The Twilight Guard

Chapter III

We left the city behind us. I was getting sick of the ruins, sick of crawling about, slinking like a rat to avoid whatever dangers could lurk behind the stones, the ruined walls, the heaps of decades-old skeletons.

We followed the directions the earth pony mare had given us. Follow the main street to the gates. She gave us directions on how to open the gates, but we were pegasi so we just flew over them. After that, we were to follow the ruined pavement road a couple miles to the northwest of Stalliongrad, where the village of Hoofsinki was supposed to be.

As we walked, it began to rain. We’d never experienced rain before. Brightwing was initially concerned, but we both grew to enjoy the cool water. When you’re wandering armoured in the heat, cool water falling from the sky does wonders to cool you down. Other than the rain, the road was pretty dead. The rolling plains of this part of Equestria hid little, but there was little to hide. A suburb of post-war shacks had sprung up around the city gates, but had long since been abandoned. Every so often on the road, we would see an abandoned building or a farm. When it was a farm, the farmer would always stop what he or she was doing and stare at the two dark-armoured ponies marching along the road. I would give them a curt, military nod as a way of indicating we weren’t a threat. Even with this (I thought) unprecedented act of friendliness, the locals were still very wary of us.

Partway into our journey, near what we assumed was the halfway mark, Brightwing spotted movement up ahead. We hunched low, only to see that as the mark got closer, it was a yellow mare with a green mane leading a two-headed cow laden with junk. She didn’t seem threatening, so I told Brightwing to stay ready as I released my half-drawn sword, letting it slide back into its sheath.

Brightwing and I used our bodies to block the road. When the yellow earth pony mare reached us, she stopped. “How much is the toll this time?” She stopped, narrowing her eyes and looking from me to Brightwing. “Hey, you guys aren’t raiders. Who are you?”

“We are affiliated with the Ministry of Awesome and are not at liberty to divulge information. Who are you and what is your purpose here?”

The earth pony didn’t even bat an eye. “The Ministry of Awesome, huh? That’s new. I’ll play along, since you kids want to play dress-up and make believe. I’m a scavenger, and I’m running my normal route, going from Stalliongrad to the Canterlot ruins and back. Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m leaving now.”

The scavenger started to lead her pack animal forward, until Brightwing drew her sword, unfurled her wings and stomped the ground.

“No you’re not. You’re going to give me a lay of the land.” I informed her. It was rare enough it seemed to encounter ponies who weren’t trying to rape your corpse that I wasn’t going to pass this up.

“The fuck I am. Get out of my way. I’m on a tight schedule.” The earth pony tensed, knowing that she couldn’t fight her way out.

Unfurling my wings as well to make me look bigger and tougher, I began asking questions.

“How much farther to Hoofsinki?” “Two hours’ trot, along this road. The road forks an hour from here, to get to Hoofsinki you’ll want to take the path on the right. The one on the left leads you to Canterlot, but it takes the roundabout way. Dangerous animals, and even more fucked up ponies. I never take that route, and for a damned good reason.”

“What should we expect when we reach Hoofsinki?” “Dunno why you’d want to go there. Place is a sinkhole. Always either under attack or recovering from being attacked. Raiders usually, though slavers come sometimes too.”

“There’s slavery out here?” The earth pony looked at us like we were retarded, rolling her eyes. “Look, I don’t know what game you’re playing here. Yes, there’s slavery. Red Eye’s operation being destroyed about a hundred years ago shattered any coherent operation they had, so now it’s just a buyer’s market. They take ponies, other ponies buy those ponies. Nice and deregulated. Can I please go now?”

I nodded and stepped aside, Brightwing sheathing her sword and doing likewise. The earth pony hurried through, seemingly eager to get as far from us as possible.

Slavery? Is that possible? I wasn’t sure how I felt about slavery. On the one hand, we were raised to believe the strong had right of power over the weak, so slavery just made sense. But on the other hand, it just felt.... foreign. Just didn’t feel right. I decided I’d wait until I saw slaves for myself to make that call.

I looked at Brightwing, and I could tell she was thinking the same thoughts I was. Best not to think though, best to move. I motioned for Brightwing to follow  my lead. The roads were taking far too long, so I crouched down, jumped, and took to the sky. Brightwing followed close behind and to my left.

As we flew, I couldn’t help but watch Brightwing. I noticed her back muscles flexing with every flap of her wings, the way her mane caught the wind, the way she looked back at me like I had three heads... Oh shit. Turning to face forward again, I hoped the cheekplates of my helmet obscured my face enough that she wouldn’t notice my embarrassment. I... was just being observant anyway. A commander needs to know what his warriors are capable of. I was just seeing how good a flyer she is. Yup, good flyer!

The land was beautiful, in its own way. Grass grew in large patches across the fields with a few bald spots here and there. What had once been lush green pasture and steppe land had become barren desert and was now beginning to grow back. Below, I noticed the fork the scavenger had told us about, and flew to the right of it as we’d been advised. As much as I’d wanted to go to Canterlot to meet the princesses and show them what pegasi could do without alicorns, that wasn’t really part of the scouting mission we’d been assigned.

I stole a quick glance back at Brightwing, and noticed she was exhausted. I began to feel the burn myself, so we put down on the road. Turns out when you live in a cave that only has one chamber large enough for flying, your wings don’t learn to carry you very far. We continued on hoof. As we walked, I brought out the transmitter and relayed to base what we had learned about slavery, and what I had observed about the grass not coming in evenly. I assumed there was something wrong that killed patches of grass.

Ending my transmission, I noticed a smudge on the horizon.  Given the smoke rising from campfires within the smudge, I was left to assume that was Hoofsinki. We approached with caution. Nearing the town, I noticed just how filthy and dilapidated the place looked. Every sheet-metal building was riddled with bullet holes,  and some of the brick structures of what had been a quaint pre-war village were partially collapsed and patched with sheet metal, wood, and even sheets of leather. The ponies milling about were the definition of downtrodden. Almost all of them earth ponies with a few unicorns scattered through the crowd. The whole town’s population had to number forty or fifty.

As we walked into town, the ponies stopped what they were doing to look at us. Given the despairing poverty we’d just walked into, our shiny black and blue armour must have set us apart. The locals were backing away from us, as if they were afraid. Brightwing and I made our way past the cowering ponies to the center of the crossroads that made up the core of the tiny town.

Brightwing stood by, eyeing the crowd as I spoke.

“Ponies of Hoofsinki! We are soldiers of the Ministry of Awesome! We must speak with your leader! Any help will be rewarded, any resistance or problems punished! Again, we request an audience with whoever commands here!”

The ponies looked surprised and confused. Why was it that everypony reacted to mention of the Ministry of Awesome like that?

The locals just looked around awkwardly, not saying anything or even moving. I didn’t want to have to do this, but it seemed like that was just how things worked out here.

“First Spear Brightwing, the caps please.”

Brightwing pulled out and held in her mouth a scrap of fabric in which she had placed all twenty-three of the bottlecaps we had taken from the dead raiders before tying it closed.

“This bag of bottlecaps goes to the first pony to help us. You will take with it our gratitude, and a favour from our organisation.”

The ponies stayed still, though I could see many eyes were trained intently on the bag of caps. A voice from the crowd yelled that “Nopony here is greedy enough to sell us out to Enclave remnants you fucking pig!”

That did it. “I assure everypony here that neither myself nor my companion know who this ‘Enclave’ is, or have ever encountered or helped them. We are not this Enclave of which you speak. Help us help you, ponies! Information and maybe a quick jog to wherever it is your leader’s holed up, and you get a bag of bottle caps to spend at your leisure! It’s really that simple. We’re not here to fight, we’re not here to cause problems. We just want to talk to whoever’s in charge here.”

It seemed they had started to get the message. One purple mare with a dark blue mane slunk out of the crowd and knelt before me, much to my surprise. I told her to stand, and that there was no need for kneeling.

“I can’t take you to the boss, because there isn’t one. But I know who you want to be talking to.” She spoke in whispers, as if the crowd hadn’t already figured out what she was doing.

I made a big show, to demonstrate that our intentions were pure. “You, miss, are a wise pony. Brightwing!” Brightwing passed the bag of caps to the earth pony, who gingerly accepted them and shook the bag slightly to note how many caps were there. She seemed satisfied by the weight and jingling. She began to lead us away, to the murmurs of the crowd. Maybe it was the caps, or the relief at us not killing her or something, but she seemed to walk bouncily.

She led us to one of the outlying buildings, one that didn’t match the others. I tried to chat with her as she walked with us, but she didn’t respond to any of my questions. I was beginning to hate the locals. No manners on any of them!

The building in question was a single-story building made entirely out of the same kind of cement as most of our tunnels back home. I looked closely at the walls and sure enough, there was the worn-out symbol of the Ministry of Awesome, imprinted in the concrete as it had dried so many centuries ago. Our guide stopped here.

“Here you go. Thanks for the caps, and good luck with that fuckup.” She trotted off without a backward glance.

I looked to Brightwing, who gave a little shrug that indicated she neither knew nor cared what that was about. She pushed open the heavily rusted steel door to the bunker, and we stepped inside.

*#@#*

The gloom inside the bunker was punctuated by candlelight. There were tables everywhere, with bits of metal and machinery and electrical parts and.... some things I didn’t even know how to identify. The candles were interspersed across the tables so that the whole work center was awash in pale, flickering orange glow. There was a clatter as the unicorn sitting at one of the tables shot up, clearly not expecting visitors.

I got my first good look at this pony. He was lanky, thin, and I warmed to him instantly because much like us, he just plain didn’t look like he belonged in these parts. His orange coat was spotted with grease and grime from the machine parts all around him, and some of the muck had even found its way into his pale blue and soft orange mane. Around his eyes were a strange set of goggles with what seemed like a thousand lenses on them, but most were spread around the outsides of the frames, giving him a nonsensical insectoid look. He raised an eyebrow as Brightwing and myself trotted over to him.

“My my my, company? What have we here? Oh, and outsiders too! How delightful! This is truly a rare opportunity!” His accent was thick, but not overly so. I would learn much later in life that the accent came from a city to the south called Manehattan. “The name’s Cinnamon Sprocket, and I live to serve. What can I do for you dangerous looking visitors this fine day in our lovely fucking wasteland?”

“Cinnamon Sprocket?”

His eyes narrowed. Or at least his eyebrows gave that impression. His eyes were entirely obscured by the goggles. “Yes, I’m sure you have a much less silly name.”

“Captain Ironside. This is my adjutant, First Spear Brightwing. We’re on important Ministry of Awesome business, and would like a word with you.”

“How charming. The feds are after me. Or at least crazies who think they’re the feds.”  Cinnamon Sprocket deadpanned. “Look kids, my time is valuable, and my expertise even more so. But, you braved the roads to get here from wherever the fuck it is you’re from so I’ll take it you’re just the rough-and-tumble types I need for a special little assignment. But first, I’m going to need the truth from you. Who the fuck are you , and what do you think you’re doing walking into my goddesses-damned workspace bumbling some blustery bullshit about a government branch that ceased to exist centuries ago and which didn’t do a damned thing anyways?”

Having come to trust her quite a bit over the last two days, I turned to Brightwing, who quietly nodded.

I started slowly and quietly. “Have you ever heard of the Twilight Guard? Of the disappearance of thousands of decorated pegasus warriors fifteen years into the war?”

Cinnamon shook his head slowly.

“Those pegasi were taken underground Stalliongrad and trained by the Ministry of Awesome. The training was so brutal that the Ministry sealed us off from the world. We’re the descendents of those pegasi. Our unit, the Twilight Guard, sent us onto the surface to scout the conditions of Equestria. Seems it’s a bit bleak of late.”

Cinnamon took a moment to let that sink in. Not being able to see his eyes, it was hard to guess what he was thinking.

“See the way I look at it, you’re either incredibly brave for being so forward with information like that, or incredibly stupid. But something about you doesn’t scream moron to me. I like you, kid. So I’ll believe you on this. That, and the customised Type 17 suit of course. I’ll even keep quiet about this for you since I’m such a gentlecolt.”

What?

“Type....17.... suit?”

“Your armour, kid. That foil wrapped so carefully around the bodies of you and your sexy little marefriend there. The shit that’s able to make a putz from a cave like you pass for competent in a firefight. It’s type 17. They started issuing it to pegasus troops in this area shortly before you claim your tribe got locked away like old shoes in a closet. ‘Cept yours is customised. I can see the fuckin’ magic from here. Hers ain’t, but yours is.”

We took a moment to look at each others’ armour. I swear they looked the same.

Looking back at Cinnamon, I noticed he’d gotten up and started walking around, surveying my gear. I wasn’t really comfortable with this, but guest rules...

“Flex your wings.”

“What?”

“Luna, you kids deaf? Your wings. Extend them, bend them, move ’em for Celestia’s sake, you’re killing me here.”

I extended my wings as he asked, careful not to swipe anything from the surrounding tables.

Cinnamon looked me over, while Brightwing and I shot each other confused and awkward looks.

“Yeah, I can make this shit useful. But first you’ve got to make yourselves useful, y’hear? I got something that needs doing. You kids can do it for me. You help me? I’ll not only help customise and upgrade your gear, both yours and that of the spritely nymph here, and if you help me properly.... Well let’s just say there’s enough loot in it for you, me, and this whole little army you’ve got going on. Not to mention some very friendly ties to the wasteland....”

Something about the way he spoke unnerved me, but I shoved it down. Forget how he was talking, it was what he was saying that was so great!

“No-“ Brightwing started to say before I interjected.

“Deal.”

“Sir! Are you-” Brightwing was shocked and appalled at the speed with which I’d agreed to the unicorn’s proposal.

“We’ll do as you ask. Tell me what you want done, and it will be done.”

Cinnamon’s face lit up. “Poifect! Observe behind me the large steel door with all the hoofmarks on it where I have painfully kicked and screamed begging the door to open for me. Well it turns out the door’s an asshole, and won’t open no matter how nicely I ask or how violently I threaten it. However, as happenstance would have it I used to work for the stallion who has the key. He has the key, but I have the town. We’ve been deadlocked for some time. I’ll give you directions to him and even provide a way to get close to his person. I’ll even give you each a gift to do it with out of the goodness in my freakin’ heart. Then, all that’s left is for you to bring me his key and whatever’s left of his head. Then the real fun begins.”

Ironside: Level 2

Brightwing: Level 2