and it was going to require Arginine’s presence.

Walking through the otherwise crowded markets with the abnormally large stallion was certainly a very different experience. A lot of the other ponies milling about seemed to take particular notice of his size and odd appearance and gave the pair of us a rather significant berth as we walked. The perpetually contemptuous gaze that Arginine gave the crowds probably helped that along too. I couldn’t deny that he was useful to have around. It was one of the reasons that I hadn’t given him over to Republic custody. Of course, if I was going to insist on having him travel with us to a place like Old Reino, I couldn’t really justify not getting him some protection; if I wasn’t going to give him a weapon anyway.

Arginine seemed to be a little surprised when I finally stopped in front of a shop that sold barding. The grungy-looking earth pony who ran the outlet was pounding out some pronounced dents in a chest piece when we arrived. A sharp whistle drew his attention though. The stallion’s expression was initially sour when he looked up, but then it soften considerably when he recognized me.

“Windfall!” he greeted after spitting the hammer out of his mouth. He stepped up to the counter in front of her shop, “haven’t seen ya in tic. What’s with the eye?” he tapped the side of his face, looking a little concerned.

“Just got a really up close and personal look at an energy bolt,” I smirked, shifting the eye patch slightly.

“Ooh,” he winced, sympathetically, “that’s rough.”

“So,” he continued, shifting topics as his gaze went to Arginine, “who’s yer new friend?”

“This is RG. I don’t suppose you have anything that’ll fit him?”

The armorer stepped back and ran his gaze up and down the other stallion that stood easily a full head and shoulders taller than the burly barding merchant. He curled his lip pensively, “you’re a big ol’ boy, ain’t’cha?” Arginine didn’t respond, but the question had clearly been rhetorical anyway, “well, I sure ain’t got nothin’ metal that’ll fit him,” Sapi admitted, “not unless you want to place an order,” he added, looking over at me with a raise brow, “how long y’fixin’ to be in town?”

I shook my head, “not long enough for a custom job.”

“Hmm,” the barding vendor looked back at Arginine and took on a more thoughtful expression, “I might―might, mind you―have some leather pieces that got long enough straps. They won’t cover all that much of’im though.”

“Something’s better than nothing,” I smiled at the armorer as he turned and went to go and fetch the pieces he thought might be acceptable. As he left earshot to go and rummage through his wears, Arginine leaned his head down to speak to me.

“You are buying me barding?”

I glanced up at the unicorn, “you are smart, aren’t you?”

He frowned at me and looked like he was about to say more, but thought better of it and stood up straight once more. When Sapi returned, he had managed to find a neck guard and some back pieces that had straps just long enough to fit. Just as he had warned, the protection that those two pieces offered was marginal, at best, but it was more cover than he was afforded by his white Stable uniform. Sapi asked if I wanted to put in an order for something more suitably tailored to fit the large stallion, but I declined. Once we tracked down those weapons that the Old World Ministry of Awesome had been developing and gave them over to the Republic, that would be when I finally shed myself of the large gray stallion. At that point, he would be more valuable as a source of information for Princess Luna’s soldiers as they planned out the attack on his Stable.

Though, while Arginine might not need any further protection, recent events had rather brutally clued me into something that I had been neglecting for a great many years, “so...what do you have in the way of helmets?”

“That depends,” Sapi said, considering, “how much of a habit are ya gonna make of staring at lasers?” without waiting for an answer, he turned and fished something out from below the counter, dropping the object onto the surface, “this was dropped off about a week ago. Had ya in mind for it, actually.”

I blinked in surprise as I stared at the helmet that Sapi had presented. I’d never seen one of them up close before, but I instantly recognized it for what it was: an Enclaver helmet. The fierce black angular features still had a polished appearance, which was a rare thing in scavenged barding. The visor wrapped around well over half of the face of the helmet, allowing for an expansive field of view. A winged letter “E” encircled by a ring of stars was stamped in silver on the forehead. I picked up the helmet and gave it a closer look.

“Where’d you get this?” it’s not like Sapi just stumbled across something like this in the middle of the street, after all.

“A pair’a zebras, of all things, stallion and a mare” he said, sounding as surprised as I was by the revelation, “at least, one of them was a zebra. The stallion had a horn, so he must’a been at least part pony, or sommut. Anyway,” he went on, “they came through here ‘bout a week ago and sold off a whole bunch of stuff: mostly Enclave tech.”

“I don’t suppose they sold you the rest of the barding that went with this?” a full set of Enclaver armor would be a fine prize indeed; not that I thought I actually had the bits to cover what it would cost to convince Sapi to part with it. Still, the armorer might be willing to hold onto it for a little while so I could get the money together. While not the focus of our trip, Old Reino would be a prime location to get valuable salvage while we were there.

The stallion snorted and got a rather sour look on his face, “well, they tried to sell me something, but weren’t no barding. That crap was made out of painted wood and plastic,” I cocked an eyebrow but Sapi merely shrugged, “my guess was that it was jus’ suppose’ to look like real barding; because it wasn’t gonna stop nothin’ more potent than’a BB pellet.”

I frowned, looking back at the helmet and studying it more closely. A couple taps with my hoof confirmed that it was the real thing, and not just some sort of costume piece; but that only made me more curious, “real helmet, but fake armor?” I searched the earth pony for answers, but it was clear that he didn’t have any to give me.

“Those two weren’t a very talkative bunch,” he explained, “skittish, though; always looking up at the clouds, like they was expectin’ the whole sky to fall down on them at any moment.”

I considered the helmet some more. This thing looked like the genuine article to me, and it sure sounded like the striped pair was concerned about being caught by Enclavers. How a pair of zebras, or part-zebras, or whatever they were had managed to get their hooves on this, I could only guess at; and I had no idea what to make of the fake barding story. Nopony was crazy enough to actually try to sneak into the pegasi’s cloudbound society, were they?

“You know where they are?” if there were answers to those questions, they’d be with that pair.

Sapi shook his head, “‘fraid not. They didn’t stick around long, in any case,” he shrugged, “so, you interested?”

I sighed. One more Wasteland mystery, I suppose. After a few pensive seconds staring at the helmet, I looked up at Sapi and dug a wing into my saddlebag to fish out my bits, “oh yeah, I’m interested…”

The two of us sat down to a light lunch of tuber stew. I spent most of the beginning of that meal considering my new acquisition, and trying to come up with theories as to why a pair of zebras would have had an Enclaver helmet with them. Unsurprisingly, I came up rather short of truly plausible reasons short of the simple and uninteresting: they found it. Honestly, that only raised additional questions that I would have needed them here to answer; such as where they had found it and whether there had been anything else around. Certainly, the locked-away nation of pegasi didn’t make it a habit of leaving behind their valuable technology that I was aware of.

Those few mysteries aside though, it was a good buy as far as I was concerned. It even fit decent enough. I looked it over, and noticed that it was more than just a simple piece of head protection too. There were obvious technological components both on the outside and within that suggest a whole host of secondary capabilities; but nothing happened when I put it on. I made a note to have Foxglove look at it when we met back up again. Maybe even Starlight would know a thing or two about it, given that she appeared to have worked with pegasi during the Great War.

Arginine looked to be deep in thought as well, though I doubted that it was about the helmet. I was hard to imagine anything that would be occupying his thoughts, other than plots to escape anyway. To that end, I was content to let him sit quietly and scheme; for all the good that it would do him in Seaddle, where it would be a simple matter to track him down―he was a rather unique pony, after all. However, it seemed that whatever he was thinking about was something that he felt compelled to share with me.

“Why did you buy me barding?”

I looked up from my meal at the gray stallion, “because you’re no good to us if you get killed before the Republic can get what they need from you.”

He thought for another brief moment, “would it not be a simpler matter to merely give me into their custody now?”

“Not until I know they’re going to do something about your Stable. That means getting them their weapon,” the corner of my mouth tugged briefly into a small grimace, “and then get them to give up what they took from the Rangers, so that this war can finally end…”

“Your handling of them was...surprising.”

“You mean the Rangers? How do you figure that?”

“You let them live,” Arginine said simply, “and them proceeded to bargain with them. That is not how you normally operate; so far as I have observed,” I quirked my good brow and the stallion elaborated, “I have observed you in four violent encounters: at my Stable’s facility, when confronted by the Lancers, the battle between the Republic and the Steel Rangers, and yesterday’s fight with the Vipers. In two of those, you left no survivors―even among those who ceased to fight. In the third, you took only a single prisoner, as a source of information for further actions against them,” he tapped the hidden collar around his throat.

“However, with the Steel Rangers, you ceased violent action once it was obvious that you held the advantage, inflicting minimal casualties when it was within your power to kill many more of them than you did,” he held my gaze for a long moment, “I am curious about the reason for that aberrant behavior.”

“That’s because the Steel Rangers aren’t really bad ponies.”

Arginine looked a little confused, “it was the understanding of our surveillance operatives that they were the declared enemy of the New Lunar Republic. This was confirmed during the altercation at the factory.”

“That doesn’t make them ‘bad ponies’,” I reiterated after a moment of silence. There was something a little...familiar about this conversation, I thought with mild amusement as I recalled being a little filly and having a similar discussion a long time ago, “not really.”

“Explain.”

“Their war with the Republic, the Steel Rangers are trying to help the Wasteland. They have a pretty weird way of going about it, I guess, but they mean well. It’s the whole reason that they’re fighting the Republic, apparently,” it was nice to know that the war really did have a reason after all this time. In all of Luna’s broadcasts on the matter, there’d never been much in the way of an explicit statement about what the Rangers were after. Not really. Knowing what they wanted, and knowing that there was a chance to finally have peace between the groups was encouraging.

“The Rangers believe that advanced technology is really dangerous. Given what things like balefire bombs and megaspells did to the world, it’s hard to really argue against that. So, the Rangers figure that the best way to keep things from getting even worse is to take away all of that dangerous tech and hide it so that it can’t be used by dangerous ponies. Yeah,” I shrugged, “sometimes they get a little...fanatical about the whole thing and that can lead to violence, but their hearts are in the right place. For the most part, they leave everypony else alone who doesn’t get in their way. They’ll even help out sometimes by going after dangerous monsters in the area.

“They’re trying to protect ponies...mostly,” that wasn’t to say that they couldn’t be a little bit more sympathetic and amiable while they were doing it, of course. Shooting at every Republic pony in uniform wasn’t exactly making life much better for ponies in the valley, admittedly.

“So,” Arginine began, looking at me critically, “you are claiming that you feel obligated to give the benefit of the doubt to groups whose goal it is to help fix the Wasteland?”

I nodded, “well...yeah. It’s what I’m trying to do, after all.”

“Should that not mean that you should be working to aid my own Stable in their mission, then?”

I blinked at the stallion, sillence taking hold of me for several long seconds as I considered his words.

Then I fell over laughing. I wasn’t even concerned about the strange looks that I was drawing from some of the other nearby tables as I struggled to control my outburst and return to my seat, “Oh, Sweet Celestia, you actually believe that! You actually think that your Stable is helping!” I wiped away a tear that had formed in the corner of my eye and finally managed to compose myself again. When I looked at Arginine, it was with anything but mirth though, as I saw his affronted expression.

“You fuckers aren’t heroes,” I snarled at the stallion, “you’re monsters. Literally, yeah,” I waved my hoof at his abnormal size and mutated horn, “but also in the way you look at ponies. You aren’t like the Steel Rangers, you’re more like those Vipers!

“‘Help fix the Wasteland?’” I scoffed at him, “bullshit. You don’t want to ‘fix’ anything. You want to take it for yourselves and kill everypony else that gets in your way!

“You know who else does shit like that? Huh? Raiders. Raiders do shit like that. They kill anypony they come across and take everything that they have without a second thought. Does that sound familiar, RG? Does that sound maybe like what your Stable wants to do?

“What exactly does that ‘fix’, by the way?” I paused for a brief moment, glaring at the stallion, who had remained silent through my tirade, “no, really, I want to know: what does slaughtering everypony in the Wasteland and taking it for yourselves ‘fix’? Does it stop needless slaughter? Nope! Does it suddenly make the world lush and beautiful again? Nope. Go on, enlighten me. Educate the ‘invalid pony’!”

“Not initially, it does not correct the most endemic problems, no” Arginine said finally, “but once our kind has rid the surface of inferior pony breeds, reconstruction can begin again, and the world will know only peace.”

“Oh, really?” I scoffed, “once you’re the only ponies left, after who knows how many years of war, there will be peace. Neat,” I leaned across the table and stared up at the stallion, “and what about the zebras? Hmm? I seem to recall that they were involved in the Great War. Is your Stable going to be ‘peaceful’ with them too? Do they get a pass on your Stable’s ‘cleansing’ of the Wasteland’s ‘invalid breeds’ because they aren’t ponies? How about griffons? Do they suddenly all become peaceful and docile too?”

Arginine’s mouth clamped shut now, and I could see in his eyes that his self-assuredness had been shaken by my question, so I pressed further, “So, after your Stable finishes their war with all the other ponies, they’re going to move onto the zebras, is that it? Wow. Why does that sound familiar: ponies fighting zebras? I feel like I heard about something like that somewhere...weird.”

I slowly sat back down, keeping my rueful eye locked on the stallion, “I didn’t realize the definition of being a ‘better pony’ was, ‘do the same fucking thing that fucked up the whole fucking world in the first place’. Good to know.”

The stallion didn’t utter another word during the remainder of lunch, or on our way out of town to go check on how Ramparts’ marksmareship lesson was going. Judging from the rather long line of empty wine bottles that were sitting unfettered along a wall about thirty yards away from the pair of firing mares, I was going to venture a guess that their progress thus far could be categorized as, ‘marginal’. At best. Indeed, the two of us had arrived just in time to see Starlight Glimmer standing, looking down the barrel of a combat shotgun, as she prepared to take a shot while Ramparts looked on. Foxglove was positioned a few yards away, firing at a line of bottles twice as far out with her own bolt-action rifle.

Starlight’s weapon was floating just in front of her, gripped in her magical telekinetic field. Her magic depressed the trigger and the smooth-bore barked and jerked minutely as it sent its torrent of pellets downrange.

I stepped up behind the pair, and noted that nothing stirred among the bottles. Ramparts glanced over his shoulder, noticing my approach. He leaned in close to Starlight and said something to her that I couldn’t quite make out. The pink unicorn repositioned her weapon slightly, and then the Republic courser walked back over to me, “are you having her practice with blank rounds to get used to the noise, or…?”

“Nope,” the earth pony stallion said in a flat tone as he turned and regarded his pair of pupils, “it’s actually pretty amazing, when you think about it: she’s firing number four shot right now; that gives her forty pellets per shell. At the range she’s firing at, they’ll be spread out about two-two and a half feet in diameter when they reach the bottles. Those bottles are just over a foot apart.

“She has completely missed all of them in six of the last eight rounds.”

I looked back at Starlight as she fired again...and left no sign downrange that any of her pellets had struck anything, “I don’t know how to feel about what I’m seeing,” the Republic courser had a point: Starlight should be hitting something out there when she fired. The pink unicorn lowered the weapon and glared at the offending targets who steadfastly refused to shatter under her torrent of shotgun fire. She ejected the magazine and levitated over another one.

“I’m not very comfortable giving her a weapon,” the stallion mumbled.

“I mean,” I looked over at the earth pony, “she can only get better, right?”

On cue, we both jumped at the sound of the weapon going off, which was joined nearly simultaneously by the sound of somepony yelling in surprise. Our heads whipped around to see Starlight hopping back from the firing line, while her weapon lay on the ground nearby a very recent smear of lead that had not been there a moment ago. Foxglove, who had been about to fire at her own targets, was staring wide-eyed at the weapon as she too took a cautious step further away.

Ramparts lowered his head and rubbed his hoof along the bridge of his nose, “you don’t load the round by pulling the trigger, Starlight,” he called out through gritted teeth, “and what did I tell you about inspecting the chamber?!”

“There’s a lot of buttons and levers on that thing, okay?!” the unicorn shot back, sounding defensive.

Under his breath, so that only he and I could hear, he muttered, “there are two buttons and two levers. How is four ‘a lot’?” louder, he said, “weapons are very dangerous, Starlight; if you’re ever unsure, stop and ask. Please,” again, at a lower volume, he said to me, “she’ll shoot one of us before she ever hits the enemy. It’s like she’s never touched a gun in her life…”

“I’m pretty sure she hasn’t more than once or twice,” I responded just as quietly to the courser. I let my gaze linger over the scene for a while, considering the discarded weapon and the unphased line of glass bottles, “you might have a point though. Maybe we should hold off on arming her for now,” I said with a sigh. We really needed more combat-capable ponies with us. It looked like Miss Glimmer wasn’t going to be one of them any time soon.

“This thing is so stupid anyway,” the pink unicorn continued, complaining loudly as she kicked some gravel at the offending shotgun, “it’s loud and smelly and you don’t have any control over where the bullets go when you shoot them; it’s ridiculous!”

Ramparts rolled his eyes, “that sums up guns pretty accurately,” he said, not sounding as though he was even trying to hide his sarcasm, “but, unless you have a better way of hitting targets at range, you’re just going to have to get used to it…”

Starlight looked over at us and cocked her head, her expression amused, “wait...that’s all you want me to be able to do? Hit things that are far away?”

Okay, wait...was she being sarcastic now? Honestly, it was very hard to tell, because while the question was worded so that it could have been rhetorical, the actual tone of her voice sounded like she was genuinely looking for clarification. Ramparts and I exchanged a brief look, the stallion clearly wondering the same thing I was, and his expression suggesting that he was going to take her response as being insubordinate―despite Starlight not being in the Guard, or even a pony under his command. I chose to be the one to respond, “that is kind of the idea,” I said, trying not to sound too condescending, “it’s generally smart to try and kill threats while they’re further away. Up close and personal is usually a ‘last resort’ kind of thing, and really dangerous besides,” I certainly had the scars to prove my point, if Starlight needed further convincing.

It didn’t look like that was going to be the case though. The unicorn’s expression brightened almost instantly, “is that all? Well why didn’t you say so?!”

Before anypony could ask what she was talking about, the pink mare turned around and looked back at the bottles with a hungry expression. Her hold started glowing again, but I saw no indication that a telekinetic field was forming around her shotgun. Instead, what happened was something rather unexpected. Bolts of brilliant blue energy lanced forth towards the bottles. Beam after beam struck out, and they shattered each of the bottles into dust as Starlight worked her way down the line. Ramparts and I were left to gape at her progress as the unicorn devastated all of the targets that had been laid out for her.

Once each of the bottles that had stood thirty yards away were disposed of, the pink unicorn turned her attention to Foxglove’s targets which had been set out at twice that range. Here she paused, licked her lips, and then shot forth a ray of her magical cyan energy that sliced through three of the targets there. The top halves of the bottles slid to the ground and shattered, leaving behind their otherwise undisturbed lower sections. Once she was satisfied with her demonstration, Starlight turned back to Ramparts and I, smiling.

“How’s that?” she said, jerking her head back in the direction of her now-vanished targets.

Now I’ve fought my fair share of unicorns out in the Wasteland over the years. While most used little magic other than their levitation to fight, there had been several with a more expansive repertoire of spells. Shields, powerful magical ‘pushes’ that could send grown ponies tumbling through the air; I’d even once fought a raider stallion that could spawn little explosive orbs which he threw at his targets. This was something new though. I recalled the one unicorn mare that had possessed those odd numbing beams of hers that I’d faced off against not too long ago, but what Starlight had just done was on a whole different level.

Ramparts and I exchanged glances again, “that works,” I said to the mare. The Republic soldiers next to me nodded silently, “you could have mentioned that you knew how to shoot laser beams.”

“You never asked,” Starlight shrugged, “and I already told you―a few times―that I’m good with magic.”

“I guess I just don’t appreciate what that really means,” I admitted, looking back at the wall where the bottles used to be, “I haven’t gotten to know a lot of unicorns.”

“I have,” Ramparts chimed in, “the Guard’s about three quarters unicorn, and none of them can do that. Where did you learn that kind of magic, anyway? I thought you were some kind of researcher or something.”

“Well, that’s sort of what it takes to get really good at magic: research,” Starlight explained with a wry smile, “as far as that spell goes, well, I spent a number of years as the mayor of a small village out in the fringes of Equestria. Somepony had to deal with the occasional monster that wandered by.”

“Fair enough,” the stallion said, acknowledging the point, “I guess the real question is how well you can do that during an actual fight when we encounter raiders out here.”

The unicorn balked at this, “you mean zap other ponies?” I could already tell from her affronted tone that Starlight wasn’t much of a fan of this idea, “is that really necessary?”

“You do remember what happened yesterday, right?” I cocked my brow at the mare.

“I do,” Starlight answered sourly, “I just feel like there has to be a better way of dealing with them.”

“There isn’t,” Ramparts assured her, testily; and I nodded in agreement, “and now that I know you can fight, I expect you to do something the next time we’re in trouble,” I cast an aside glance at the brown earth pony, frowning slightly. I wouldn’t have phrased it quite that way, honestly, so I turned to Starlight.

“The fact is that raiders probably won’t think twice about trying to kill us. The more of us that fight back, the less likely it is that we’ll get hurt―or killed―when that happens. Obviously we can’t force you to kill anypony,” I flashed Ramparts a brief look, noting his displeased expression as I subtly overrode his previous statement. The Republic officer was going to have to remember that we weren’t his soldiers, and that I was the pony calling the shots in this group. I resumed looking at Starlight, “but if you think it’s hard to deal with killing somepony, I assure you it’s a lot harder dealing with knowing that somepony died because you didn’t do everything you could to help them.”

The pink mare was quiet for several seconds, then, “I’ll think about it.”

I sighed, “that’s something, I guess,” that issue settled as much as it looked like it was going to be, I cast my gaze at Foxglove, “getting any better with that thing?” I asked, pointing my good wing at her rifle.

Ramparts answered for her, “she’d scoring hits a little better than half the time,” the stallion didn’t sound particularly impressed with the mechanic mare’s progress, but that was likely due to his own high expectations. Though, frankly, Jackboot wouldn’t have been happy with me if I’d only achieved that level of performance either. However, given what I knew of Foxglove’s marksmareship skill, I was impressed at how far she had come in such a short time. With a few more months of practice and familiarity, the violet unicorn could end up becoming quite capable with her rifle indeed.

As expected, the mare was looking at her ‘mentor’ with a none-too-pleased expression on her face, so I ventured my own appraisal on the matter. Unlike Ramparts, mine was delivered with a broad smile, “that’s pretty good for a pony that hadn’t even picked up a rifle a month ago,” I noticed a flash of subdued surprise cross the brown stallion’s face at the revelation, and his previously critical expression softened, “you’ll be popping raiders’ heads like Sparkle Cola caps in no time!”

“Thanks,” the violet mare said with a dubious smile.

I turned my attention back to Starlight again, “How’d things go with the Princess?”

Now I saw everypony’s expressions sour. It was the pink unicorn that gave her irritated answer first though, “they wouldn’t let us see her,” she groused, “obviously they didn’t believe I was really a two hundred year old pony, so I told them to just go and tell her my name and when the Princess saw me she’d know who I was,” her features grew even more incredulous, “I finally convinced them to do it, and a guard left and then came back, but I’m pretty sure he didn’t even speak with the Princess, because he insisted that Luna had never heard of me. That’s preposterous! I have a shelf in the Canterlot Library! They don’t give just anypony their own shelf!”
] I had sort of expected that things would go along those lines, given my own past experiences; but I’d held out hope that Starlight Glimmer might have more luck than I’d had, given her more personal foreknowledge of the reigning monarch. This was a little disappointing, but nothing could be done about it right now.

There was the option of trying to leverage another meeting with Ebony Song through the Galacians again, but I wasn’t quite prepared to spend all of my goodwill with those influential ponies quite yet. Once we found the weapons that the Republic wanted, I was going to get to meet with the Prime Minister again anyway, and then I could speak to him personally about getting a meeting with the Princess. Once Starlight and Princess Luna were in the same room together, a lot of things would start to fall into place for us. All it was going to take was one quick jaunt into Old Reino.

“We’ll try again when we get back,” I assured the aggrieved unicorn, which didn’t seem to do all that much to sooth her. The mare was obviously annoyed that none of her clout, or her former titles from her Ministry of Arcane Science days, were affording her the level of respect from ponies in leadership positions that they once had.

“We should consider returning to Seaddle,” Ramparts said, looking around, “we’ve been out here a good while, and it’s only a matter of time before somepony, or something stumbles across us.”

“Fair enough,” I nodded. I turned to Starlight, “did you at least find everything that you need to help me with my Cutie Mark situation.”

This brought a smile to the mare’s face once more, “indeed! If you’re ready, it would take hardly any time at all.”

“Awesome,” I smiled at the unicorn. At least there was going to be something that worked out today!

“What are you doing now?” I asked, watching the pink unicorn mare as she used a small diamond to etch a series of ornate and intricate patterns into the side of a glass jar. The cuts were so shallow and delicate that they were almost invisible, except when the light caught them in just the right way.

“Cutie marks are composed of powerful magicks inherent to a pony’s being,” the mare explained, not taking her eyes away from her work, “their desire to return to their host is very strong. You can’t just stick one into a glass jar and expect it to stay put. That’d just be silly. I’m inscribing wards into the sides,” she ceased her work and held the jar aloft with her magic, studying her work as the light from the nearby lamp glinted off the carved glyphs, “they...confuse the cutie mark, so that it doesn’t sense its host and stays put.”

I nodded my head, though I only vaguely understood what the mare was even talking about, “this is a much more involved process than I thought it was going to be,” though, looking back on it, I wasn’t exactly sure what I was expecting. Maybe just rubbing it out with a lot of turpentine?

“Are you sure you want to go through with this?”

Foxglove’s oft-repeated question drew my attention to the violet mare. The mechanic’s expression made her concern and trepidation very clear. There was no denying that the mare wasn’t a fan of this whole ‘get rid of my cutie mark’ notion. It wasn’t her fault, I reminded myself; she actually liked her talent. Most ponies did, after all. Even ponies who had a mark in the same vein as my own tended to enjoy inflicting suffering on others; which was why they had those marks in the first place. Meanwhile, I had spent years constantly working against my own nature, in an effort to avoid becoming something that I loathed.

Getting my cutie mark removed wasn’t something I had reservations about in the least, and so I smiled back at Foxglove, “I’ve wanted this ever since the day I got my cutie mark, Foxy.”

She didn’t seem to have been been completely put at ease by my assurance, but at least she wasn’t putting forth any additional objections. Hopefully she’d understand how important this was to me in time. I looked back over to Starlight Glimmer, who had put down both the jar and the diamond and was now looking at me expectantly, “what else do we need to do?”

“Just sit tight and leave everything to me,” the pink unicorn said with a confident tone. She closed her eyes and her horn started to glow with cyan light.

It was soft at first, but as I continued to look on, it grew steadily with intensity until it began to hurt my eyes and I was forced to look away. Just as I did so, I felt myself enveloped by a sudden warmth. In that same moment, I also found myself lifting off the bed, floating in the middle of the small apartment.

My eyes were open again, and I was looking around while trying not to panic. Foxglove and Ramparts both looked concerned, but Starlight appeared to be completely calm and collected. I tried to bring my own anxiety under control, assuring myself that if there was any cause for alarm, I’d be seeing some telltale sign of it from the pink unicorn mare. She was the mare who had pioneered this sort of technique, right? If anypony knew how it was supposed to go, it’d be her. Right?

That thought had only just begun to assert itself in my mind when the pain began. It caught me off guard, since at no point had anypony mentioned that there would be any. At first, it wasn’t all that bad really; it was more of a ‘discomfort’ than real ‘pain’. Sort of like a really irritating itch that I was having to scratch really hard. It didn’t remain that mild for long though. Just as I was getting used to that feeling, it crescendoed into something that was genuinely agonizing.

This time, I screamed.

My entire body was on fire. Every nerve was insisting that I was being pulled inside out through my own anus with a pair of searing hot tongs. I wasn’t even forming words with my screaming, I was too far gone into the pain for my brain to have been able to accomplish that.

Foxglove tried to jump in and stop everything, but I guess that Starlight had considered that was going to be a possibility. The violet mechanic was instantly frozen in place by some sort of paralyzing field. Ramparts and Arginine, though they had not made any move to interfere, were likewise contained; presumably as a precautionary measure in case they changed their minds later. All of the other ponies could only look on as I just cried out and writhed in the air above the bed while Starlight’s spell ravaged my body.

After an eternity, or at least what had felt like the next best thing to it, the pain subsided. It left as quickly as it had come, and I gasped with sudden relief as my torment ended. Through my bleary vision, I caught sight of something small and silver, with tinges of red, moving around in front of me. I blinked away the tears that had formed in my eyes while I’d been wallowing in pain and was then able to recognize my cutie mark, floating free on its own. My mind was still in a bit of a haze, so I couldn’t bring myself to really say anything quite yet. I could only watch listlessly as the tiny little winged heart drifted away from me and slipped silently into the waiting jar. Starlight gingerly screwed on the cap, a satisfied smile on her face.

It took me a few seconds to realize that I wasn’t even floating anymore. At some point during the process, the pink mare had let me back down onto the bed. She also finally released the other three ponies. Arginine was his usual impassive self. Ramparts was mostly annoyed that he’d been needlessly frozen in place; but Foxglove was bordering on apoplectic as she rushed up to the bed.

“Celestia; Windfall, are you okay?!” she didn’t wait for an answer before glaring at the other unicorn, “what did you do to her?!”

“Only exactly what she asked for,” Starlight Glimmer replied with a cool tone, clearly not enjoying the accusatory tone of the other unicorn, “she’s perfectly fine.”

Foxglove was dubious, to put things lightly, and proceed to conduct her own assessment of my well being. I had recovered enough to offer up my own meager assurances that I was alright, but my words hardly sounded very convincing. Which was probably because I still wasn’t very sure how I was doing myself. While the pain was gone, there was a lingering...sensation, I guess? It was hard to really explain exactly what it was; like I’d walked into a room looking for something, but forgotten what it was, yet knew it was something important. I felt a little weak too, but I chalked that up to the aftermath of being subjected to powerful magic. A good night’s sleep would set me right.

As I continued to clumsily offer up token assurances, I heard Foxglove let out a gasp. Her emerald eyes were locked on my flank, where my cutie mark would have been. I craned my head around to follow her gaze, and cocked my own head in mild surprise. Where the impaled heart framed by silver wings had once been, the perpetual reminder of my sins, was now an...equal sign.

“Huh,” I blinked and looked back to Starlight, asking the silent question.

Quickly grasping the source of my confusion, the pink unicorn stowed away the inscribed jar and said, “in my studies, I learned that cutie mark magic is tied to ponies in such a way that the strict removal of it in its entirety would prove effectively fatal. Obviously, that’s completely unacceptable. However, what can safely be done is to switch out the magic with a ‘placeholder enchantment’ of sorts.

“Say, ‘hello’ to your new talent, Windfall: being a perfectly average pony,” She smiled warmly at me.

I looked back at the mark again, “so...that’s it? I’m cured now?”

“Well, you tell me,” said the unicorn, “do you feel compelled to kill anypony?”

“I mean...no,” not that I’d ever have described myself as feeling compelled to kill anypony. Frankly, I’d always hated killing other ponies, even when it was necessary. I’d just done it because, well, it’s what I was supposed to do.

“Then, yes, you’re cured. Though, I should warn you that there may be a lingering sense of loss as a result of the procedure. This is a completely normal part of the process, and I’ll be there to help you every step of the way,” the pink unicorn stood up and walked over to the bed, patting me lightly on the head, “we’ll get you through this together. In no time at all, you’ll feel like a new mare.”

“I...do feel different,” I admitted. I wasn’t yet convinced that the ‘different’ that I felt was an improvement. My whole body felt weak and there was this sense of profound loss that permeated my very being. Regret welled up inside of me, and I wanted nothing more than to demand that Starlight reverse what she had just done and pretend that none of this had never happened.

But...the unicorn had said that was normal. I bit back those urges and buried them deep down inside of me. This was for the best in the long run. Starlight was an expert on this, so I just had to trust her. In an effort to dispel Foxglove’s lingering concern, and help to put my own mind at ease, I smiled at the violet unicorn and made myself more comfortable on the bed, “I’m fine, Foxy. That spell did a number on me, but all I need is a little sleep. Right?” I looked to Starlight for assurance.

“That will certainly help, yes,” the pink mare confirmed. Then she fixed a look on everypony else in the room with us, “and I’m going to need something from all of you as well: This process is difficult for ponies to deal with, emotionally. We’ll all need to be supportive of Windfall for the next several weeks, until she’d ready to cope on her own.”

Ramparts was frowning now, “was this really such a good idea then, right before heading to Old Reino? If it’s going to affect her that much, maybe we should reverse it and―”

“No,” Starlight snapped, glaring at the stallion, “this is not something I recommend doing a second time. The psychological trauma would be compounded if I performed the spell again. Cutie mark removal isn’t like washing out mane dye, for Celestia’s sake!”

“You could have mentioned all of this before,” Foxglove growled.

“Nopony asked!” the other unicorn mare said in an exasperated tone, “and I notice that the pony who actually had her mark removed is the only pony here who doesn’t seem to have a problem with it,” she looked back at me, “do you, Windfall?”

“I wanted this,” it was a bit of a struggle to say the words, but I got them out. If I said them often enough, I might even start to believe them. To everypony else, I said, “look, I’m fine. Really. I’m just a bit tired right now. In the morning I’ll be perfectly fine. All Starlight did was remove my desire to kill ponies; it’s not like she got rid of my ability to operate a gun.”

The Republican Guard pony didn’t look as though he was fully convinced by my assurances, but he didn’t argue the point further, “I’ll join all of you at the front gate in the morning,” he said, heading for the apartment’s door, “I have a few more things to take care of back at the barracks while I’m in town; and I’m going to get the Republic’s latest maps on the radiation pockets in Old Reino.”

The four of us watched the brown stallion leave, and then Foxglove stepped away from the side of the bed and headed for her little ‘workshop’ area of the room, “I have some things to do as well,” she pulled out a small stock of jewels and talismans that she had managed to procure from the market earlier that day and sat down, “just so you know, Windy: you’re only going to have one full magazine of explosive rounds. Green-banded grenades are in short supply.

“Apparently most of the city’s stock was bought out by a few pegasi last week.”

My ears perked up at that last statement, “pegasi? As in more than one?” winged ponies were rare enough on their own in the Valley; I’d never heard of there being a group of them before that weren’t, “Enclave?” that seemed unlikely.

“Not that anypony could tell,” Foxglove said, shrugging, “at least, they weren’t wearing Enclave gear.”

“Enclave,” Starlight interjected, “those are the pegasi that left the surface, right?”

“Yeah. It’s pretty rare for them to visit places like Seaddle,” I informed the pink unicorn mare, “when they do, it’s usually because they’re looking for something or somepony specific; but even then they’re almost always wearing power barding.

“The Enclave isn’t exactly known for being shy about who they are.”

“So if they’re not Enclave, then who are they?” Starlight asked.

“They could just be a group of Dashites that were expelled together,” Foxglove offered, “no idea why they’d need all the firepower they bought. Might be setting up a mercenary outfit?”

“A whole band of pegasus mercs?” I mused at the implication, “I wonder if they’re taking applications...

I shrugged and made myself comfortable on the bed, "it's good to have options I guess."

Footnote:...

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!