Voluntold

Every time you go and achieve the landmark of ‘idiot-proof,’ they go and build a better idiot.

Sky Sage
Day Two, Noon

While I can’t remember a lot from my early childhood, there are a few things that will stick with me forever. Those snapshots, like an old, distorted video tape will always be there as a reminder of who I was. In those days, I utterly detested any time on the road. I didn’t get any say in where we were going, and it rarely was anywhere interesting. The worst were the long road trips. During those, I’d sit for hours upon hours, expected to sit still, be quiet, and somehow enjoy myself with nothing to do at all. If I had the misfortune of being in an older vehicle, there wouldn’t even be air conditioning, so I would have the unique joy of sticking to the seat. That happened a lot in the newer ones anyways, when my parents somehow forgot to set the AC to the whole vehicle, leaving it in the front. Those would be long hours of sitting half in the sun, half out, and never getting sunburnt behind the glass windows. As the day would wear on, the back half of my shirt and pants would gradually get sweaty and stick to the seat, leaving me uncomfortable but stuck in one spot.

I had that exact same feeling right now. The front of my shirt and pants and socks and everything else was soaked in sweat, and still warm. Yet for some reason it still felt comfortable, and as my mind swam slowly toward consciousness, I realized that I wasn’t sitting somewhere, but rather lying down on my side. I was holding something...no, someone, because it was breathing. My right arm was asleep, and as I went to shift it, that’s when something clicked. That isn’t an arm. Damnit.

Getting one leg out from under Ash, I squeezed her tightly with the other. That didn’t wake her, but the motion woke me up enough to hear what had disturbed my rest. Radheart was talking to Dizzy, probably at the top of the stairs. I couldn’t quite tell with my eyes still closed, but these pony ears sure had a range of hearing on them. The conversation had been going on just a little while by the sound of it. Radheart was giving some instructions to Dizzy.

“...he’ll be ready to go in a few minutes, so get everyone up. I’ll be waiting for you upstairs.”

I couldn’t make out any further voices, and the two sets of hooves sounded to get further away. One went back upstairs, and the other was coming towards me. Rather than let Dizzy wake me, I sat up and opened my eyes suddenly, and found myself looking right at him. If that startled him, he didn’t show it.

“You hear?” Dizzy asked plainly.

I nodded.

“Well, let’s get everyone up. Wingnut is about done and Radheart wants to talk.”

That didn’t make any sense to me, but I wasn’t about to argue with a chance to move forward. “What time is it?”

“Lunch time.”

Again, something I really couldn’t argue with. While Dizzy woke up Page and Stalemate, I prodded Ash a few times in the side. She groaned and shifted around, forcing herself even closer to me. It’s hard to describe how much I really wanted to go back to sleep, but we had work to do. I tapped her again.

“Ash, we gotta get up.”

“Why?”

“Food.”

The sudden burst of energy caught me by surprise, as Ash half fell and half leaped out of bed, immediately awake and interested. However, such moves were for those who could move on more than two legs. What would have been an artful leap quickly turned into a haphazard sprawl towards the ground as Ash kicked me in the face as she struggled to get off the cot.

“Ow!” Always in the face! What the hell?

“Oh, come on, it’s not as bad as last time,” Ash prodded. I quickly leaned back and rubbed my muzzle, both for comfort and so she couldn’t bump my aching face again. My wakeup fare two days in a row had been to succumb to face-smashing. I really hoped this was going to stop soon. Sure, my face was bigger than before, and had a nose/mouth combination that stuck out much further than it had any good reason to, but this was just ridiculous.

“You kicked me in the face! Horse-kicked! No, it’s not funny, it hurt!”

Getting out of bed was something that I planned on taking carefully. I doubted it was going to be any easier than the last time, but at least I was on my guard for the fall and not entangled in sheets. When my hooves hit the floor, I swayed back and forth several times until a pair of hooves gently pushed at my side to stabilize me. It was Page, who had somehow gotten up and walked over to us by the time I managed to hit the floor.

“Thanks.”

“No problem!” His horn was glowing, and I turned to see that he was also holding Ash up by her barrel. A flash of jealousy hit me as I stood up all the way. How was he adjusting so quickly to this? All I had managed so far was walking, half-succeeding at opening a few doors, and flapping my way into a bathtub. Despite all of my grander thoughts, all I could manage was an old quote from a friend. Big plays, Sage. There were raiders and worse waiting for us outside Alpine, and I was still struggling to get out of bed. That wouldn’t do. It was a damn long ways between here and becoming a wastelander.

As Page put Ash down harder than I would have liked, he nonchalantly declared, ”Wow, that worked way better than the first time. I’m just glad you aren’t as breakable as the other stuff I tried earlier. And nothing caught fire this time!”

Despite being used as a test subject, Ash remained entirely focused on the prospect of breakfast. Well, if she and Page were both ok, Stalemate hadn’t killed anything, and I found a miracle headache cure, we’d all be ok. Well, all of us except for Wingnut.

As long as I could remember spending time with Wingnut, he’d never been slowed down by injury or sickness. Whenever he was sick, he still stuck to his workout schedule. When he got injured, he just changed his lifting and parkour regimes to accommodate. Every time life hit him, he hit back harder. With each step closer to the operating table I got a little bit more worried that this would be the time that he’d taken a hit from which he could not recover.

Radheart was pacing in the waiting room. Her troubled expression made me wince. “How is he?”

“He’s awake, but take it gentle with him. Don’t surprise him. Also, he seems to have some trouble remembering his name. While you visit I’ll stay with you, and if I ask you to leave, just leave. I don’t want to have to try and get him out of shock. One more thing: one person visits at a time -- just you for now.” She pointed one foreleg at me. “If all of you rush in there at once it might shake him up.”

I had hoped to talk to him without Radheart there to fuck it up, but wasn’t looking like I had a choice. “Alright, can I go in now?”

“Mhmm.” She pushed the door open, and I followed her inside. The operating table had been pushed up against the wall, and Wingnut was laying on a cot underneath several layers of blankets. His eyes were glazed until we got closer, and which point he blinked and looked at each of us in turn. He slowly smiled at me, and a cold chill ran through my body. He didn’t know a single bit of our cover story. What had he told Radheart? What was he about to do? This was about to become an act of pure damage control.

“Hey, Wingnut!” I forced myself to ever so slightly emphasize his name, praying that he’d pick up on it. “You really had us worried there.”

Every word he spoke was a little slower and lower pitched than usual. “Huh? Oh hey man, what’s going on?”

I winced at the word ‘man,’ and hoped that Radheart would chalk it up to his druggy state. “How are you feeling?”

Wingnut chuckled a bit. “Oh you know, the drugs are taking away most of the pain, but my back really hurts.” He turned his head over his shoulder to check where his wings used to be. “Dammit, I just got them too.”

Radheart raised her eyebrows at that remark. Crap! Bad move. “Just got them?”

I cut in before Wingnut could answer. “I’m so sorry Wingnut, we did everything we could. We killed the fucker who cut off your wings. Page slammed him into a barn so hard that he just broke. I know it’s going to be different without them, but we’ll take care of you, ok?” I winked at him.

“Thanks, Dominic. It’s still odd to hear your voice coming from there.”

Shit.

“Dominic?” In the space of a few seconds, Radheart had gone from the cooly professional doctor to a caring mother. “Who is he?”

“Dom? He’s my--”

I cut off Wingnut before he could cause any more damage. “He’s an old buddy from when we were younger.”

Radheart turned to me with her face hidden from Wingnut and mouthed several words. I’d never been able to do that trick with people, let alone ponies. Needless to say I had no idea what she was saying, but I guessed she want me to cut the cover act. After a few moments, Wingnut interrupted her.

“Okay, what is going on here guys! I missed something important. One minute I’m a person, next minute I’m a pegasus, and now I’m a de-facto earth pony. Somebody care to fill me in?”

I hung my head and sighed. “Well, I was trying to avoid us looking like a bunch of weirdos in front of the locals, but I think that’s fist-fucked now.”

Radheart grinned outright and giggled just a little bit. I wanted to knock to the floor. As it was, I was just happy enough to see Wingnut alive and kicking. Sparing a shove, I ran around Radheart and stood next to him. How was I supposed to show the affection of a good friend? Normally I’d slug him in the arm, but between the change in limbs and his recovering state, I settled for laying one foreleg gently on top of him. Even then, my balance was precarious. Wingnut looked up, confused, but there was also gratitude in his gaze. It lasted until Radheart managed to recover from her excitement.

“Ok, I knew it! Your little group was strange, and I knew your story didn’t quite add up, so tell me, what in the fires of Tartarus is going on here? You two are certainly not from the enclave, and what kind of name is Dominic?”

Silence hung over the room, and my brain couldn’t come up with any more excuses. Wingnut put both of his forelegs over me in a crude hug, causing me to feel a mix of sorrow and anger inside that threatened to drown out all other thoughts. I had no good answer for this that wouldn’t come off as insanity or the worst lie she’d ever heard. “Would you mind waiting for me to explain to you later? It’s...a long, and very bizarre story.”

“I’ve heard some pretty strange ones in my time here, but yes, you can explain it to me over lunch.”

My ears pricked at that. “You buying?”

“Only for Dizzy.”

Lunch, as it so turned out, was again at Morningside’s inn. The food had changed to include potatoes and vegetables, and the place was alive with ponies milling to and fro. That was just outright problematic. I had to wonder if Radheart had any discretion at all. It didn’t help that everypony around had glanced at Page at least once since walking in and taking his hood off, and some were still staring. Hiding under a cloak was a great idea until it was daylight, and fifty ponies were all milling about nearby. For each time that Page had been given a curious look, I’d been given an angry glare.

Despite the sudden attention, Page returned each with an uneasy grin. Until someone bothered us though, I wouldn’t bother them. No sense in making enemies before we needed to. Still, it seemed like several tables worth of ponies had pointed over in our direction, and while I couldn’t hear their words, they sounded incensed.

At least everypony else seemed to be mainly interested in their food. They were all coming and going, getting their lunches, and eating them quickly. Those that actually stopped to talk were busy talking to each other and were paying very little heed to the large rectangular table in the corner where we sat. Radheart had taken the seat opposite mine, and to her left and right sat Wingnut and Dizzy, respectively. At my sides sat Ash and Stalemate, both already engrossed in their food. I winced again at the number thirty bouncing around in my head. At this rate, we’d only have a day and a half of food left.

“Alright, you can start explaining whenever you’re ready.” Radheart stared at me expectantly as she levitated the first bite into her mouth. My stomach grumbled.

I’d been thinking the whole walk over how to go about starting this conversation and I had come up with nothing clever. Time to use that conversation sledgehammer that Ash always told me I carried. As I opened my mouth to tell her as bluntly as possible everything that had come to mind, Page beat me to it.

“Have you ever read a story where the hero travels so far away that he can never come back?” Page seemed to be waiting expectantly for an answer.

I wanted to facehoof, but Page was breaking it to her gently. There was no doubt that we needed someone who believed that we weren’t just crazy to help us, and preventing Radheart from getting up and walking away would be a good start. To that end, I stuck my face in my plate and listened as the two talked.

“Where are you going with that?” asked Radheart.

“Well,” continued Page, “if you couldn’t tell...we’re not exactly from around... ‘here.’” He furrowed his brow and swept his legs across the room in a broad arc, balance wavering as he did. At this, Radheart took another look at us and saw that Wingnut had scattered crumbs all over the table, the floor, and his face. Stalemate was and had been whining about horse problems ever since he sat down, and Ash was still struggling with her telekinesis.

Page continued, “It’s obvious that we don’t fit in here. You’ve had time to speak with us and know that we’re intelligent and relatively sane, but do we seem ‘normal’ to you? Can you think of any rational way that this kind of naivety could happen? Even if we came out from under a rock, we’d at least be able to walk down stairs properly. You know as well as I do that if you threw us outside Alpine, we wouldn’t last a week.”

Radheart finished chewing and swallowed. “I admittedly was wondering how I got half a dozen adults without cutiemarks showing up at my clinic. Not to mention that there are two pegasi traveling with you… and whatever you and Dizzy are. You don’t talk in the same diction or accent as anyone I’ve ever met, and you stumble when you walk around like cripples or foals.”

Page was smiling and nodding, but I was starting to feel a twist in my stomach. Just what kind of conclusion was she going to get to? I wanted to nudge her closer to the right one. “Well, there is a logical explanation. But it’s going to be the strangest thing you’ve ever heard. For that matter, do we have to discuss it here, rather than somewhere quiet and more private?”

“If I’m taking care of you any longer, I need to know who, or what my patient and his guests are.”

Dizzy started to answer like I had before, only to be cut off by Page again.

Page lifted his spoon with telekinesis and bobbed it in front of Radheart. “Simply put, if you had asked me three days ago if this was possible, I would have probably said no. Wingnut, what do you think?”

A slurping noise announced that Wingnut had pulled his face out of the mush that remained of his potatoes. He curtly said, “Nope, not possible, but it is pretty awesome!” and went right back to polishing the plate clean. Finally, Dizzy dropped the line I’d been wanting to hear.

“I’ll not sugarcoat it. We’re from a different dimension, universe, reality, or something along those lines. We have no idea what we’re doing, except for chucklefuck over there.” He stuck a leg out to point at Page who promptly grinned and set his spoon back down. “Otherwise, we don’t know magic, can’t fly, and can barely even walk. None of us have any idea how to even use our own bodies, or even fight. We were attacked by raiders, three of them all sick and half dead as it stood, and we barely made it out of that alive.”

Radheart frowned, closed her mouth once, then opened it again to slowly ask her next question. “So what exactly is Dominic?”

I sighed. “That’s my name. Or was my name. I’m not quite sure how that works at this point. That’s what everyone called me before we got here, but I figured that would go over poorly with the locals. Hence ‘Sky Sage.’” I pointed in turn to Wingnut, Ash, Stalemate, Page, and Dizzy. “That’s Seth, Amelia, Sawyer, Marcus, and Terrance.”

While Radheart was trying to absorb all the new names, Page continued. “We’d heard of places like this before we got here, and so as strange as it might sound, we decided to take on nicknames instead of our real names. Still, it looks like they’re our real names now.”

“Your world is an imaginary place: a fiction or a fantasy in our world,” added Dizzy. “We all have seen games or stories depicting your world, with the exception of Fluffy over there.” He jerked a hoof at Stalemate and frowned. Stalemate simply started another round of cursing at Dizzy, who just smiled. I leaned a little forward so Radheart could hear me.

“Don’t mind him. He isn’t taking all of this very well, and I can’t really say any of us are. We just want to get home, and the first step is making sure that none of us die. So for whatever it’s worth, thank you.”

For a few moments Radheart just looked back and forth between Stalemate, Dizzy, and myself. I could feel the seriousness breaking down as Stalemate started to yell louder, and something told me I had to salvage the conversation.

“They are telling the truth. We are telling the truth. It’s crazy, but it’s all we’ve got. If I were any less desperate, I’d have spent the time to come up with something that didn’t sound so outlandish.”

Page poked me with his spoon, and I yelped. Fuck! Still ticklish as a pony. At that sound, everypony but Sawyer stopped and turned to laugh at me. Page jabbed at me a few more times, forcing me to try to block with my forelegs while he gave a much less serious version of my plea.

“Well, aside from being hopelessly stuck in an insanely dangerous wasteland with no social competence, wealth, or status, I'm actually quite content with having magic. Guess you take the good with the bad, eh? But it would be swell if you could help us out.”

Just before Radheart could answer, Wingnut got sick of listening to Stalemate complain and shoved him off his seat. Stalemate fell to the floor, snorting and swearing as he tried, and failed to get back up. At the sound of Wingnut encouraging Stalemate, who was still spitting and ranting, Radheart broke out laughing.

“Well,” she said as she stopped laughing with a sigh, “it’s stupid and asinine, but I can’t think of anything else that would make more sense. That being said, regardless of where you all came from, you’re going to need to eat. And if you want food, then you’re going to have to work. I don’t care that you’re not master spellcasters or elite fliers, but you’ll have to lend a hoof.”

“We’d be grateful to,” I supplied. It was a start. At least she hadn’t gotten up and walked away from the table or run away screaming. Then the lights flickered and went out, and most of the ponies started to run screaming in every direction. Morningside sprinted to the door, a large shotgun braced over her back. She peeked outside, then bellowed over the din.

“It’s not an attack, now cut it out!”

Everypony stopped right where they were and started to return to their meals. Some were hiding under tables, others behind the counter, and four or five were packed under the stairs. The whole scene was almost comical, until I realized I was watching the local equivalent of preparing for an incoming bomb or mortar attack. Radheart hadn’t ducked under the table, but she certainly was a little more tense than before.

“What was that all about?” asked Dizzy.

“Well,” answered Radheart shakily, “the last time the enclave hit, they turned off the power first. They botched the job, and now the generator is damaged. We’re not really sure what to do with it, because it’s been running since before the war.”

That gave me an idea. It wasn’t a great one, but it was always better to act right away than to wait for opportunities to pass. They had the wonderful habit of always accomplishing something, even if only to teach me what I should and shouldn’t do. Learned decisions were for after I’d learned more.

“If told you that Page and I are engineers, and that Dizzy is a mechanic, would you think that it was too far-fetched? How about if I also told you Wingnut is a scientist, our other two are apprentices?”

“After everything else you just said? Come on. You might just be able to earn your bread after all.” Radheart’s expression visibly relaxed as pushed her plate back and motioned for us to follow her to the door.

The building next to the watermill was ringed by a whole mess of ponies clamoring and brandishing farm tools angrily into the air. Classic angry mob. Radheart put out a hoof and stopped us next to a tool shack and silently urged us to wait for several minutes until the crowd began to disperse. A light-blue unicorn buck walked amongst them with several armed figures that I guessed were town guards. He was mingling with the mass, and although the exact words he spoke were lost to me, he radiated an aura of command which told far more than the escorts ever could. As he walked by, the ponies around him rapidly calmed down and lowered their makeshift weapons until the entire crowd dissipated.

It really didn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out exactly how or why pegasus were hated in this town. Still, it was kind of frustrating that I couldn’t just walk over to the mill and look at what was going on -- double-bonus points for the wait being because the bunch of angry citizens would prod me with pitchforks if I walked in too soon. After five far too long minutes of sitting uncomfortably behind Radheart and with everyone else right behind me as if we were stacked up to attack the mill, we came out from from behind the rotting timber.

About twenty meters of open ground separated us from where the unicorn and the guards were standing at the mill, and we made it about two steps before we got their attention. In the blink of an eye, I was looking down the barrel of a half-dozen rifles, and the guards were slowly fanning out into a half circle in front of the unicorn. Oh that was not the kind of friendly hello I’d hoped to receive. What else was I expecting? Aside from possibly birdshot for the bird-pony.

“Radheart! Hang on!” The unicorn, who was very clearly in charge was snarling, and pointed at me. “You! Get away from her! Get away from all of them. Right now.”

“Spare us the theatrics, Rainfall. You know as well as I do that if this feather-duster was bothering me I’d off him.”

At Radheart’s rebuttal, most of the guards lowered their weapons, and some put them away entirely. Rainfall merely frowned, then stood stock-still for a few moments as he looked us up and down. If what he had done with the crowd was anything to go by, then he was equally capable of talking us down and shooting us up. Considering he had the guns to back it up, I couldn’t do more than stand and wait on edge, adrenaline mixing with nervousness to pollute my blood with a cocktail of unease.

“Just why did you bring them here then? A friend of a pegasus is just as bad.” His voice was like oil on top of a bucket of water -- smooth, but there was a lot more depth to it.

Radheart stepped forward, putting herself firmly between Rainfall and myself. “They claim they can help with the generator problems we’ve been having, and I have half a mind to believe they’re telling the truth.”

Turning tail to us, Rainfall walked authoritatively back toward the generator building. He was almost strutting, but left room to talk over his shoulder. The display was obnoxious for sure, but no one had shot yet, for which I was grateful. All of the guards had relaxed their weapons, and my heart wasn’t pounding quite as hard now that there weren’t twenty lines of fire going through my skull. I was more than relieved to try the talking avenue over the shooting one.

“Really now? The Enclave have seldom been kind to us. I would question their motives of sending us a mechanic just now, and I see no reasonable motivation they could possibly have for helping the townsfolk.”

“I’m not a mechanic, that’s my friend here. Nor are we part of the Enclave.” I gestured to Dizzy. “Though I think I might be able to fix up your local power grid.”

Rainfall’s eyes followed my hoof to find Dizzy, and then widened as he took a step back. “J-just what the f...what are you?” His hoof struck the threshold of the door and he stumbled backwards. I was grateful he hadn’t noticed Page yet.

Dizzy just stood there and blankly replied. “I’m a mechanic.” Page just stood at the back of the group with his head partially concealed under the cloak. He wasn’t going to draw more attention than necessary, especially after all of the looks he got over breakfast.

“What?!” Rainfall stood up straight again, now atop the concrete walkway to the mill door. His eyes shone with barely contained anger, then glossed over as he smiled yet again. “Oh, I see. Well, allow me to explain, we don’t just let anypony work on our generator. He’d have to have unique skills and unquestionable honest intent.”

Radheart stepped in front of Dizzy, shaking her head. “He’s a friend of mine, and I trust him.” She flicked her tail across his nose, and Dizzy turned bright red, but didn’t move. “That is all you need to know, now get out of the way so they can fix your shit for you.”

Rainfall deliberately stepped forward until he was right in front of Radheart. “Just another fuck-buddy then, Radheart? You’re as predictable as your mother was.”

“Said the pot to the kettle.” Radheart pushed her face against Rainfall’s, each trying to start the other on fire with glares alone. Yay for small town family rivalry. The mayor and the doctor hate each other, and they’re important enough that nopony else bothers to get in the way. Time to break it up.

“Look, you two can sit here all day as your generator runs down and fails completely, or you can let us do something about it.” Shocked out of their rivalry, they both shifted their gazes to me. Rainfall still looked pissed, while Radheart had a slight smile about her lips that belied her knowledge of victory. “Rainfall, right?”

“What do you want?!”

“You notice how I am a pegasus, walking around down here, sans armor, no guns, and asking nicely if I can help you? You know? So all those foals get the heating that you want them to have so dearly... and those lights that you want so desperately stay on? If I were with the Enclave, why would we come down here and plead with Radheart for help if we had access to the doctors up there? What does that sound like to you?”

In that time, Rainfall had marched over to me and stepped up close. Really close. Typical bully stuff, and I was not in the mood for it. Save for his horn, he was shorter than me, forcing him to talk up at me while trying to be threatening. Cute.

“It sounds like a treacherous enclave plot! You’re here to get inside and destroy what little we have left!”

I laughed. It was a fake chuckle to throw him off at first, but the more I thought about it, I started to convulse. When at long last I could control my breathing again, I put my forehooves back down and explained. As the words fell from my mouth with greater and greater conviction, his presence shrank.

“That’s rich, Rain. From what I gather, the enclave could bomb this place whenever they feel like you’re having too good of a day, right? And yet somehow they sent two of their own to live on the surface, get dismembered, and integrate to the point of camaraderie with the surface ponies just to get inside and destroy what was already nearly broken? Please. We’ve offered you help, and in return you’re spewing accusations into the air that you know are pointless. Why?”

“Why? I’ve got a better question. How do I know I can trust you? Reason all you will, but I’m not hanging the welfare of four hundred souls to your words.”

“Because I can vouch for him.” Radheart really didn’t look like she enjoyed being left out of the argument. “Sky Sage and his little gang here stumbled into my clinic last night, starving, freezing, and in the case of Wingnut, dying. They aren’t elite spies or warriors, and I know because they’ve all fallen down my stairs at least once.”

“Guilty,” chirped Page.

Two dozen pairs of eyes focused on anypony else would have enforced some cringing, but Page merely shrugged and grinned sheepishly. As the silence lingered on, the sheer weight of his word sank in to everyone present, and Rainfall dropped his facade.

“You weren’t kidding, these guys are grade-A idiots. I’ve seen enclave stupid, and this ain’t it. Tell you what.” One of the guards jumped a little as Rainfall levitated a carbine out of her saddle-holder. “I’ll give ya’ a shot at fixing it. If you fuck up, I give you another shot. One for each of you that decided to break our stuff. Come on in, ya’ freaks.”

We followed Rainfall on inside, ducking a little as we passed under the low-slung front door. The inside was dim and musty and noisy and downright stifling. Age old mildew mixed with the churning of water, sloshing back and forth against the planks of the station’s walls, worn gray from age and moisture. Each step creaked, and every breath stank: a cloying inhale of dying, rotting wood.

The floorboards under my hooves vibrated with a pronounced hum, shaking my bones and chattering my teeth. At the end of the short hall we arrived in the generator room. The ceiling was two stories above my head and the floor sloped down until it was right next to the portion of the river running through the room. Neither of those were my focus though, but rather the rusting behemoth that sat before me. Through a thin veil of smoke and a mountain of tangled wires I could make out a small shaft spinning in place, wobbling side-to-side: the cause of that horrible clunking noise.

“What the fuck…” Dizzy breathed next me, his mouth hung open.

“Look, I’m no master mechanic; I made it work.”

That was perhaps the first truly honest statement I’d heard out of Rainfall.

“You made it fucking worse, it’s going to take days to fix this. Just to clear off all this useless shit!” Dizzy poked the generator with a hoof, which caused an electrical arc to run over the tangled winding and fade away. I could smell burnt wires... and burnt bat-pony. “How much amperage do you have running through these wires? Far too much...is that speaker wire?”

Rainfall gave a short nod. “It keeps smoking whenever the rotor spins too fast. I made it work.”

“What voltage are you running this all at?” I perused over the outgoing lines, listening to the humming coming off of them.

“Hell if I know. You can touch it and find out, right? You feather-brains are supposed to be shock-proof.”

“Well, until you can give me a voltage, a frequency, and a power level you are running all this at, no! I don’t feel like sticking my tongue into that circuit. I’d need to sit down and map where it’s all going first, how much power is going to where, and make sure you don’t have any shorts in the system. This is a few week’s worth of work on just electrical side alone, though it doesn’t look like the mechanical parts are faring much better.”

“From what I’m seeing, you’re cycling all of this with far too much stress. Have you even thought about straightening this shaft?” Page earned a glare from Rainfall for his interjection, but both ponies’ comments were cut short by a loud banging noise from behind the generator. As fast as it began, the banging ceased and the generator slowly started to spin down, crackling.

“Found the clutch to the water wheel. It was a little stuck.”

“What the fuck is a clutch?” Rainfall spun around as Dizzy glowered at him, and I turned to start tracing some of the wiring. I didn’t suspect I’d had much time before Dizzy got belligerent, Rainfall got pissed, and we’d all get thrown out, beaten, and possibly shot. That wiring was too much of a mess to do anything with other than pretend to be useful while I nervously waited for them to come to terms.

Dizzy popped his head over the generator as the room slowly went dark. “I’m not even mad!” He then took off his sunglasses and took off a back panel. “Just dammit! Where are your tools?”

“Seriously, what are you?”

“My mother used hydra when she was pregnant. You should see my sister.”

“Fine then, what do you need?” Rainfall walked over to an old rusted toolbox under the window.

“Screwdriver, flat head. First step is to see if the brushes are even still there.”

“Has anypony got an electrical diagram of this? Or failing that a piece of paper and a pencil?” Somepony pressed a piece of paper and a charcoal stick at my hooves, and I started on putting together a rough outline of where everything was going. The charcoal tasted like the bastard child of industrial fires and cheap scotch. A few minutes passed and I heard the screwdriver hit the ground multiple times, as well as Dizzy’s low cursing. Eventually he stopped, and spat it out.

“Look, I’m not even too far into this, and I can tell you that the brushes are wafer thin, they have worn a groove in the rotor, and just by looking at it I can tell you that the coils are probably all nearly melted. The wobble in the rotor is from shot bearings, the leads going out are corroded, and one broke off from me basically just touching it. I’m actually rather floored that this coil of AC wires laid on top didn’t start on fire. It really looks like no one has done any work on it since the bombs fell. Frankly, this is beyond repair.”

“Brushes...as in...paint brushes?” asked Rainfall. I cringed, and Dizzy just stared at him. “So we can’t get new parts?”

Page perched himself on a crate overlooking the generator and was scrutinizing the main fasteners for the machine. At the request he replied, “I might be able to reforge some of these parts… or at least reweld the more serious fractures. Each fix would take a good deal of time to make, and I’ve seen at least ten already. From what it sounds like however, time is not a luxury we have anymore. Also, ironically, I would need power in order to weld anything.”

Dizzy was still staring, and answered Rainfall cooly. “At this point all the new parts I would need would amount to a new generator.”

“Well that’s just fucking peachy!” screamed Rainfall, waving his carbine about. I spent months of my life putting this all together, and saving the well-being of the town, just for you to come in here, poke it, and break it! It’s a two-century old relic that I’m keeping up and running, not something you can just whack with a wrench! Is there anything else that is possibly wrong with it while we’re destroying it?”

I sighed, not really wanting to pour more gasoline on the fire, but also feeling the need to give an honest assessment for their time. “Well, since you asked, you have several shorts in your system, and a lot of extra wiring that I don’t think you need. It’s built for a three-phase system, and it looks like you’re only generating one phase with the equipment. The fact that the humming is loud enough to hear over the clunking says that you’re wasting a ton of the power, and that could be errors or just old wiring. I’d like to be able to check more, but I don’t have the equipment to do it, unless you have a multimeter or two somewhere.”

“In short,” added Page, “it’s pretty trashed! Thankfully, in addition to being elite mercenaries, secret agents, and enclave spies, we’re also experienced contractors. It would take almost a miracle to get this monster up-and-running again, but if you’re willing to keep us around, we can totally fix what shouldn’t have ever been this broken!”

“Oh shut up!” Rainfall bellowed over Page.

“There has to be a nearby junkyard, or something.” Dizzy muttered as he stepped into the group again. He was covered from mane to tail in dirt and grease. He’d gone from a freakish looking nightmare to a black freakish-looking-nightmare, and the guards stepped away as he walked up. I wasn’t quite sure if it was from the appearance or the desire to avoid being covered in old grease.

Rainfall ground his hooves into the floorboards as he spoke. “Well that’s just fucking perfect. The only one nearby is a full-on raider base. Been sending out raiding parties for about a year now, hitting our caravans, shooting at our farmers, and generally being worse than the enclave.”

“They stole pretty much everything we were expecting to get this month, including my medical supplies.” Radheart was eyeing Dizzy up with a smile, and I could already sense the future. Something about him being generously ‘bathed.’

One by one we all left the little generator room, and there was a small mob of ponies waiting for us out front. Here was to hoping Rainfall didn’t plan on making good on his threats.

“Rain, when is the generator going to come back? We need power!”

Similar cries echoed through the group, striking me like lashes. I glanced at them, back at our group, then at Rainfall. If he got pissed off or petty, then he’d name us responsible and I seriously doubted anyone would question his words.

Rainfall looked at the ground for a second, then perked up, a wicked smile on his face. “These good ponies here have offered to overhaul the generator, giving us more power than ever! And on top of this, they have just volunteered to go to the junkyard, clear out the raiders, and bring back a whole new system for us to have. Isn’t that right, Sky Sage?”

I gulped, then coughed, then tried to sound as confident as I possibly could. “That’s right! Though we don’t have any weapons, or know the way. I don’t suppose you kind ponies would be willing to help us with those things?” Read: Thank you for not lynching us or shooting us! Now give us guns!

A big brown earth pony out in front bellowed loud enough to drown out the rest of the ruckus. “Wait, if there are raiders out in the hills, we all need to go clear them out, not just use the ponies we can’t trust!” Cries of affirmation and agreement ran throughout the crowd. From somewhere deeper in the bunch, another pony yelled over the rest. “Tomorrow morning, let’s leave and kill all those sons of zebras!”

Page mumbled “...heeey” under his breath. The mob grew louder and louder, and I looked over and winked at Rainfall, who was fuming at me. “Look, this way you get all your parts back instead of us just disappearing and becoming corpses. I’d say we’re both winning here.”

“Whatever you say, featherfuck, whatever you say.”

“We still need guns.”

“So go buy them.”

“We don’t have caps for that, and Copper likes us just as much as everyone else in town. Mind helping us help you?”

“Looks like I didn’t leave myself a choice. Don’t fucking screw it up.”

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

Uh, yay?

Adonicus: Level Two (50% to next level)

Oh boy, another fun night...

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

We seriously need to reevaluate our paradigm for labelling ‘friendlies,’ and maybe a major discussion about tact...

Stalemate: Level Two (50% to next level)

Dom keeps dragging us into more and more shit.

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

Still alive and un-shot! Woo that’s a 2x day streak! How long can I keep this going?

Wingnut: Level Two

Fuck Yeah! Food! I was starving!

Author's Note

Dun dun dun...dun dun dun! (Ok, so I couldn't resist the reference)

So an electrical engineer, a mechanical engineer, and a materials engineer walk into a bar and write a fic. They add nerd porn. It was hard work to reign everyone in, and it’s a good thing we did, otherwise this chapter would be a textbook section on small generators instead of a fiction story. This chapter had a 6.2k wordcount before Page, Ash, and Wingnut happened along. If it weren’t for Dizzy, the generator discussion would have barely been a thing. Thank goodness for good friends that edit this crazy mess.

Also, due to chapter cutoffs, the next musical number is pushed to chapter five.