Caps and Isms

I get called ‘smart’ a lot, more times than I can count. That’s usually also by people who have no idea that there is a difference between book-smart and street-smart.

Sky Sage
Day Two, Early Morning

One of the most simultaneously abused and yet necessary evils of the driving world is construction. Anytime I saw orange up ahead on the road was was one more time for me to groan and shift the car into neutral. Then I’d wish that somehow I could slow down ten, twenty, or even thirty miles an hour to match the speed that was demanded on the friendly little sign without losing the thrill of motion. Somewhere nearby I would see some kind of sign telling me that my tax dollars were putting people to ‘work’ and implying that there would always be a police officer or two or three hidden nearby. If the sign was honest, there would be actual construction work going on and the officer would have the lights on while reading a newspaper or playing on their phone. If it was like some of the places I’ve been through, there would be five or six one-mile-long construction zones, one after another, with a speed reduction and nothing more than cones on the side of the road sheltering nothing. In each zone, there would be an officer hidden in the shadow of an underpass off to the side waiting to stick me with that doubled fine.

All of that really bothered me. Heck, I’m pretty sure most of it was just being unreasonably angry at having to slow down. Those roads didn’t last forever on their own, and work had to be done at some point or another. Still, I’d yet to find any roadwork that seemed to be finished in a short enough time that I approved of it. The worst was when I had to stop though. And right now, we were stopped all right. Dead end in a one-horse town. More like a five hundred horse town. Too many damn horses.

And not just that, either. I opened my eyes to stare up at the gray of the concrete ceiling, lit up faintly by the light coming down the stairs. I wanted to burn a hole through it just by the force of my glare. Vaporize that concrete, the wood above that, then the floor above that, and somehow immolate Radheart. Becoming a pony didn’t come with fire vision though, so I rolled over onto my side to look at Ash. That’s when I found out that it did come with a lot of wing stiffness, which really made sitting up a lot more awkward. It was like waking up sore and stiff after a long day on the dojo, or doing a few good pull-up sets, except that it was making it hard to fold my wings back in all the way. They were dragging the blanket with me as I moved, still caught up together. As I pushed with my forehooves, wincing at each and every shrug, I didn’t notice where I was going until gravity took me and I crashed over the edge in a giant pile of pony, blanket, and feathers.

“Ugh…”

It wasn’t as if the blanket muted my fall much, it was too thin for that, but everyone else was still sound asleep. They stayed that way while I worked myself out of the blanket, losing a number of down feathers in the process. At least all the primaries stayed in, one thing to be grateful for, but looking at them reminded me that they would need to be preened. And I had no idea in hell how that was going to happen. Landing hard had reminded me of one other thing -- that I desperately needed to pee.

Upstairs, the house was just as still and quiet, and the first rays of sunlight were peeking through the windows. No noise came from the top floor, and that was just fine with me for a small plethora of reasons. The front door was locked, but the key was hanging on the inside right beside it. I brightened, then stopped dead in my tracks. Oh not again. Ever so delicately, I bit down on the back end of the key, lifted it off the peg, and tilted my neck until it lined up with the keyhole. As each tooth went in, the recoil shook my neck slightly and made the pain in my back even worse. The lock opened easily as if it had been well oiled. Is it just me, or does everything around here seem especially nice for Falloutville? Blankets, electricity, hot water, oiled parts...I’m not sure I want to know where this all ends. Hope it doesn’t.

The outhouse was exactly that: a wooden shack that smelled like shit. On one end, there was a hole in the ground, and I planted my rump firmly on top of it and went. It felt stupidly awkward, but it was what excretion was going to be like for the foreseeable future, so getting used to it wouldn’t be an option. The disconcerting part was the lack of toilet paper. I didn’t feel like I really needed it, but it was odd to not be using a hygiene item that I remembered using for as far back as I could remember. Using it with hooves would have been clumsy and painful though, and forget using my mouth. No way, no how.

Back outside, the air was clean but cold. Even with the hair covering my body, my skin still demanded I go back inside where it was warm. Still, I took a moment to look around. Alpine was quiet, and the lights were still on, holding sway against the dark cover of the clouds. Nopony was out yet, save for two guards in the watchtower hunched under their blankets. An urge beckoned me onward to go explore the town, but I didn’t really want to leave everyone else behind and have to go do it all over again. Nor did it appear as if any of the shopkeepers were up -- their lights didn’t extend to the inside of the circle of shops that lined the center of town. I hope Radheart isn’t planning on sleeping in.

Once back inside, I noticed my feathers were still bent out of place and ruffled from my failure to get up like a normal equine. As flexible as my neck was, I couldn’t reach all the feathers without tilting the wings forward. Starting with the innermost feathers on the left side, I took them in my mouth one at a time, and slid them gently back to their original positions. Each one took another fifteen or twenty nibbles to smooth out the softer parts. Their consistency surprised me just a little. They were very similar to the pigeon feathers I’d found on the ground as a kid: soft, but very stiff. One more thought struck me: that whatever idiot had dreamed up the idea that pegasus feathers were an erogenous zone was full of bullshit. This was like clipping my nails, with my teeth, and I had a lot more of it to look forward to.

Preening was the perfect mindless task. Being new at it, each feather required constant, undivided focus, and my mind didn’t wander off to sulk while I waited for everyone else to wake up. Ten minutes passed...then twenty before I finished the left wing. While it was a slow start, by the end of the wing, I’d kind of gotten an idea of what I was supposed to be doing. Not that I’d know for sure until I figured out how to fly. The second wing was easier, save for the kink in my neck that ached every time I leaned back to get the feather-tips.

“Well isn’t that something. You’re licking yourself like cat.”

I snapped my head up at the sudden noise, wincing in pain at the sudden movement, and completely tearing out the feather between my teeth. Ow. Radheart was standing at the bottom of the stairs, rubbing sleep out of her eyes.

“You’ve never seen a bird preen itself before?”

“Birds yes. Ponies? No.” She raised one eyebrow. “Though perhaps I could figure out just how close you are to a bird with a little closer examination.”

“Oh, fuck no!”

“Relax, colt. I don’t know what your problem is, but you had better get over it. I’m the only mare within at least a hundred miles of this place who can save your dying friend. I made an exception to take special payment, even though my last shipment of supplies got stolen and I’m running desperately short. I’m not some evil witch; I’m up this early to get started on making Dizzy some breakfast and to work on stopping your buddy from taking his early trip to the other side. And all of this is to save a pegasus, on the request of a pegasus, in a town that really would rather see you both burn. I think you should be thanking me.”

“...just fix him up. And I want to talk with Dizzy.”

“After breakfast. If you want it, I’m sure that Copper over at the general store or Morningside at the inn will sell some food to you.” She trotted off to the kitchen, leaving me to long for incendiary magic for the second time that morning. The part that burned the most was that I couldn’t find anything she said that was reasonable to be angry at. I wanted to hate her so badly, but it seemed that her words were true. Between the two evils, Wingnut deserved to live. Though I wasn’t looking forward to talking to Dizzy when all was said and done. He’d probably be locked up tight and pissed off like a--

My stomach growled, and hunger re-asserted its dominance over my thoughts. Time to get everyone up. The long hike from the plains had left my legs sore and shaky, making each step down the stairs a trial. It really didn’t help either that walking down the stairs put my entire body angled butt-up towards the door. The awkwardness left room for self-consciousness, which in turn distracted me from walking carefully. Only two steps away from the bottom, my left forehoof caught on a loose nail, sending me face-first into the floor. Concrete certainly hurt more than dirt. It also made more noise.

“Agh!”

The problem with yelling and smashing my face into the concrete was that despite all the racket, it still wasn’t enough to wake up Sawyer, Amelia, and Marcus. Correction: that’s Stalemate, Ash, and Page now. They’d always been heavy sleepers, all of them, but this gave me a chance to wake up Ash a little bit more nicely than with loud noises. In this case it took a kiss, and then a gentle nudge on the shoulder.

“Amelia, sweetie, wake up?”

She grumbled then rolled over, and then groaned. “I’m still fuzzy.”

“I’m sorry, dear. It’s probably not going away anytime soon.”

Her muffled groan was the sound of the worst possible Monday morning conveyed through the most wonderful translating device of a pillow. It somehow managed to say ‘I don’t want to get up,’ ‘why the hell am I still a unicorn,’ and ‘why didn’t you bring me breakfast’ all in one fell swoop. I couldn’t answer such a tough question, so I turned to wake the other two.

Page woke after a few prods, and once he was coherent enough to see what was going on, he slid right out of bed with a smile on his face. “Good morning all!” Page chirped in a bubbly tone as he quickly jumped onto his hooves. He must’ve slept well. Unfortunately, as he hopped, his horn banged against a low ceiling beam, leaving a small nick.

“Ow! What the hell was that?!” Page moaned sarcastically as he fell and curled into a ball on the floor. I think I could just make out a tear in the corner of his eye from where I was standing.

I paced over closer to his quivering form, and I could easily see his eyes watering from the impact. “Are you...crying?” I asked in the most incredulous tone I could muster.

“No...” Page muttered, sniffling. “They’re tears of manly poniness. I’m obviously practicing at horn carving! How’d I do?”

I craned my neck and regarded the small gash in the joist. “Needs work. Try cursive next time?” He chuckled and got to his hooves.

Sawyer took just a little bit more work to wake. After several pokes he shifted, muttered something about Saturday, and then rolled over. As I jabbed him again, I felt a force suddenly press all along my side and shove me away. The purple-blue glow faded away right as I turned back to face him.

Oh you’re not getting out of it that easy. “Sawyer, get up.”

“Make me.”

“Fine.”

On any other day, that would have been my cue to flip the bed wholesale. Right now though, I lacked the coordination to either stand up and flip it with forelegs or the aim to buck it. That left pushing him right off the bed as my only option. Resting each foreleg on the bed, I leaned forward and shoved. Sawyer was going to wake up just as pleasantly as I did. Meeting the floor with a yelp of despair, Stalemate was definitely awake now. The pillows suddenly lifted in telekinesis and whipped one way and then the other, but I stepped back just before I could get swatted.

“Goddammit, Dom! What the hell did you do that for?”

“Because it’s time to find food, and you weren’t getting up.”

“You could have asked!”

“I did.”

After much struggling and a few near-slips on the stairs, our group managed to make it outside without getting more hurt. Give thanks for small blessings, I suppose. It didn’t take too much wandering to find our destination. A small wooden sign swayed from the eave of the crumbling building in the wind. Despite its flaking paint, the sign still bore the crest of ’The Golden Pitchfork’ in a regal shade of gold, contrasted against a darker forest of green in the background. From the looks of it, unlike how the hospital had once been a barber shop and the general store used to be some kind of plow shed, the inn had always been an inn.

I could see a faint wisp of smoke snaking its way up into the gray sky from the inn’s chimney. The cool of the morning still bit at my hide, and I knew I wasn’t the only one who could smell the promise of a hot meal in the breeze.

The group paced briskly to the door, and I rushed ahead to open it. Sometimes your stomach thinks for you I guess. At the slightest push of one hoof, the weathered door creaked open, echoing loudly into the smoky foyer of the inn beyond. There was a large firepit in the middle, burned down to coals, and the only electric light was hanging over an old, beat-up bar counter. The bar had seen many a drink slide across it, and from the looks of it, many fights too. There were dents from hoof-strikes, gouges torn by knives, and what looked like a bite mark on the right end. About two dozen tables stood in no apparent order, each made from old sawn pine planks, bleached to a mild gray by time and spilled ethanol. Standing behind the counter was a green earth mare, black mane held back by a bandanna. As soon as our eyes met, she frowned.

“Well don’t just stand there, get on inside and close that door!”

Spurred on by her yell, we all piled into the common room and somepony slammed the door in the back. After making room for everyone behind me, I had almost approached the counter and was face to face with the proprietor. There was very little right now that made me feel like smiling, but I tried to put on my best for her.

“Hello, I’m Sky Sage! You must be Morningside!”

“That’s right, and what can I do for ya’?” She didn’t stop running a cloth over a large mug, but looked over me, and then everyone else one by one. She wasn’t the only one, as the few locals seated at her tables had ceased all conversation to stare. “I don’t mind what you look like, so long as you’ve got the caps to pay.”

Most of her golden coat was buried under a large apron, the few pieces that poked out were a dull goldenrod. Her mane was graying, and judging by the faint few streaks of purple in her mane, it was due to age.

Behind Morningside, a row of pots and pans hung from a rack over a wood-stove. One pot, full of what looked to be a stew, and another, a frying pan with cuts of meat, sat idly above the cozy fire, bathed in its smoke. Next to the stove, a large stone fireplace roared and several loaves of bread were browning on a protruding shelf. Split firewood was piled almost as high as my head on the other side of the fireplace. I inhaled deeply, and the overpowering mix of pine wood, baking bread, and frying meat all wafted into my nostrils. Rumbling started in my stomach, shaking my belly. As I opened my mouth to answer, a glob of saliva ran out of my mouth and splashed onto the floor. Everypony stared. Of all the most embarrassing, stupid, and self-deprecating things I could do while meeting somepony new, that ranked up near the top. They all kept staring -- at the floor, at me, at the thin line of drool still hanging off my jaw, and my face burned. Morningside decided to break the ice for me.

“Well, I’m sure I can guess why you’re here, but normally most folk just ask for ‘food.’ Now have you got money or not?” Her tone spoke equal volumes of amusement and bemusement as she started at the dark spot between my forehooves.

“Ah, yes!” I shouted, half out of surprise, half desperately trying to change the topic and save face. “How much for a meal for each of us?”

“Four caps a head for eggs and toast, and six if you want some brahmin sausage with it. Dunno if you folks eat meat, but I’ve got it.”

Looking back, everyone had the same looks smeared onto their faces. It was hard looking into their eyes, each one trying to stay strong but pleading at the same time. We didn’t have much money, yet we needed food. Each of them in turn looked at me. Page was holding himself together. Stalemate looked more or less as angry as he had been for the last day. But Ash...I’d seen those eyes before, when she’d been too hungry to care about anything else, and too tired to say anything about it. Those eyes begged ‘please feed me!’ I wanted to see her smile again...and I was hungry too. I didn’t want to let that show, but I also figured that my mouth had already said too much. They’re going to get fed. That means me too.

We had thirty-four bottlecaps. I’d counted them last night. Enough for food, and a cheerful hello. “Yeah, we’ll take four of those breakfasts with the sausage.”

“Wait, you all are ok with getting meat?”

The sudden chorus of ‘yes’s’, ‘uh-huh’s’ and nodding heads left Morningside furrowing her eyebrows in confusion, but she quickly perked back up as I fished the small bag of caps out of my saddlebags and leaned over to set it on the counter. I’d let her count them. She wasn’t the one who could barely stand up high enough to set a bag of bottlecaps on the counter, so she could nimbly take twenty-four of the thirty-four caps we had. If for some reason we didn’t get ten back, I’d complain later.

She took the bag, poured them out on the counter, a mix of bent metal caps in blues and greens and reds on gray, covering them with a discerning gaze. Hard to believe that the tiny bits of twisted aluminum that it was had somehow become the measure of value for hundreds of miles around. There was plenty of philosophical crap to that, but right now all that mattered was the remaining ten caps she put back in the bag and hoofed over to me. That wasn’t enough money to buy much anything with, and the next time we’d want food was only hours away.

That, I decided, was a problem for after breakfast. When Morningside put a steaming plate in front of me, all other thought was cleanly erased. After eating grass and drinking from the stream the day before, there wasn’t any problem with just burying my muzzle in it and chewing, but there was one thing holding me back from starting the meal. It was a real effort to not clock myself in the forehead, and to reach both of my shoulders, but it wasn’t a habit I planned on giving up anytime soon.

Bless me O Lord, and these Thy gifts, which I am about to receive, through Thy bounty, through Christ our Lord, amen. Crossing myself a second time was a lot easier, and without any further thought, I stuck my face in the plate.

My father always told me ‘Dominic, hunger is the best spice.’ Every time I tested that theory, his words proved to be true. I’d eat just about anything when hungry, but right now I felt that I was eating like a king. In that little world of bliss, I wasn’t really paying attention to much else other than making sure that I didn’t choke.

Forcing myself to look back up while chewing, I could see that Page and Stalemate were already done, and Ash face down in her plate, chomping on whatever she could reach. Page and Stalemate both stared at me, Page in some degree of amusement, Stalemate looking as if he wanted to know if I was going to share. My answer was to put my face back down and chew until everything was gone.

Once the plate was empty, I still wasn’t quite full and licked at the egg yolk a few more times as if it would somehow fill me up. That wouldn’t be the case, but I at least got the benefit of being able to mentally bicker with myself that I’d absorbed a few more milligrams of high-protein food, and as a result I’d be able to go on further and be a little less hungry later. If I could keep arguing that, I’d get distracted enough to forget that I was hungry.

Leaving the inn was far less awkward than arriving. Everyone seemed to relax as soon as the first of us passed through the door. Most infuriating was the sudden increase in conversation that resumed as soon as the door closed behind us.

While the population had exactly zero pegasi aside from myself and Wingut, I still couldn’t fathom what their problem was with me. Walking had made us all into dunces and we all had no clue how to avoid showing human mannerisms. Basically we were children. Foals? However, that was immaterial. What about wings made me so evil? Scratch that, from what I’d read, I at least had some idea how bad it was. But really, just how accurate were those ‘stories’ to this world anyway? Could I really trust our lives to what I’d read in some odd story?

Still, that bias hadn’t stopped Morningside from selling to us. The way she’d brightened when I held up the bag of caps was the best reception we’d gotten from anyone here, and I hoped that trend would continue. We still needed to sell the crap we’d taken off the raiders.

The last thing I wanted to do when trying to trade for a few more caps was show up with my muzzle covered in egg yolk. Professionalism and such. Sadly, I lacked the ability to wash my own face. That was quickly remedied by Ash, who had decided my face needed licking clean, much to everyone else’s amusement. A quick trip over to the river allowed me to purge off the mix of eggs and saliva, and leave me smelling somewhat less like a mix of breakfast and pony breath. Not that sticking my face in the icy water was much fun, but it left me awake enough to conduct business. I was only hoping that it wasn’t radioactive.

Apparently my thoughts were shared by Ash, Page, and Stalemate, who each hesitantly washed off in the shallow waters. A bit sandier and a lot less sticky afterward, I plodded away from the muddy shore and waited for the rest of the group to finish. Time to not be a nice guy to every last idiot who doesn’t deserve it. “Sawyer? I mean, Stalemate?”

At the mention of his name, Stalemate snapped his head up, and then frowned at the second. “What?”

“You’ve gotta be my reality check here. You know better than I do when someone is trying to rip me off. Let me do the talking, but if anything starts smelling funny to you, go ahead and call the merchant out on it.”

“Fine.”

Ever since we were little, Stalemate had been there to provide the bad cop to whatever I did. Granted, we were always merchants, warriors, or whatever else in the random games of discussion we had while spending hours in the front yard bouncing on the trampoline. I suppose the police were just too mundane. Still, that pattern followed us as we got older. Whenever we’d play games together, he’d always be the first one to point out when something wasn’t going our way with others. Perhaps it was my concern for the other guy, perhaps it was just an eagerness to get the deal done and move on, or maybe it was just my own stupidity. I don’t know.

Regardless, he was also the quickest to find ways to separate fools from their money, or as he so called it: ‘high-quality lessons on who not to trust.’ As I pushed open the shop’s door, I was really hoping my brother didn’t have any foul play planned, but there still was the simple matter of having no idea what a chainsaw was worth in bottlecaps. A thousand thoughts came to mind. What would the dollar equivalent be? Does that really even help? The production of the economy is probably very different here, and varies by region. I could be really fucked if they have no use for a chainsaw.

I cleared my throat and looked into the shop, which appeared to be empty of ponies. Shelves ran along the walls, mostly holding assortments of farming tools and burlap sacks labeled as various grains. Behind the counter were several locked glass cabinets, holding all sorts of goodies. Dusty bottles with corks, pistols with rusted triggers, and what I could only guess were explosives of the homemade variety. While it lacked the second floor that the hospital and inn had, there was some kind of back room, which I hoped was inhabited. Breaking in (if it could be called that when the door wasn’t secure) on our second day here probably wouldn’t go over well. “Hello?”

A stallion answered from the back, gruff and annoyed. “Hang on, I’ll be right up.”

I could smell the whiskey on the store owner before he even got around the empty doorframe. There was no way that could be a good sign on any level. Glancing into Ash’s eyes, she clearly shared the same sentiment. If he noticed, Page didn’t even flick an ear, and was preoccupied with slowly glancing over all of the various products that the shop boasted. That was all the time I had before a large reddish-brown earth stallion lurched around the corner. His mane was dirty and graying, and smelled worse than the whiskey. Despite initial impressions, he wasn’t having trouble standing up, his eyes were focused, and he wore a grimace that suggested more of a hangover than would be good for any kind of haggling. When he spoke, his words were clear, deep, and husky.

“Name’s Copper Runner. Just call me Copper, though. What can I get for you?”

“Good morning, Copper,” I said, trying to sound equally gruff and down to earth. I needed to make a good first impression and not put him on to how ‘new’ we were to being here. “My name is Sky Sage, and we’re here to trade.”

As slow and erratic as a practiced drunkard, Copper lurched around the counter and held out one hoof for a shake, swaying where he stood.

Shit...oh shit.

Hesitantly, I spread out my legs and lifted my front right into the air. Tiny tremors racked my frame as soon as the keratin appendage left the floorboard. Higher and higher it stretched, until my leg was almost parallel to the ground. Copper for his part didn’t seem to notice how much time I was taking, and waited patiently until my hoof smack right into his. Yes!

By some mysterious force, the two seemed to bond together, and he shook me hard. Halfway through the first undulation I was already swept off my hoof, wings splaying in shock as the ground abandoned me. The thud of my legs, head, and ribcage all impacting the floor at the same time echoed through my flesh, leaving me stunned and gasping as everyone laughed. Then Copper fell over too, landing inches from my muzzle.

Dizzy stared down with at me like I had just stomped on a foal. He was the only one who seemed to grasp the gravity of the situation. Everyone else was laughing, even Copper, who hadn’t bothered to get up. I’m not sure if he was trying or not, but I barely got up faster than he did.

“Oh you little fucker pegasus...ha! Can’t even give a real hoofshake!” He paused and coughed roughly, the low and deep sound giving me good reason to roll away. “Fucking birds can’t even stand up without all four hooves on the ground.”

Something grabbed my torso and sat me up. A blurry smear of red and indigo light clang to my underside, and I turned to see both Stalemate and Ash casting with strained looks on their faces. As soon as they let the magic go, Ash slumped a little on the spot, but Stalemate just glared. I wanted to go back and help Ash, but the message was clear: get the trading done first.

Copper had finally slunk back behind his counter. “Alright then,” he said with a slight shrug. “Let me see what you’ve got.”

I dumped the contents of my saddlebags onto the counter. We’d taken the time after breakfast to sort the things that we needed into Dizzy’s bags, and so Copper went down the line, pointing his hoof at each one and muttering to himself.

“Ok, I’ll give you eight caps each for the spark batteries. That barding looks like it belonged to raiders, and smells like shit, so I’ll give you ten. This though,” he turned over the stone in his hooves, “I don’t know what to make of. It could probably be set into a necklace of some kind, but otherwise it’s just another rock. Three caps for it.”

In the meantime, Page stepped forward from examining a shelf in the back, and immediately interjected. ”But that’s an opal! And a big one at that. I don’t know who the raiders had to kill to get it, but is three caps really the best you can offer for it?”

“Do ya’ want the caps, or the rock? There are a lot of rocks out there.”

“I’ll take the rock. Thank you.” Page quickly scooped the stone back into his saddlebags without any further ado.

Why Page needed a rock, I had no idea, but I didn’t want to bicker about it with him in front of the shop owner. I nodded to Copper, who swept the rest of goods off the counter. He fiddled for a few moments with something that I couldn’t see, and then dumped a small pile of caps on the counter. I gave them to Page to count.

“Is that all you came in here for?” growled Copper. I had to wonder if he started drinking this early, or just had been since last night.

“No, one more thing. Page?” I nodded as Page hefted the chainsaw on top of the counter. The lift was a little bit shaky, but he still landed it all on the counter without denting the top. Unlike yesterday, he wasn’t wincing, but rather smiling as he slung the heavy tool around without once touching it. Another pang of jealousy flared in my throat at how swiftly he was mastering being a pony zebra thing.

I never prided myself on being good at reading body language, and that was on humans. Yet, I still saw Copper’s eyes bulge just a little at the sight of the tool. Seeing my opportunity, I made my move. “The fuel tank on that is just shy of full. It’s a little...dirty on the bar, but that’s just proof it works.”

Copper slowly looked up and down the chainsaw, apparently undeterred by the rust-colored dried blood on the chain links. “Hmm-mmm. Looks pretty beat up, I’ll give you fifty caps for it.”

I really didn’t have any idea how the wasteland economy worked, but I had to wonder. The chainsaw really was pretty beat up, but the fact that it was filled with what I was mostly sure was gasoline said something. Even if crappy chainsaws were a common thing after the apocalypse, logic told me refined fuels wouldn’t be. If humanity had endless uses for octane, it stood to reason the ponies would too. “Look, Copper, how much would I get for the gas in the tank if I took it over to Morningside?”

“Thirty caps, tops.”

Any other day, anywhere else, with anything less important on the line, I’d have nodded and agreed to his offer. Right now, though, I needed that money. The future was too unknown, hell, even the next meal for everyone I cared about was up in the air right now. That just wasn’t going to do. “Well, I think I’ll take it around town and see what everypony else can offer me for it.”

“If you do that, I won’t be wanting your trade anymore,” spat Copper. He put a hoof up on the chainsaw. “I’m offering you a lot of caps for your shit, and I doubt it even works.”

“Doubt it works?” Stalemate hissed through his teeth. Suddenly, the whole device lit up with indigo light and was dragged violently off the counter. The roar of the engine filled the room, and Stalemate held it up, the bar vibrating in a blur of motion.

“Stalemate, shut that off!” I bellowed as loud as I could, but my voice barely cut over the din. Stalemate let the motor die, and without waiting for the teeth to hold still, set it back down on the counter. Copper threw himself back with a startled cry.

Stalemate grinned at Copper. “Now go on, make us a real offer.”

“What he means to say is that we’re quite sure that it works. You admitted it yourself. Why else are you so freaked about us selling to somepony else?” I didn’t let him answer the rhetorical question. “I know we’re new here, but you’re trying undercut us.”

For the first time since we walked in, Copper looked me square in the eyes. Reading the expression on a pony’s face wasn’t my strong suit, but it was pretty safe to say he was seethingly angry. Good. I could work with that. Better to be disliked and treated as an equal than to be liked and assumed to be an idiot.

“One hundred and twenty caps. No more. And if you ever heft a blade or a loaded weapon in my store again, I will shoot you where you stand. Do you understand?”

“Clearly.” I slid the caps he gave me into Page’s saddlebags, and I had to wonder just how far the money would go. It would be enough to take care of us for a day or two, but we needed something for the long term. Find a way to pay for lunch, check. Find a way home? Still pending. Find a way to find a way home...also pending. As the last of the caps rattled in the base of the bag, I wished I had a hat to tip. “Thanks for the business, Copper. I’m looking forward to trading with you in the future.”

“Fuck off, feather-brain.” Copper turned and started to reorganize a very pristine shelf.

“Have a nice day.” I figured antagonizing him further wasn’t going to help. His insults were an obvious shot at species vernacular, but it wasn’t like I had been a pegasus for very long. ‘Feather-brain’ seemed almost like an appropriate term. Everyone filed out the door, and I tried not to kick it shut too hard.

Outside, it was still cold, gray, and dreary. The clouds were one solid mass of darkness looming overhead. Gray had always been my favorite color, and I’d never really thought to stop and think about why. I suppose it was because it was different from every other color. It wasn’t pure, but rather a conglomerate meld of everything else, and it was a color that I only saw in two places. One was the sky, and the other was metal. Other than those places, people always seemed to avoid gray. Right now though, I was beginning to wonder if it was time to give that fondness up. That gray above symbolized everything that was a problem right now. I was cold, soon to be hungry, and lost in the middle of a land I’d never experienced before. Somewhere, up in those clouds, were the pegasi that had somehow scarred this little town enough to make everyone wince at the sight of me. Worst of all, I was gray too. Not the ‘dark of the thunderstorm gray,’ but a medium slate hue that said ‘meh’ to the entire world. It was almost like I belonged with those clouds, but I wanted out. Soon enough. Focus on getting back to Dizzy.

The dampness from outside clung to me as I entered inside Radheart's lair. All mental musing aside, this world was cold, wet, dangerous, and utterly foreign. I didn’t think that fact had really settled in yet. Everyone was still carefree. Scratch that thought, they were anything but ‘carefree,’ but all of us were simply not ready. Ready for what exactly? We didn’t even know. Ash was still staring at the ground, Stalemate was still giving a metaphorical middle finger to the heavens, and Page was still fiercely preoccupied examining everything that wasn’t a clod of dirt. Still, that wasn’t what we needed. Every last one of us had to be constantly looking for some help, some way out, any information, or whatever kind of advantage we could get. Something had dumped us on our heads so hard that we needed every last bit of advantage we could get to claw back up the giant pile of shit we were under.

Dizzy wasn’t waiting for us in the entryway, the kitchen, or in the basement. I didn’t exactly want to go upstairs either. It wasn’t my room, and I doubted there was anything I really wanted to see up there. He wouldn’t likely want to sit in on the operation, but I had nowhere else to look, unless they had up and gone shopping. As I neared the operating room door, I could hear two voices coming from behind it. The door creaked loudly as I pushed it, and both Radheart and Dizzy stared at me from around a stainless steel table beyond the threshold. Radheart was in a full body bio-suit, and Dizzy held a tray in his mouth that provided a selection of scalpels, a heavy gauge needle, some thread, and a smaller tray filled with a clear liquid. Behind both of them, Wingnut lay still on his stomach, far too still for my comfort. His eyes were closed, and his breaths were shallow.

“What are you doing in here!?” Radheart’s voice came out somewhat muffled from behind her mask.

I grunted. “Wanted to see where Dizzy was.”

“Well you found him, and now you’re distracting me in the middle of an operation. Get out.”

Everyone is just so friendly around here. “Fine. Dizzy, I want to talk to you when you get a minute.”

He turned toward Radheart and half-mumbled something around the tray in his teeth. It sounded utterly unintelligible, but she must have known what it meant. “Alright. Put the tray down and go with Sage. Don’t let anyone back in.”

Page piped up from right behind me, ”Want me to switch out for Ter-Dizzy? Tag me in!” I jumped involuntarily. How did I not hear him follow me up the stairs? Was I that preoccupied? At least Radheart didn’t seem to notice his slip with the name.

“You’re not clean,” Radheart hissed. “What did you do, bathe in a river? This is an operating room. Do you want your friend to die of infection!?”

Despite his best intentions, this was definitely not the time for his antics. I turned to face Page, consciously avoiding the line-of-sight between Radheart and him. “Uuh, Page?” I paused for a second to think. “I really don’t think now is the best time.” He nodded, returning to the spot behind me.

I turned back towards the door, wincing at the sight of the cold steel table and not envying Wingnut one little bit. Without giving so much as a glance to either one of us, Radheart took the biggest knife off the tray, and started digging into the bandages over Wingnut’s back. I looked away, holding open the door for Dizzy to leave. There wasn’t much room for him to enter the hall; everyone else had heard our conversation and made their way upstairs to lean over my shoulder to get a look into the operating room. Utterly ignoring all of them, Dizzy pushed his way through and I followed amidst a throng of delighted hellos and questions.

“So, how was it last night?” chuckled Stalemate through a grin.

Ash glowered. “Shut up, little shit.”

“A lot better than yours,” seethed Dizzy.

“Ooooh.” Page snickered as he followed us into the foyer.

“Come on, all of you. Go on down to the basement.” I struggled with my saddlebags for a few moments until I finally managed to find the clip and prod it with the edge of a hoof. I held them up for Page. “Take these, and take inventory of what we have. Dizzy and I will be down in a minute.”

“Pleeease?” Page returned in a very high pitched dramatic voice, as if he were a small child pouting for candy. He held the word for several uncomfortable seconds until I couldn’t bear it anymore and talked over him.

“Just take the damn bags!” I said, throwing them into the air. With a smirk, Page caught them and levitated them onto his back. “Aw well,” he sighed, “I’ll be over medium load so most of my dex bonuses are gone, but that’s okay I suppose.”

Page shifted them more securely on his back, and proceeded down the stairs. As I watched, Ash turned away and hurried over to the basement steps. Again I cursed the sheer number of things stopping me from taking care of her. Stalemate looked like he wanted to stay and argue, but soon followed them. For a few moments the only sound was the rhythmic noisy clicking of hooves against the concrete steps until I heard a slightly different hoof-fall, followed by a sound that could only be described as three ponies falling down stairs. Loud swearing followed from the bottom, and for the first time since we’d arrived I attempted the equivalent of a facepalm -- carefully. At least I wasn’t the only one tripping and falling down the stairs. Dizzy, on the other hand, didn’t look even the slightest bit amused.

“Ok, there’s no easy way to ask this, but are you all ok?” I tried my best to find a happy medium between a frown, and a creepy grin. Hopefully it looked like a sincere and caring smile.

“I’ll live.” He tried to look anywhere but at me, sounding annoyed and angry.

For all the time I normally let my imagination run loose and wild, right now I was running after it with an assault shotgun and a whole pile of nets. “Ok, she didn’t misuse you or...holy shit that sounds so bad. I’m sorry.”

“Don’t worry about it, did what I had to, nothing more.”

“Well, so long as you’re all ok up here.” I tapped my head for emphasis. “That’s what matters. Was breakfast good?”

“It was food, and I think we have more important shit to worry about than how I’m doing.”

“I can’t think of anything more important than making sure that we’re all taken care of until we can find a way back. And as of right now, Wingnut is in the operating room with Radheart, so we have time to kill.”

“Look, what happened can’t be changed, the sooner we can get out of here, the better. The only thing worse than talking about this shit is sitting there being bored.”

“Well, ‘sitting there bored’ is the only thing I’ve got planned for us until Wingnut gets out from under the knife. We already sold the crap that we found and got food. Now all that there is to do is kill time and hope that Wingnut comes out from this alright. Do you want to go talk to Stalemate for me while I nap?”

“Why the fuck would I want to talk to your brother? All he is going to do is pester me until I remove a few of his teeth with the nearest blunt object.”

“I might not stop you. Anyways, I’ll be in the basement if you need me.” I turned and slowly made my way down the stairs, making absolutely sure that I didn’t trip over anything. Dizzy soon followed behind, but I wasn’t paying too much attention. When I got to the bottom, I looked around until I saw Ash on her cot, gazing miserably at the floor. Everything else seemed to fade away as I walked toward her. Stalemate was calling out something at Dizzy, and Page was trying to smooth everything over, but they all sounded far, far away as if I were underwater. I hopped up onto the cot next to her, and tried to wrap my legs around her. It was awkward, but it was the best I could do to make up for letting her go back at the general store.

“It’s all going to be ok,” I whispered in her ear.

“Is it?” she asked, her words short and biting.

I squeezed her just a little tighter and tried to think of an answer. I couldn’t. I didn’t fall asleep for a long time, but lay there staring at the ceiling. Eventually, Ash fell asleep next to me, or was pretending well enough that I couldn’t tell. Still, I lay awake and wondered. Worry wasn’t something I usually let myself do. When I was a little bit younger and more foolish, Stalemate had told me that worrying was pointless.

Despite that advice, I never really took it to heart until the day I could find no use in worrying at all. It didn’t find a way out of my problems, it didn’t make me more prepared to solve them, but it could remind me to make sure I had exhausted all of my options. As best as I could tell, they were gone. So I continued to ponder. I was running out of things to do before facing the big question, and still had no way to answer it. Sooner or later I’d have to ask for help, and if couldn’t get any, what then? One more thing to not worry about. We’re running out of options, time to make some more.

Sky Sage: Level Two (50% to next level)

I’ll deal with everything when I wake up.

Dizzy: Level Two (50% to next level)

I only did what I had to...

Ashen Shield: Level Two (50% to next level)

Just leave me alone.

Stalemate: Level Two (50% to next level)

There is no fun in this place. None at all.

Page Gemwright: Level Two (50% to next level)

We’re in this deeper than we can ever imagine. The only way we’re going to live... is to keep moving forward at any cost.

Wingnut: Level Two

...

Author's Note

So this quickly becomes a decision between long chapters and longer time between updates, and shorter chapters with more frequent updates. I've elected for the latter. It also means that the next musical number is being pushed back to chapter five.