Fallout Equestria: Homelands

By Somber

Chapter 25: Jigsaw

The Great Western Empty wasn’t nearly as empty as it was a month ago. The settlement started at the remains of the old train station and rose up the yellow and brown slopes towards the mountain peaks above. What had been little more than a dozen vehicles had transformed into nearly a hundred small homes, the majority of which were the remains of boxcars cut apart and rewelded into ramshackle but liveable dwellings. The terraces kept the growing crops away from the salt pan, and scores of Propoli hustled and bustled about the fledgeling settlement. Already they were carting clay out of the badlands, talking excitedly about ‘adobe’ and ‘kilns.’

General Marrow had spent her whole life wanting to become one of the big shots. As a lieutenant, she’d bullied recruits. Now she was in charge of a thousand Bone Legion all around the Empty. None of which had ever dreamed a town of Propoli would be budding right in the middle of their territory. Marrow had tried to explain it as Ossius’s plan, but cold skepticism was etched in Colonel Scapula’s face, and a pall of disapproval cold and silent as the grave descended when Marrow admitted they’d lost the means to raise more undead. Shortly after that, she and Captain Tibia disappeared to the north side of the Empty.

“Beans, General?” Captain Fracture asked as they walked by the Propoli cooking pit heading back to her office. He extended a bowl of something thick and pungent. Apparently peppers also liked the volcanic soil. After years of eating flavourless mush, it was quite a shock to many of the soldiers. She gave a nod, and he ordered a pair of bowls.

At first, the legion had tried to simply ignore the settlers. But the settlers needed muscle, and really, what else was the legion doing? Soon they were working side by side expanding the terraces and building things. Some of the Propoli actually seemed to like the legionnaires, who were as unaccustomed to respect as Marrow was to chili peppers.

“Have you heard from Scapula and Tibia?” she asked between bites.

“Nope. They’ll sulk for a while and figure out this is for the best,” the older stallion replied in a sharp, brittle voice. Fracture had been spiritsent as far as she was concerned. He’d been the legion quartermaster, and while he’d first advocated killing the settlers and taking their stuff, he conceded the Propoli really did know how to use what they had better than they did.

“And if they don’t?” Marrow furrowed her brows. The Propoli kept their distance, but at least gave respectful nods when they saw they had her eye.

Fracture didn’t answer for a time, chewing slowly as he stared off to the north. “They will. They have to. Not going to lie, no one was happy moving rocks, but I’ve never seen beans or turnips grow that fast before. Those greenhouses may just be plastic film, but it’s making use of every drop of water we have. Not to mention they’ve gotten all of our steam tractors fixed. Even the ones I wrote off.”

It was true. When Marrow’d joined, the Bone Legion were rejects and jokes. No artillery. No horde. But let some Propoli settlers do their thing and watch civilization fly. The stallions kept everything running, and the mares kept everything organized. She could definitely respect that.

So why wasn’t she happy?

“Get a letter to Asheput. See if she’ll say what Colonel Scapula’s up to. I doubt it’s simply ‘patrolling,’” Marrow replied. That wasn’t even mentioning the radwyrms, or the other legions… Bastion… Was being boss simply having more things to worry about?

She finished up her bowl. “Thanks,” she replied reflexively as she returned it to the vendor.

“Legion eats free!” the stallion cooking the food replied happily.

Marrow and Fracture split off at the station, the latter going to check stores and get some new lieutenants in place. She wanted to elevate him to colonel, but that would mean dealing with Scapula when she returned. Something that she didn’t want to face with dozens of settlers trying to put down roots.

Inside the train station, she went up to her office. Her office. It still felt surreal. Xona had replaced the broken windows with scavenged glass. It was still a little wavy, but it’d allowed the boards to be removed and let light in. The books were a lot, too. She used to believe they were just for show, or maybe emergency fireplace fuel. Now she felt an overwhelming desire to know what was inside them…

She’d been feeling a lot of overwhelming desire recently.

She picked one at random. ‘Intertribal Law of the 43rd Caesar’. The pages crackled as she parted them carefully, the paper stiff and delicate. She didn’t know how to read. Not really. She knew enough to scribble glyphs like ‘attack’ or ‘enemy’ or ‘casualties’. Yet as her eyes roamed down the glyphs, several of the meanings just came to her. As though with her rank she’d gotten a whole new vocabulary too.

Hooves shaking, she shoved the book back on the shelf. Would it continue? Would she one day stop calling herself Marrow and start insisting she was Ossius too? She remembered the general when that pony and her friends showed up and turned everything on its head. Her eyes lingered on the banner in the corner of the room. The scales of justice. The importance of truth. Her flank brand ached as she stared.

A knock broke her out of her reverie. “C-come in!” she said, trying to settle herself.

The Propoli director strolled in. Xona gave a polite nod, glancing at the many books that lined the shelves. Her husband Xarian entered behind her. Propoli were like that; they almost always had a mare and stallion present. “General,” they said pleasantly, sitting on cushions opposite her desk. “We have a problem and a solution.” They seemed pleased with themselves.

Old Marrow would have been annoyed. If they had a solution, what were they coming to her for? Just solve it. But she was the general now. She had to okay it… and if it went wrong, she’d get blamed for it. “Okay. Which problem?”

The two glanced at each other and nodded with a smile. Xona started to explain, “We’re drawing in more people. Some people barely surviving on the edge of the Badlands. Orah, but they’re willing to work and have mapped the northern edge of the Badlands all the way towards the radwyrms’ territory.” Marrow’s hind hoof tapped a staccato as she fought to not ask the question on the tip of her tongue. The pair shared a look and she shifted to sit on the foot… but that just made the other one start to twitch…

“Okay… problem…” the general said hastily. “Go on.”

“Well, we need water for them. Food of course, but we’ve calculated the stream’s water limit to be around five hundred people… that’s one hundred percent at current flow. It could drop less,” Xarian said, looking at some papers with charts on them.

“Okay. Okay…” Marrow said as the faint taptaptap filled the room. The pair eyed her in concern, and she immediately tried to sit on both hind hooves, perched awkwardly atop them on her cushion. She coughed. “Continue.” The question screamed at her to ask it.

“Well, we’ve determined that there are several aquifers flowing from the Badlands and into the Empty through porous rock in the ground. We can dig laterally into the rocks, and the water will just flow out where it can be used.” Marrow couldn’t answer, frozen, as she struggled to keep in the stupidest of stupid questions. “General, are you okay?”

Marrow jumped to her hooves and started to pace. “Fine! I’m fine! Everything’s fine! You needed water! You found water! Water is good! Yep. Good meeting! There’s the door!”

Xarian frowned, “General, we need to work out–” but his wife touched his shoulder and trotted around the desk.

“General, what’s wrong? Something is clearly bothering you. If it’s bothering you, it’s bothering us.”

Marrow had no memory of anyone maternal in her life, but the concern in Xona’s eyes connected with her, she felt the question rising up in her throat like the urge to vomit. “How many are Equestrian infiltrators?” she asked in a husky whisper.

Xona blinked once in response while her husband just narrowed his eyes in concern. Marrow blurted out in exasperation, “I know! I know it’s a stupid question! THE stupid question. There is no Equestria! It’s gone. We won. But I feel like…” She sat down hard. “I feel like there’s a war on. Like there’s an enemy somewhere and I need to find them and stop them and it’s crazy! It’s just crazy! But I can’t stop thinking about it!”

Generals weren’t supposed to need therapists, but Xarian stepped forward, looking at her gravely. “It’s not crazy. At all. I’m glad you told us, General. I’ve been trying to figure out where that vibration was coming from.”

“What?” Marrow asked warily.

“I’m a shaman. I feel spirits. Like machinery. When they’re happy, everything hums along. But when they’re not, there’s grinding. Burning. Things break. And that’s what I feel around you. I’m glad it’s not just my imagination either.”

“You think there’s a spiritual thing going on with me?” Marrow didn’t like spirits, or people that spoke for them. At the best of times they seem like an excuse to tell her what she ‘ought’ to be doing. At the worst, they dragged her into the darkness of her nightmares.

“It’s possible. Have you noticed anything else?” Xarian said as he put a hoof on her desk.

“I’m reading.” She walked over to the bookshelf. “I didn’t even know I could before I became General. Philosophy of Law of the 78th Caesar. Why do I want to read that? Why does anyone want to? And I feel like I already read it and know it’ll be interesting.” She sat down hard. “I don’t feel like I’m me inside my own stripes anymore.”

Xarian trotted to her. “There’s said to be three components to every being: a mind, a body, and a spirit. Your mind is your experiences. Your body anchors it to this life. Both these change over time.”

“And my spirit?” she asked, feeling a strange dread in her chest.

“It’s you. The purest expression of you,” he explained. “You could die and be reborn a hundred times, stallion or mare, and you would still be similar in every life. Sure, in one life you might be a legionnaire and in another a baker, but your personality… your youness… would be the same.”

“So in my last life I could have been a loser too?” She surprised herself with her bitterness.

Xarian exchanged a glance with his wife. “That is an age-old debate, but the spirit is the purest expression of a person. Whether it’s a good expression or a bad one…” He shook his head. “I’ll spare you months of shamanistic philosophy. But it’s also the reason why censure from spirits is so bad. A change to one’s spirit lingers not just in this life but in those to come”

“So… something’s happened to my spirit?” she asked guardedly as she trotted to the window, looking out at the salt pan to the north. The wind wasn’t too bad. She could make out swirls in the white dust.

“You’re all branded. It’s a brand of the body, mind, and spirit. There’s a censure in that brand. I think it’s affecting all of you, but I also think it’s affecting you first, and spreading to the rest of the legion.”

Xona took a seat next to the window. “You feel like you’re fighting the war against the ponies?”

“Yes! But I’m not. I know I’m not. I’m feeling one thing, but I know that thing is impossible. How do I stop it? Do I have to sacrifice a chicken or something?” Marrow asked Xarian in desperation.

The stallion chuckled. “I doubt it’s a death spirit we’re dealing with. This is something in conflict with your legion. Something fundamental to it. Why Equestrian infiltrators? That’s what you should ask.”

“Because that’s what we did during the war.” Marrow rose and paced before the window. “Infiltrators were everywhere. The tribes had spies too. We’d find them and turn them over to… to someone! But there isn’t a war now. There’s just this shithole.”

“Excrement makes good fertilizer if used properly,” Xarian said patiently.

“Have you talked to another general about this? Maybe they’ve experienced what you have,” Xona asked, looking over to the radio set in the corner.

Marrow scoffed. “Oh, yeah. I chat things up with Sanguinus all the time. ‘Hey, Bloods. I know you’re trying to kill all of us, but could you tell me real quick if you feel like you’re still fighting the ponies? Yeah? Nice. Good talk. By the way, I’m going to resurrect your ass and use it as a mobile holster.”

“Graphic,” Xarian muttered.

“There’s other legions besides the Blood. It couldn’t hurt to reach out. If we can determine the cause, we’ll have a better idea what to expect.” Xona said with a nod. “More data never hurt.”

Marrow sighed, the dread receding. She took a breath and held it, trying to silence the stupid, angry part of her that wondered if the pair were Equestrian sympathizers. Slowly she felt more herself, which wasn’t much of an improvement, but it was better.

“We’ll do our best to help you, General. We’re committed. If we can’t make the Empty civilization, we don’t have enough to try again elsewhere,” Xona swore. “We just have to find something for this… feeling… to go to. Energy should be used when possible, not wasted.”

Marrow let out the breath, grateful for the faint reassurance. It was stupid, but she was just a little more confident that she wasn’t going insane. She turned and her eyes caught on the banner. Justice. That’s what the Bone Legion used to be. Law was about Truth. That’s what the scales meant. She knew it somewhere deep inside her bones. “Thanks. How many people do you think we’ll need for these…”

“Freeflow wells. Quite a few, but if you can task some of your… living impaired… assets we might get the first one done in a year,” Xona said, her brows knitted in concern. “We’ll work out the best location. If growth continues, we may need to consider two or more.”

The door banged open, and Marrow ducked behind the desk, about to draw out the shotgun taped to the underside, when the bloodied sphynx staggered in, supported by Fracture.

“Scapula… Tibia… took my trading post,” Asheput wheezed as she bled over the floor.

“They’re saying you’re not the real general, General,” Fracture said gravely. “They’re rebelling.”

Marrow stared as digging wells, Equestrian infiltrators, and spirits suddenly became far less pressing concerns.

* * *

“You’re prancing like an idiot,” the scarred zebra pulling the massive cart growled as they rolled along the Old Road. This far west, the road wound along a narrow strip between the volcanic mountains of the dragon lands and swamps below. The Orah walked several paces ahead of the pair. “You know they’re just going to pop you into this cage soon as they're tired of your stories.”

Taliba allowed herself a brief frown in the stallion’s direction. In the weeks she’d accompanied the Orah, she’d learned nothing of Broken, the powerful, one-eyed stallion, save his name. His strength, however, could pull a cart loaded with the various creatures and salvage the Orah picked up along the way. Whenever the trio, named Hippokrates, Deimos, and Enyo, started looking at her too closely she broke out another story. The Tappahani comedies were best. Orah liked anyone they could laugh at who weren’t laughing at them. Prince Happihani predominated, but Taliba mixed in a few stories of Herne, the Orah markspony who counted as the only heroic Orah she could recount.

“We’re almost to the Imperial Library. I’ve always dreamed of going there someday!” As if prancing on her hooves didn’t give that away.

“Prepare to be underwhelmed,” Broken muttered.

“You’ve been to Lexica?” she asked, skeptically.

“Many times. As little as I possibly can.”

“What business does an Achu have at the Library?” A hint of scorn accompanied her curiosity. The scarred stallion intrigued her, not least his supernatural strength. No zebra should be able to pull a huge cart by themselves with such ease, yet for him it seemed as if he could have pulled a second behind the first. Probably even a third behind that!

But it was also the things he hinted at knowing. He claimed Claudio wasn’t a womanizer, and that the tribes hadn’t been nearly as against the war as many affirmed today. Was he simply being contrarian, ignorant, or did he actually know something the greatest historians and poets didn’t?

“Doesn’t matter,” he grumbled, a refrain she’d heard many, many times since they’d left. “You’ll see soon enough.”

The Old Road came around a corner of the woods and opened up to a magnificent sight. A pillar of water fountained a hundred meters into the sky. The water rained down, filling a lake that pushed right up to the Old Road. One section a hundred meters long had been washed out and had eroded a narrow V down to bedrock, pouring through in an ear-shattering torrent before fanning out in a great muddy plain to the west. The sea was barely visible on the horizon, as were the dozens of ruins half drowned in the sodden muck of the plains.

But that was nothing compared to the drowned city of Lexica.

Its highest marble towers protruded from the lake, slick with green algae. In the middle, just in front of the endless geyser, rose an immense round dome with a water-drenched cupola perched at its apex. Dozens of small Zencori villages hugged the shore, in the remains of the city that sat above the waterline. A network of ropes and pulleys moved platforms and people above the churning water. Some enterprising Propoli had placed a paddlewheel in the gap where the water poured forth, and wires carried electricity all around the flooded basin.

“I’ve never seen Lexica,” Taliba breathed, then slowly frowned as she thought about the young, green mare she’d met. “I can’t believe the ponies did this.”

“Water megaspell. Ironic. If they’d cast in in the Empties or on the east coast they’d be heroes. But Equestria didn’t fight us to a standstill by being idiots,” Broken said calmly, not bothering to stare. The trio of Orah seemed to be in close discussion.

“Indeed,” Trailblazer said as his hoof tapped the pavers. “They turned the Old Road into a dam. Made certain the whole place flooded. Eventually it pushed under the road and flooded millions more. Lexica wasn’t the only city that drowned to that megaspell.”

“But… why? Did they hate us that much?” Taliba asked weakly. It was one thing to read about, but to see it before her eyes…

“Did we hate them enough to poison their capital?” Broken asked in kind. “You think Lexica was a saint during the war? You think the Zencori did nothing, just make up stories and jot down historical notes?”

She turned on him, baffled. “What are you talking about? We didn’t vote for the Last Caesar, but we supported him as tradition demanded and served as neutral observers. The truest truth demands no less.”

Broken’s scarred lips curled in a cynical scoff. “If you think that, this should be over quick, one way or another.”

“What do you mean?”

“Go see for yourself,” the muscular zebra said with a wave of his hoof towards the lake.

Taliba shook her head. What did an Achu with a name like Broken know? She turned to ask Trailblazer if he wanted to join her, but the old zebra was nowhere to be found. She started to ask, but the Orah weren’t paying attention to any of them, and Broken walked slowly back to the wagon. She shook her head and trotted to the lake.

“What’s your story?” the Zencori guards standing outside the cable car asked as she approached it. The complicated arrangement of motors and gears ground and squeaked as they turned.

“Ah! Story! Yes!” Taliba stammered, fumbling open her saddle bags. “I have The Twelve Chronicles of Tamabini, The Historics of the Twenty Ninth Caesar, and–”

“I mean what do you want?” the guard, a Zencori stallion, interrupted with an annoyed frown while his compatriot had a bemused smile.

“Oh! Ah. Yes. I am Taliba of the World’s Stage. Have you heard of it? We do a performance of the Serpent and the Star every autumn? Master Baruti is thinking of doing a performance of the Ballad of Ignatia but I’m not sure we have a soprano–”

“If you don’t stop wasting my time and tell me what you’re doing here, I am punting you into the lake,” the dour stallion warned. Taliba thought that was quite rude… then she glanced at the way the water poured through the gap with a rather horrifying roar, the wheels of the paddle slamming down every second as it turned.

She took a deep breath and tried again. “I am a librarian and I’m here to speak to the Canonicity Council to correct an error in the record. It shouldn’t take very long,” she said with a reassuring wave of her hoof.

“The… what council?”

Something lurched within her as she stared. “The… Mandatum of History?” They both stared as if she were mad. “The High Poetrix?” In her mind was an organizational list and she was drawing an alarming number of lines through it. “Are there any elders, masters or librarians here at all?”

“I think she’s asking to see the old mare. The Secra… something,” the second guard guessed.

“The Secretariat! Yes! Wonderful. I’ll talk to her.” Taliba relaxed. Technically, all the secretariat did was keep the schedule for the elders of the tribe, but it was at least someone she could address! If nothing else she could direct Taliba to whomever she did need to speak to.

To say the Zencori administrative apparatus was complex was a bit of an understatement. Elders ran villages, masters operated theatres and schools, and librarians tended to the needs of a spirit. The bureaucracy prevailed even following the Day of Doom; sometimes the routine and structure was all that kept the tribe together. While a Zencori could serve more than one role, they could only ever have one title, to keep authority clearly delineated. Because the Truest Truth was that important.

“I’ll take her,” the guard said, stepping into the gondola. As soon as she entered, the other guard pulled a lever and it dropped onto the cable. As they moved over the flooded city, she saw a multitude of colorful platforms and banners hanging over the rippling waters of the lake, built atop the stone structures that jutted from the surface. Zencori loved colors; perhaps not as deeply as the Sahaani, but their settlements dazzled whenever possible. Each platform and spire held as many Zencori as her whole village, or more.

“What productions are you working on?” Taliba asked eagerly as the gondola whipped past a platform where a dozen Zencori youths were engaged in a mock battle with color splashed across the stage in dramatic fans of rainbow ‘blood’.

A Zencori not aware of upcoming performances and festivals was no Zencori at all, and the guard didn’t disappoint. “The Final Days, Peace’s Folly, Dreams of Tomorrow, and probably Nightmare’s End in winter.”

“Oh,” Taliba said in response, furrowing her brow.

“What?” the guard asked in unfriendly tones.

“Nothing!” Taliba said at once, raising a hoof. She should be quiet, but… “It’s just those are all Subria’s works.”

“You have a problem with Subria? She was one of the Terrific Twelve,” the guard huffed.

“Magnificent Twelve. ‘Terrific’ was just an alliterative alteration added to compare with ‘Macintosh's Marauders.” The guard’s eyelid was twitching. She should really be quiet, but… “It’s just that Subria’s works were all about the war, and they were just a tad propagandistic. ‘The Strength of the Stripe’, ‘Broken Rainbows’, ‘Celestia’s Lament’, ‘The Wisdom of the Caesar’…” She could go on.

“We do them every year,” he sniffed.

“Every… year?” she asked weakly. “I mean the plays are… good. Very dramatic! But… what about the Second Empire classics? The Tappahani comedies? Even the Romani marching chants?”

“Subria was Zencori. Those are our plays,” he growled as he leaned in towards her. “Our stories.”

She couldn’t dispute that. Subria had written numerous plays, speeches, and chants during the war until she’d died sometime after the Day of Doom. Over five hundred. Taliba had read them all; they’d proven remarkably tenacious even after the end of ‘modern’ civilization. While her early work, already ‘great’ in the canon back then, varied far afield, her works narrowed significantly as the war progressed.

The gondola reached a platform built next to the cupola atop the dome. Skids lifted the gondola free of the cable as it slid to a stop and they stepped out. Part of her hoped that, by magic or technology, the interior would be dry, but as they wound their way into the dimness beneath the dome, the light of hundreds of large glowing insects rippled off the wall: Blattela Ignis, or ‘Fire roaches’. As long as her forehoof, these domesticated varieties happily lived in little cages and kept well fed on scraps. In turn, their abdomens glowed like heatless torches. Dozens flew overhead like swirling stars over hundreds of stone shelves carved from solid rock rising up from the water. The islands were connected by stone and wooden bridges that made her wonder if the library had always been flooded. Small narrow boats navigated the shelves. She could only ponder what placations were made to decay spirits to prevent mold and mildew. The air smelled cool and damp. Somewhere far away was the distant rumble of the megaspell.

They reached the base of the dome, and she saw a few doors to the outside being used to admit other visitors to the library. Some trick of architecture kept the echoes to a shushed mutter. The guard walked her up to a landing and spoke to one of the little boat stallions. “He’ll take you to the old mare,” the guard assured her.

Taliba wasted no time scrambling aboard the boat. Not that she was fond of them; she didn’t know how to swim but had read about the basic principles involved. The mare at the rear wore a cloak that obscured everything but her muzzle as she gripped a long pole. A fat fire roach clung to a beam at the front of the boat, lighting their way as it chomped down on a dead bat. She supposed the free roaming insects must have been quite the deterrent to anything wanting to nest above.

As the mare poled along the silent, still water, she saw the lowest shelves were occupied by stone tablets and hoofglyphs, then clay, metal inscriptions, and only the uppermost shelves were occupied by books. Taliba bubbled with questions, but that hush seemed to perpetuate itself and so she only stared – and was astonished to see blue-green lights in the depths. She looked down and watched as eels, spotted with luminous patches, wove amid the submerged shelving. She had pondered if the library had always been flooded. It hadn’t. From the flickers far below, the shelves must have plunged a dozen meters or more.

The gravity of so much lost, and so little remaining, squashed any further desire for questions.

The oarzebra pushed them towards an annex: the hall of librarians. Marble statues poked from the wall, some fortunate enough to sit on plinths, others submerged to their waists, and some looking trapped and drowning under the dark, still water. Ahead, a landing lay built out of the wall atop a marble edifice. Lit by only a few fire roaches, a lone figure sat behind the desk, covered in similar robes as her escort. The boat bumped up against the wooden landing and Taliba stepped out.

Slowly she approached the intimidating figure. Books were piled up around them, stacked flat. An equine skull sat on the corner with a small set of glyphs that read ‘It’s how overdue?’ Opposite the skull, a roach nibbled on a tray of bread, water, and half eaten mush. Reedy music played on a phonograph, filling the air with anemic brass. A placard read, ‘Thirst was made for water; Inquiry for truth.’

Ancient was the only proper word to describe the mare behind that desk. She had attained that point where age was simply an irrelevant number to be marveled at by others. Pale blue eyes scanned a tome before her through thick square glass lenses. Her stripes had faded to barest gray and her mane was utterly white and translucent. She was the embodiment of age.

And before Taliba could so much as clear her throat, without looking up from whatever she was reading, the old zebra stated in a quiet, clear voice, “For truth is what matters, and truth is what I shall bring. If ever I am proved a liar…” she trailed off.

“…let me be removed from the office of Caesar and suffer the totality of your judgement,” Taliba answered.

“For it will be no less than I deserve,” the old mare finished with a sigh and wistful smile.

“The Rice River speech, when Claritas was running for Caesar. It secured the vote of the Carnilian tribe, setting up for the great four way split,” Taliba elaborated.

“Indeed. And so, with the vote of the Starkatteri, Claritas became the last Caesar in our war against the Nightmare. Up until Doom struck and the Nightmare released her megaspells upon the world.” The old zebra gave a little smile and nod. “Well, it seems I finally get to deal with someone with a bit of education. I am the Secretariat of Lexica.”

Taliba didn’t want to interject that there was more than a little conjecture as to who struck first, but now was hardly the time. “I am Taliba, Librarian from the World Stage. I need to address an error in the canon.”

The mare didn’t react beyond an arched brow. “Master Baruti’s theatre, as I recall. Is he still doing the ancient classics?”

“He is, but…”

“He’s quite a scoundrel. ‘The Sins of the Serpent’ as a child’s pageant. And Master Rati is well?” the Secretariat interrupted immediately. “He always was meticulous with his facts. And so handsome…”

“He is, but about the canon…”

“And I assume you addressed your concerns of the canon with both of them?”

“I did, but…”

“Well, I wonder what error you could be thinking of that would necessitate you coming instead of some other representative. A letter would have sufficed, dearest. It’s quite a trip down the Old Road just to lodge an error with the canon,” the old mare said as she reached over and ripped off a chunk of bread and held it out to one of the roaches. “Gotta keep them fed or they start nibbling the pages, the little devils. Their droppings make for an excellent ink, in a pinch.”

“Secretariat, I have serious reason to believe that Legate Vitiosus did not destroy the accursed city in Equestria, as canon reports,” Taliba blurted. The old mare fell silent, her smile replaced with surprise. “I met an Equestrian who said that a pony named Blackjack was responsible for the defeat of the cursed city.”

The Secretariat said nothing but arched both her brows skeptically as she finished feeding the bread to the roach. “Oh, yes. ‘Blackjack’. I heard the accounts. Black and red cyber alicorn who went to the moon? Died multiple times? Please. That story is merely a pony fabrication trying to play on the tale of the Lightbringer. A truly miserable derivative. Its creator ought to be ashamed of themselves.”

“Ma’am, the spirits of our library confirmed her tale,” Taliba said slowly and carefully. “If there is even a chance that the canon is wrong, the elders should investigate.” That was just… sense!

“Ah, so Taliba of the World’s Stage now commands the Elders of the Zencori? My, I wish I’d gotten a note before now. How embarrassing,” the old mare said as she pressed a hoof to her chest before folding her legs on the table. “This job gets so onerous sometimes, I should just retire. Every year some young librarian hears a story that’s ‘true’ and thinks all the canon needs be upended. ‘No, Legate Vitiosus didn’t destroy the cursed city, it was a cyberpony from the moon.’ ‘No, Big Macintosh was killed defending Celestia, not trying to silence her.’ ‘No, the ponies didn’t attack first.’ Speculation that the elders don’t have the time or resources to investigate.”

“Well, at least let them decide for themselves. This isn’t something that happened centuries ago. Just a mere two years. It should be worth it to try and keep the canon straight.” Taliba tapped a hoof on the desk next to the Secretariat’s placard. “Inquire.”

The old mare stared at her for several seconds, her lips drawn into a very tight ‘o’ as she regarded Taliba before she gave a small shrug. “Very well. Let me check the schedule of their next meeting.” And she reached over for a large leatherbound book and laid it before her. She may have been old, but the Secretariat handled the thick tome easily. “Let me see. Let me see. The first opening I can see is in… Ah. Yes. Here’s an opening.” She tapped the book. In three years, six months, and twelve days. Shall I put you down?”

“Three and a half years?!” Taliba gasped.

“Too soon? I can put you down a decade from now. I’m sure you’ll have your canonical challenge together by then.”

“What are they doing between now and three years from now?” Taliba demanded.

“Ah, youth. To be so impatient,” the Secretariat said with an elderly purr, folding her hooves before her on the desk. “It is quite difficult getting elders and masters together to discuss critical issues of the tribe. We’re lucky if they’re able to meet bi-annually. Three and a half years is hardly unusual.”

“Can I speak to at least one of them?” She wracked her brains for any of the tribal elders she could recall Baruti or Rati mentioning. “Elder Adamma? When is she available?”

“She’s dead, poor thing. Slipped on the stacks while wrestling a stone tablet into place. Tragic,” the Secretariat said as she unwrapped an old candy, the cellophane wrapper crackling like brittle bones between her hooves. “That tablet was one of a kind, pre First Empire.”

“Naamiah of the Immaculate Script!” Taliba blurted. Granted, she hated Rati for declining her but still, for this…

“Retired last year. I believe she’s penning a biography of Ignatia,” the Secretariat stated as she finished unwrapping and popped it into her mouth.

“Rashidi! He’s Baruti’s brother.” And an idiot. A towering idiot, but at least he might listen to her.

“Ah, yes.” The old zebra gave a smug chuckle as she suckled wetly on the sweet and consulted a page on the book. To Taliba’s eyes, it was full of names. Mare names. The sorts of names a mare might use with a stallion rather than a mother might give her daughter. “I’d be happy to pen you in for a ‘private tutoring’ session. How’s next year sound?”

Seriously? He was Baruti’s elder brother. By two decades! How many mares did he need to ‘tutor’? But Taliba stabbed a hoof down at the column next to Rashidi. “Elder,” she tried to read the glyph upside down. “Siti. She doesn’t have anything scheduled except for a few meetings next week.”

The old mare’s jaw clenched, the sweet cracking loudly before she kept chewing. “Siti,” she muttered slowly between crunches and grinds of confectionery. “I suppose I can put you down to see her. If I must.”

“Please,” Taliba begged. “It’s very important.”

The Secretariat swallowed, then sighed and shrugged. She picked up a pen in her mouth and scribbled down ‘Tibi of the World Stage. Confusion about canon. Elder Siti to correct.’ Taliba flustered at the childish diminutive of her name, but the book closed with a loud bang. “Sixth month, on the first day of the month.”

“Thank you! Thank you!” Taliba gushed. “I’m sorry, it’s just as a librarian it's very important to me to keep the histories clean and correct. The truest truth,” she said with a relieved smile.

“Yes, very important. Good day,” she said, her blue eyes never leaving Taliba as she pranced back to the gondola.

* * *

Those pale blue eyes never left her till the little boat was steered into the central chamber. The hooves reached into a drawer and pulled out a small tome bound in black leather. It whispered as the old mare opened it, picked up a pen and scribbled ‘Taliba, Librarian of the World Stage.’ Then she closed the book, a sigh that came from no throat whispering in the air. The fire roach suddenly stiffened, fell on its side, curling up. The light at the end of its abdomen winking out.

* * *

“And then! Then she suggested that I should talk to Rashidi and was going to put me down as seeking private tutoring lessons! All respect to master Baruti, but his brother could teach a cephalopod a thing or two of sticking to a mare!” Taliba fumed, much to the amusement of Hippokrates, Deimos, and Enyo who were cooking a stew with foraged goods. The Orah knew the roots and berries better than she could ever imagine. Broken watched from the cage with a smug satisfaction.

“You fixate on the strangest things,” he muttered with a shake of his head. “The fact you came back at all was impressive. Those waters are deep.”

“We may not be Atoli but we can manage a boat or two,” Taliba replied, then frowned at the dome protruding from the lake. “I don’t understand. Master Rati and Baruti told me I shouldn’t go to Lexica because it’s dangerous. They said they meant the roads, and they didn’t lie…”

“The truest truth,” Broken sighed. “That’s what you Zencori value, right?” She nodded and he went on, implacably, “Well, it’s true the road’s dangerous, but it’s also true that Lexica’s dangerous too.”

“Well, I accept that those gondolas might not be the safest. A fall from that height would be considerable,” she said with a wave of her hoof. Broken just stared with a furrowed brow. “What?” He said nothing, his expression turning pitying. “What’s that look for?”

“Are you really that sheltered?” he asked, more to himself than her.

She stared at him, then at the city, then back at him. “You think the people here would harm me? I’m Zencori. I’m a Librarian! That’s insane.”

“Did you see many librarians in the Imperial Library?” Broken asked.

“Well, no. But I’m sure there had to have been some. Somewhere. They’re probably busy with other duties. They’re putting on Subria this year,” she said, trying to push positivity into her voice.

“They do Subria every year,” Broken replied.

“No! They wouldn’t. I mean… how many ‘glorious Caesar’ speeches can people take?” she asked, her cheeks stinging as she fought to maintain her smile. Broken just stared at her. “Every year?”

“Every year I’ve been forced to come through here.. Your elders have a hard on for her works like no one’s business,” he replied. “Don’t get me wrong. Subria was nice. Smart. Wickedly smart. She knew every creature’s story, and all of them. She was always… good. I can see why your tribe would be so in love with her.”

“You talk like you knew her,” Taliba muttered.

The scarred pony opened his mouth and closed it again, twisted his face to the side as he clenched his eyes, then sighed. “I might have read a thing or two myself.”

“Soup’s ready,” Enyo shouted at the pair. The trio were already eating. It was full of fresh cut tubers and mushrooms. She’d worried once about being poisoned, but the Orah laughed and took turns pointing out poisonous mushrooms and how quickly they’d kill her. Of course, their descriptions tended towards the hyperbolic; their lessons tanged with the tings and jangles of fiction intermixed with the ring of truth. She indulged them.

“I wish I knew your story, Broken,” Taliba said as her stomach growled. The Orah may not have a Tappahani’s hoof for cooking, but the trio could make even the humblest root tasty. She turned to go and eat. She’d have to find some way to convince the three to bring her back for her meeting. There was, of course, the possibility of something bad happening to her. Many bad somethings, but her mind was fixated on the task of just addressing the problem of the canon being incorrect.

“What do you think my story is, if you were writing it?” Broken asked as Hippokrates passed her a bowl of the delicious smelling soup. The trio were already working on seconds. Taliba was about to start eating, but his smirks irked her.

“I’d say you were,” she paused and thought. “I’m guessing you were the son of an elder, destined to become the ruler of your village, but your sibling overthrew you. Oh! Over a mare! A beautiful librarian mare who…” she trailed off as his smirk was replaced with an amused eye arch and she coughed hard. “Well, probably not a librarian but definitely beautiful. And you dueled your brother, but she loved him, and so you were cast down and assumed the name ‘Broken,’ sold into bondage to Orah as penance for your failures.”

“So am I the protagonist or villain in this story?” he interrupted her again just as she was about to eat.

“I haven’t decided yet, but if you keep me from my dinner, it will definitely be villain!” she said, taking a bite. It was… definitely not as good as it smelled. There was an odd tingle on her tongue. The trio of Orah were asking who peed in the soup, but they didn’t look well at all. In fact, all three were sweating despite it being cool and overcast. She pulled out a chunk of mushroom. Its cap was a wrinkled brown with a purplish undertone. “Hippokrates,” she called out. “Isn’t this one of the bad mushrooms?”

“It’s a morel,” the Orah said as he smacked his lips. “Underdone, though. Bitter.”

“Right, but aren’t the purplish ones poisonous?” She gave a sickly grin. “I mean, you called it the ‘death morel’ when you showed it to me. Certain death? Horrible pain?” Her stomach lurched. “This isn’t that… right?”

The Orah stared a moment, their grins gone.

The groaning started fifteen minutes later.

The screaming an hour after that.

Taliba had only had one bite and her entire body was clenched into a knot. Anything inside her digestive tract was purged and it still wasn’t enough. Broken forced water down her throat so she could bring it back up, but it still wasn’t enough. The guards stayed away, seeming deaf to their cries of agony.

The three brothers died before sunrise. She didn’t despite fighting her own rigid muscles rendering breathing almost impossible. She’d assumed that it’d be like getting sick. That she’d feel worse, then better. She could barely move. Barely breathe. There was only pain. She’d only had a few bites… just a few bites…

Then the hallucinations began. The earth screaming. Holes eaten into the wagon, the earth, her forelegs… Broken standing there, dripping black blood, his chest cavity a gaping, bloody void. Trailblazer coming and going, the golden zebra chained to the cobbles of the path. An immense equine face, the eyes burned into black pits as maggots writhed in the sockets. A court of corpses holding a green pony on trial.

One of the ghastly court stared at her, an equine skull in a duster and coat. “Well now. Ain’t this interesting?”

“Am I dead?” she tried to ask, but only screams and the taste of blood issued from her mouth.

“You’re working pretty darn hard at it,” the skeleton rasped.

“I don’t want to die.”

“Well then,” the bony equine reached into its coat and withdrew a deck of faded cards and fanned them out before her. “Pick a card?”

* * *

“The Blood Legion have won,” Captain Isfjell stated as Aldopha stared down at the map before her. Cecilio’s office was crowded, with a muddy Galen and Aleta bringing reports through the tunnel. Vega consulted various reports from criminals on both sides. The old zebra was trying to enjoy his whiskey, but it tasted like kerosene.

“They haven’t,” the Iron Legion colonel replied, examining fortification diagrams. “There’s been no sign of Riptide returning.”

“True, but you must admit that the situation is far from ideal.”

“We assumed that once they consolidated Rice River’s west bank, they’d cross over,” Adolpha stated bluntly, conceding the reality of the situation. “Because that’s the point. Attack Carnico. Take the chemical plant. Choke out the Irons for good.”

Isfjell replied. “But they didn’t do that because they didn’t need to. Instead, they let us dig in, then besieged Irontown.”

Adolpha nodded as she grimly considered the situation. “We’ve got half our legion’s guns, our good train guns, here. If we take the train south to relieve the siege, Haimon will cross the river north or south, assuming the Riptide doesn’t miraculously reappear and shell you directly again. If we take half and leave half, same problem, they just have to walk a little farther. We won’t be able to move position to blast them as they cross the river. If we spread out the guns, it dilutes our fire power. The Red Legion can spread further than we can, and once in mass on this side of the river, they can rush us. They still take the city.”

“Haimon hasn’t been taking people out of Rice River. In fact, they’re bringing more people in,” Galen reported. “Desdemona’s been keeping the peace with comfort houses, but honestly, these Bloods aren’t your usual maniacs. They’re soldiers. Serious soldiers. They’re not just well bred. They’re trained too.”

“Their equipment’s freshly manufactured too. Crates are from Bastion,” Vega added.

“Rice River’s filled to the brim. The legion’s rounded up all the scar farmers and brought them here. We thought they’d drain the town to fuel the siege at Irontown, but they’ve done the opposite,” Aleta pointed out.

“Is your family still okay?” Galen asked.

“They’re terrified, but yes. They’re fine.”

“Well, we could just level the town,” Isfjell commented, getting a number of glares. “That is a capability at our disposal. Burn the town with incendiaries. No more town means no more soldiers. You go south and take care of your siege. Victory.”

“A pyrrhic one,” Cecilio said in a hollow, tired voice. “Everyone’s lost.”

“Excuse me?” Galen asked.

“We were short on weed killer supply before that pony fixed our factory. We’ve gone three months down. No weed killer produced. If Haimon left today and we started production right now, no complaints or worker strikes or other disruption, we wouldn’t be able to kill enough razor grass to grow a food supply to sustain Rice River. That was before Haimon raised the population.”

“The Bloods are feeding people corn from down south,” Galen observed. “Some factory a mercenary found.”

“A temporary relief, and one I suspect that won’t last. The reality is simple. Within a year, half the remaining arable land will be lost to razor grass. We simply don’t have the time or volume to prevent it. We don’t even have enough precursors made to start trying to catch up with production.”

“But the talisman…” Adolpha began.

“Doesn’t load pallets! It doesn’t lubricate valves! It doesn’t load coal! It doesn’t do the ten thousand other things the plant requires in order to produce!” Cecilio shouted, jabbing a hoof south. “You could force the entirety of the population on this side of the river into the factory and we’d only have a twentieth of the population we’d need to meet our production needs!”.

“What do you want us to do, Cecilio? Surrender?” Vega asked.

“That’s not an option,” Adolpha snapped.

“It’s an inevitability,” the old stallion countered. “In addition to not making weed killer for the razor grass, we’re not making the nitric and sulfuric acid you need for your cannons! You know this.”

Adolpha grit her teeth like she was about to be sick. “I do,” she admitted bitterly, “but I can’t surrender Carnico either. If we pull out, it doesn’t matter if we liberate Irontown. Without those chemicals we can’t make shells. We’ll be reduced to black powder. Sanguinus could just walk right in on us. The Sands could beat us.”

“We need a third option to get the Blood Legion out,” Vega said with a scowl. “I’ll radio the exchange. Maybe we can work out a contract with the Gold Legion. Find some Atoli pirates willing to make a move for the right price.”

“That changes nothing!” Cecilio said in exasperation. “You shell Rice River, hundreds, maybe thousands die. I need those hooves. I would pay their weight in imperios if I could! Where else will I find people? Sanctuary? The desert? Yaks?! We are out maneuvered.”

“By the Blood Legion of all people,” Isfjell sighed.

“No,” Adolpha said with a shake of her head. “Not the Bloods. Remember that pony? The green one that made that broadcast? Someone is manipulating things. Playing Sanguinus, all of us, for fools. This ‘New Empire.’ The Shadow Legion.”

“Scary stories,” Isfjell muttered, but the shaggy zebra rubbed a leg nervously.

“It’s Haimon. He’s the key,” Galen said grimly. “This strategy must be his. If he takes over Rice River and Carnico, what does Sanguinus have left? His forces will be bled dry and far from his headquarters to the west. He might have Irontown, but without modern shells, what good will it be?” He took a deep breath. “If we can expose that, Sanguinus would pull back. It might even cause a rift in the legion. That wouldn’t help Rice River, but it would shift things away from Sanguinus.”

“Or we just kill him,” Isfjell added. “That’s an option.”

“Not likely. He’s got guards. Very good guards. And he’s close to Sanguinus,” Vega said with a shake of his head.

“They’re lovers,” Aleta said quietly. Eyes suddenly turned to her. “I do laundry. When the general visited, there was ample evidence of it. But listening to gossip, they’re very close. I don’t know what would convince him that Haimon’s disloyal.”

“We’ll have to find something. Or manufacture something,” Adolpha muttered. “I will not give them Carnico.”

Cecilio turned and walked out of his office and into his private bathroom. He splashed water on his face and rubbed it, looking into his bloodshot eyes. None of them understood. They’d all lost. All of them. Rice River would become another ruin covered in razor grass, and the finest, possibly last great chemical refinery would be no more.

The door opened and Isfjell took a seat, the shaggy coated soldier regarding him soberly. “If I told you to kill Aldopha and the Irons, could the White Legion do it?”

“That’s an option, but it’s not a good one. If we mess up, Aldolpha’s dying act will be to make sure this factory is a smoking crater. She might even have standing orders to fire if she’s killed or we overrun her. I’m sorry to say, but the Whites are a defensive legion. The Irons are offensive. We could weather her. We might even bleed her dry, but the damage would be substantial,” the captain said matter-of-factly.

“And Haimon?” Cecilio asked. “Can we appeal to him?”

“We might. He might even do it. Pull his forces back. Make her think she’s safe to take the train artillery back and lift the siege at Irontown. And I’m pretty sure that he’ll give a nice speech, and then put a bullet between your eyes. You know what he did to Greengap, yes?” Cecilio nodded. He knew all too well. “Your money is still good. My general supports this partnership. But I don’t see a way out of this, Cecilio. Not with you keeping Carnico and your head.”

Nor could he. So many people were going to die. He hadn’t wanted that. Rice River had seemed special. Blessed. But like so much of Zebrinica, it was on the precipice of disaster. “See what your engineers can do to fortify critical areas of the factory. The processing center in particular. Say I’m concerned about Riptide. Just in case the worst should happen,” he croaked, tired. Spent.

The captain nodded and trotted out. He waited till the noise in his office faded before emerging again. He trotted over to his desk and poured himself another drink. If alcohol didn’t provide answers, at least it might provide peace.

“Director?” said Aleta said from the doorway out of his office. The scarred mare trotted in, glancing around the now empty office. “I just wanted to thank you. For understanding how bad the razor grass is. My family’s fought the razor grass all my life. I may not like Carnico or your weed killer, but I appreciate sparing anyone that fate.” She smiled and took a deep breath. “I also wanted to tell you not to worry. Carnilians are tough. If we have to go a few years against the razor grass, we’ll do it.”

His eyes stared at her, roaming over the dozens of scars that lined her frame, his face hollow and thin. He gave a tiny, almost spastic sort of nod, and she smiled and trotted out. He stared at the closed door for almost a minute. Then Cecilio trotted over and locked the door to his office. He moved a potted plant in the corner, peeled back the carpet, and opened the safe set in the floor. The folder within crackled with age, its paper having developed a permanent curl.

There was no ‘working hard’ to get out of this. Vega would understand. The exchange could move a lot, but it couldn’t manifest the thousands of workers he needed. He opened the folder and looked at the information sheets. ‘Sample 6981: Equestrian fungal spores’. His eyes skipped over the abstract, one he knew so well. He’d written it, after all. His voice whispered like a ghost as he read, “Sample 6981 demonstrates a remarkable ability to infest and strangle razorgrass rhizomes. One gram of spores can eradicate one thousand square yards of razorgrass within a week. The decayed biomass proves ideal for immediate crop plantation. Greater study recommended.”

His signature was almost legible beneath the enormous glyph that simply read ‘Canceled’ and the scribble next to it, ‘All samples of 6981 are to be destroyed. This will put us out of business.’ A photograph showed five zebras grinning like idiots holding aloft a packet of what was little better than glorified yeast. He’d been one of the five. The only one to keep their mouth shut and not object. The only one with a career. A future.

He pressed his hooves to his eyes, but that couldn’t stop him from seeing a headstone half buried in razorgrass. It read ‘Here lie the Carnilians. We died because it was unprofitable to live.’

* * *

“Fuck, this place is boring,” Vicious muttered as she watched the landscape stream by, the train chugging its way south. The periwinkle unicorn huffed as she stared out the window. Endless gray and brown mountains of rock poking out of ancient white lake beds had been all that filled her view since they’d left Irontown behind. She wondered if there’d be a Blood Legion flag flying above it when they came back.

The three of them had a car cabin all to themselves. Vicious had impressed upon them that not just giving her what she wanted would be far more deadly than handing it over. Tchernobog had loomed appropriately, and between the pair the calculation was the same: the price of passage was far less than the price of replacing the entire train. The Irons had enough troubles on their plate. They didn’t need a psychotic mare on it as well.

She’d already sharpened everything that could be: knives, hidden knives, throwing knives, swords, hooves. She fiddled with her PipBuck, wishing it could pick up more in the Empty. Tchernobog was reading a scroll impassively. The spirally glyphs made her head throb.

Lumi sat quietly on his seat, the blind shaman staring at his forehooves as the train rolled along. He didn’t speak much since getting plucked from the river. Given that Green Legion caravan had probably been his whole world, she doubted he had any other family to go back to. “So this is the Great Central Empty, huh. You should be glad you can’t see all this brown, kid.”

“Mmmm,” was his only reply.

“Leave him alone, Vicious,” Tchernobog said as the Starkatteri examined the crude map of Zebrinica. Vicious started to speak, then mentally kicked herself. “The Central Empty is furthest from prevailing winds and coasts, and the mountains act as a barrier to clouds. This region sees rain once per century. Most moisture is the result of frost melting into the dust. It may not be as massive as the Eastern or Western Empties, but it is by far the driest.”

“I just need to find whatever that thing is that’s hunting Scotch,” she said as she smacked her hooves together.

“And what will you do when you do?” Tchernobog asked with the tiniest of smiles.

“I’ll shoot it. Blow it up. Slice it up some. Shoot a lot more. Use some fire and acid. Slash it a couple more times for fun. Hit it with a cryo grenade. Drop a house on it. Maybe use a balefire egg on it.” She rubbed her hooves together.

“And if none of that works?” Tchernobog asked without looking up from his map.

“Then I’ll get creative. What’s your plan?” she countered.

“I want to study it,” he replied.

“And here I thought Vega was the nerd in your relationship.” She rolled her eyes.

“There are rules to the spirit world. One of those rules is that we are material, our souls are spiritual, and we do not transgress on the spirit world. Devouring a spirit is a severe transgression. At best, it will merely kill you as the spirit overwhelms the flesh. At worst, you will become a monster that will hunger evermore for more spirits and more souls. That hunger will inevitably consume you,” Tchernobog said. Vicious glanced at Lumi, the colt curling ever tighter in his seat.

Some company we are. “So you want to know how it cheats the rules,” she summarized.

“I do. If such a technique is possible without resulting in death and madness, I wish to know it. I wish to know why I cannot sense it. I know many sensations of corruption. The oily taint of a bribe. The bitterness of resentment. The sharp edges of a murderous plot. If someone out there has this capability, to devour a spirit without losing their mind and soul, I cannot allow it.”

“I just want to kill the bitch that used magic on me.”

“I want Lumihautile back,” Lumi muttered.

“If it was devoured…” Tchernobog began, but Vicious silenced him with a glare and moved to sit next to the colt.

“I know what it’s like to want what we love back,” Vicious said softly, touching his shoulder. He pulled away, and she sighed. “Look, wanting doesn’t fix things. Trust me. If you can find another spirit, do that. Don’t beat yourself up over wanting things you can’t have.”

“What do you care? You just want to kill things,” the colt said as his filmy eyes stared hard into the air.

“Yup. Because I am uncomplicated. I have my job and a skillset and cutie mark ideally suited to it. I cut, shoot, stab, explode, defenestrate, and otherwise devivify anything that messes with me or the Syndicate.” Vicious sighed. “You and Boggy deal with spirits. I can’t even imagine. I don’t want to. I’m happy just slashy slashing and shooty shooting.” Lumi just closed his cloudy eyes. She looked at Tchernobog. “Is it even possible to un-devour a spirit?”

“I’d say no, but a month ago I’d have said it was impossible for someone to evade my sight so readily.”

Vicious patted Lumi’s head. “Hear that? If there’s any way that we can get Lumihall back, we will.”

The colt sat up a little at that with a small smile. “Okay. I know there’s probably not, but if we can…”

“How does someone hide from a shaman though?” Vicious asked. “And why could he see through it? Well not see but you get what I mean.”

“There are spirits of lies and obfuscation, but they are predictable. I can recognize their viscous presence with little difficulty. For something to be there but not detectable… it would be soulless, like a feral ghoul. Yet such a being could not think nor act as you describe when you stood in their hoofsteps. And yet he can detect them despite being blind?” Tchernobog shook his head gravely. “I cannot think how such a thing can be.”

“It sounded wrong. I didn’t hear it any better or worse. But it was wrong. Like a voice turned inside out,” Lumi said with a shake of his head. “I knew it was bad the second I heard it.”

Tchernobog rubbed his chin thoughtfully. “Inside out? Like a requiary?”

“A requiwha?” Vicious asked.

“I don’t know what that is either,” Lumi admitted.

Maybe it was just her, but the lights seemed to dim as he spoke, the sounds of the train fading. “I would be shocked if either of you did. It is a dark and desperate technique to cling to existence. One takes their soul and forces it into an object. In the process the soul is mangled and mutilated beyond recovery. Quite a few of my tribe sought to escape justice and death by forcing themselves into black books of lore.”

“Evil books?” Vicious said, a bit skeptical as the lighting returned. It must have just been a cloud.

“It was their plan to manipulate other shamans and their tribes from this state of being, but so horrible was the process of their transformation that few didn’t see them for what they were. Thus only the corrupt, desperate, or foolish gave them any heed. I know not how such a state would grant the powers of obfuscation, however.” Tchernobog mused, “If the ancients of my tribe had such capabilities, those tomes would be far more pernicious.”

“Maybe someone learned new tricks? Like they deliberately made themselves into a requiwhatever designed to be undetectable?” she suggested.

“Perhaps,” Tchernobog murmured. “But why then could the colt detect its true essence?”

“Maybe they screwed it up? ‘Make me invisible to people’ but didn’t figure on a blind person being able to detect them?” Vicious offered, then glanced at Lumi. “No offence intended.” For once. Gah, when had she turned so soft?

“If so, it would imply our adversary is capable of mortal flaws and errors. I don’t know if that’s reassuring or concerning. Or else, they’re more clever than I with arcane convolutions and the boy’s perception is some other coincidence. Perhaps a result of their censure, or…” he paused. “It ate a spirit bonded to you. In taking that spirit, it may too have taken the bond.”

“Maybe. I’ve felt… sick… ever since I lost Lumihautile. I thought it was just missing them and wanting to get them back,” Lumi said softly as the shaggy colt looked away. “Or being in the river for so long.”

“Can you feel anything else?” Vicious asked. “Our quarry may not even be aware of the connection?”

“I’m not sure of the words. It feels angry. And hungry,” the colt confessed, shivering. “It’s full of hate. For everything.”

“Sounds like me on a Monday,” Vicious muttered.

“But why? There must be a reason. Whatever, or whoever it is,” Tchernobog said with a wave of his hoof, “it must be stopped, if only to understand it. Fortunately, we know its animus: Scotch Tape.”

“Why though?” Vicious muttered with a frown. “I mean, Scotch is a cute young mare, sure, but she’s nothing special. Aside from the whole shaman thing.” She rubbed her shoulder, wondering why it was sore. She hadn’t seen any action since the river.

“Even that I’m uncertain. Perhaps she made contact with an immensely powerful spirit, but how that could happen to a pony is incomprehensible to me.” He settled into his seat with a sigh.

“Well, she’s had weeks in Roam to find things out,” Vicious said and then pursed her lips. “Assuming she actually followed my advice and used the train to get south.” At least she knew she was alive from her broadcast. The last broadcast on Z TV… “She’s fine. She’s tenacious. She was an absolute champ in bed.”

“Isn’t she a little young for you?” Tchernobog asked with an arch of his brow.

“Wha… she’s only three years younger than me!” Vicious sputtered. “How old do you think I am, Boggy!?”

“I assumed… ahem… I think I should ponder some imponderables,” the Starkatteri muttered as he looked out the window.

“Too young… when I was her age, I was learning nine ways to cut a throat. Through experience. Pah…” she snorted with a toss of her mane. She winced as something tweaked in her shoulder. “Ow,” she muttered, rubbing it with a hoof.

“Something the matter?” Tchernobog asked with an arched brow.

“Nothing,” she growled. “Just been sitting too long. I should take a walk.”

“Don’t kill anybody,” Tchernobog said as he resumed studying his scroll.

“No promises.” She smirked as she stepped out. The soreness didn’t go away, but she could ignore a little pain. She walked down to the end of the car, stepping over the Iron Legion that slept in the hallway. Most sized her up, but Irons weren’t like Blood. They didn’t need to prove themselves by picking stupid fights.

When she reached the door, she realized Lumi was following her. It was strange how he walked, barely lifting his hooves as he stepped till they bumped into something. Even without touching, his ears twitched as he navigated around the Irons. She watched as he brushed his tail along the wall to navigate. “Where you going?” she asked.

“Toilet,” he said as he pointed a hoof at the door behind her.

“How’d you know?” she asked, looking at the sign on the door

“It smells like a toilet, whether it is one or not,” he replied. She wrinkled her nose, and he looked shyly away. “Sorry.” Vicious cocked her head. “That was probably gross to say.”

“Eh, I’ve heard worse,” she said with a shrug. “First time I disemboweled a person, I couldn’t stop gagging for weeks.” His smile suddenly looked a lot more strained. “What?”

“I’m just not used to people talking so casually about killing people. Even with the Greens, we only killed if someone attacked us first.” He stepped up next to her. “Can I ask a question?”

“Probably, since you just did,” she snickered, his ears lying flat in embarrassment. “Go ahead. What is it?”

“What is Scotch Tape to you?”

Vicious blinked. Normally personal questions would earn at least a slice, but she couldn’t bring herself to cut someone who was pretty much a kid. She huffed softly instead. “She’s nice. We were roommates with benefits. I liked coming home to her, but I had work and she had her quest. Never occurred to me to leave and go with her and the others. Now here I am chasing after her.”

“If you’d gone with her, you wouldn’t have known this thing is hunting her,” Lumi said.

“True. I dunno. I shared her bed but I never had her heart. I guess in the end we both just wanted to feel less alone.” She regarded him and gave his head a pat. “What is she to you?” she asked with a grin.

“Nothing really, but Lumihautile loved her. He said she was like the coming of winter,” he said with a smile. “He said she was really, really, really important, but couldn’t explain why.”

“Coming of winter? That sounds ominous.” Vicious chuckled.

“Not if you’re a snowflake.” He smiled as he pushed open the lavatory door. “Excuse me,” he said, inside.

Vicious snorted and looked out into the Empty. The gnarled stone spires and dry mesas stood like giant petrified ponies patiently in the desolation, statues carved by wind and water over millennia, or longer. She didn’t like the Empty. Not because it was boring, but because it rendered her and her swords and gun as insignificant. She hated what she couldn’t kill.

What about this thing she was hunting? Some kind of spirit thing? She didn’t know how to kill a spirit any more than she knew how to kill a thousand kilometers of dry rock. But by the knives on her flank, if anypony could find a way, it’d be her…

* * *

The concrete sign read ‘Equestrian Post’ with an imprint of a pegasus holding an oversized letter in her mouth. Nothing else of the post office remained since a pair of tanks had driven through it in the Battle of the Hoof. The cavernous chamber underneath, an unfinished stable, had weathered far better and it was here that most of the wealth of Chapel lay, protected from the vagrancies of life above. Most of the Crusaders growing up hadn’t known about it until after the fight.

“Two thousand and sixty four rounds of ten millimeter ammunition. Nine hundred and six capacitors. Eighty seven bowling balls. Nine bowling pins. Huh. If it was the other way I’d try and get those Society ponies into bowling,” a light blue unicorn mused as he levitated an inventory sheet on a clipboard, noting each pallet of the town’s wealth. Or Charity’s wealth. Or his wealth.

“Hey, Perky,” a pair shouted from the cargo elevator that went up to the post office’s basement. “Mail for you. What are you doing?”

“Just taking Charity’s monthly inventory,” Perky Ears said as he regarded the sheet. “We got way too many bowling balls.”

The two earth pony mares gave a little snicker. “Seriously? She’s been gone for almost six months. Pretty sure she’s not coming back.” the first chuckled. Thrown Stones was an earth pony who could buck a boulder a hundred feet. The other one, Broken Glass, was pink and had a cutie mark of a smashed window.

“Yeah. Her little foray to Zebrinica was only supposed to be a week.” Then Glass grinned. “She’s probably zebra stew by now.”

Perky Ears just smiled and ignored them. Charity was a hard boss, but a good one. She could have sent someone else with the alicorns to see about opening up trade, but she went herself precisely because of the risk. And to make sure no one screwed her out of opportunities. Charity wasn’t easy to work for, but she never cheated anyone. Perky respected that, and as her manager, did things the way she wanted.

“You should just take over,” Stony said as she passed him a stack of letters. He flipped through them briefly, then paused at one covered in Equestrian script, but also strange loopy symbols. He set the others aside. “I mean, nopony would blame you. She’s pretty obviously dead.”

“Yeah, that’s not happening. Death doesn’t have enough bits to pay for Charity’s service fee.” He ripped the envelope open.

“Oh come on. You’re the one running this place. It’s not like she had kids. We were all kids. Just say the word and we’ll totally back you,” Glass said with a wiggle of her rump. No surprise. Even liquidated at cost, there was a fortune to be made here.

A pair of envelopes was inside the first, both written in Equestrian. ‘For Perky’ and ‘Not for Perky’. Now the pair were paying attention too as he ripped open the one for him. Then he grinned as he scanned the contents. “Charity’s alive.”

“What?!” gasped the first.

“No she isn’t!” insisted the second.

“She’s in Roam,” he said as he read.

“She’s supposed to be dead,” muttered the second to herself.

“Says she’s working for a group called the Flame Legion. Says if any of you try to take over Charity’s she’s going to fine you into your next life. Your grand foals will be paying your debt. Yadda yadda yadds… buy more bowling pins. Huh…” He glanced at the pallet behind him. Did she have some kind of innate magical connection to her inventory?

‘In the other envelope, I have reports for the Twilight Society and the Followers. Make sure they get them. Also, pretty sure that somepony set me up. Whoever they are, they got thirteen alicorns murdered. Take what you need out of petty cash to deal with it. The Zodiacs are probably bored.’

Perky glanced at the second mare. “Supposed to be dead?” he said. A lot of people really underestimated his hearing. “Why do you say that, Glass?”

Broken Glass backpedaled. “Look, I didn’t kill her! I didn’t do anything!” He just cocked a brow at the pink mare. “It was the zebras. Remember when that Scotch Tape kid was here? There were these zebras who were wanting to know about her and Blackjack. Like did she really take a rocket to the moon and shit.”

“Why’s that?” Perky asked in a calm, reasonable, curious voice that many found bafflingly intimidating. Self-control can be a marvelous thing.

“I don’t know. They’re zebras. Stripes are always frigging weird. They wanted her dead, and I figured it’d be a good way to get rid of Charity, so I said they were best friends and about the trip. If something happened to her, it was the zebras that did it. Not me.” She grinned at him. “Look, just burn that letter and forget about Charity! She’s all the way in Roam, bonking zebras. I’m here. You’re here. No one needs to know,” she said with a purr.

Perky blinked and glanced at the other mare, who immediately backed up a step, raising her hooves and shaking her head. Then he smiled at the earth pony. “Know what, Glass? You’re right.” He floated the two letters into his saddlebags, then levitated the folded up piece of paper, pulled out a lighter, and lit it.

Glass gave a simper of triumph. “Let’s go back to your place.”

He gave her a smile back. “Let’s.”

Thirty minutes later, the green alicorns were bundling her up in chains for transport to Junction City, the mare screaming profanities. “She was directly involved in the murder of your people,” Perky explained calmly as he passed on Charity’s message for the Followers. “I don’t know if it’s enough to build a case…”

“It’s something.” The purple alicorn took the letter. “Thank you. You are a credit to this place’s namesake,” she said, glancing up at the huge sign that read ‘Charity’s’.

“Don’t let the owner hear you say that. She’ll bill you.” He chuckled as the trio of alicorns trotted off. The first mare approached as he levitated out his inventory list and tugged off Charity’s letter from the stack of inventory. “She’s going to kill me for burning a page of inventory though.”

“Why though?” the mare asked. “For that filly?”

“She’s a mare now, same as you, Stoney. All us Crusaders grew up.” He put the clipboard away. Those that hadn’t yet were now being cared for by the Society and even the Reapers for the more incorrigible youth. “There’s a right way and a wrong way to do things. If someone’s eager to do a wrong thing to someone else, they’re probably willing to do a wrong thing to you too.”

“Huh, does that policy apply to marefriends?” Stony asked with a smile and arch of her brow.

“Why don’t we have dinner and you can find out?” he said as he trotted over to the new post office, where a pair of pegasi were collecting letters. He slipped his into the mail slot on their wagon, wondering what business Charity had with the Twilight Society. Lots of ponies had wanted to get rid of Charity, but she always held on, trying to make things better in her own strange way. Perky wondered just what would come in her next letter from the zebra lands.

* * *

“I’m going to kill you,” Mahealani swore as the Atoli captain crouched between the woefully inadequate clumps of brush keeping them from view.

“Well that would be dumb, given that our pycrete raft’s melted and our only way off this rock is my ship,” Thrush responded.

“Not your ship. Eye Scream’s ship,” Mahealani countered, jabbing a hoof at the Estori scow. It was everything she expected of the Estori: a rusty crab boat bristling with machine guns, painted with black skulls and flying the flag of a pony with spikes being driven into its eyes. No dignity, no self-respect, just a crude and brutish intimidating aesthetic. A good wave would capsize her.

In comparison, Thrush’s ship was typical pony design. Pretty and deadly, with a fine pointed bow, a turret with two machine guns on top, and two torpedo tubes. Its hull could be replaced a dozen more times if need be, and though she’d never admit it, she liked the use of a wooden hull. Some might scoff, but it was far, far easier to patch and repair than a composite or steel hull. Pony design was hit or miss, but when they hit, they hit hard.

“Technically,” Thrush repeated with a dismissive wave of her hoof.

The rock they inhabited was a horseshoe shaped caldera with a ring of concrete bunkers rimmed in frost and an observation post at the highest point. Mahealani guessed it’d been used to watch for Equestrians trying to sneak around the sea or air raids from the Crystal Empire. Too small to warrant a megaspell. Thrush’s crew were trying to keep warm in one of the small bunkers while they retrieved the Seahorse.

Only Mahealani had no idea how they were going to do that. The Occular Annulus, Eye Scream’s vessel, was between the shore and the Seahorse. Swimming in the frozen water was out of the question, and there wasn’t anything to build a raft. Even if they did, with no cover, they’d be spotted right away.

“We should radio for help,” Mahealani suggested, pointing at the radio tower atop the observation station.

“We could do that,” Thrush said as she stared at the sailors on the shore. “Or we can look for rum.”

“Are you mad? One good broadcast and Tsunami can have three or four ships here!”

“Sure, but by then my ship could be sunk, scrapped, or taken. We’re much better off finding rum.”

“What are you talking about? What rum?” Mahealani hissed, on the verge of tearing her mane out. “There is no rum!”

Thrush grabbed her cheeks and stared into her eyes. “There’s always rum. Come on,” she said, moving along the scrub and rocks, sniffing the air. Mahealani would have left her, except that if the unicorn was caught, it wouldn’t be long before she was found too. Keeping low, they moved down the rocky slope towards the Occular Annulus.

The crew were lazing about, clearly waiting for something. They talked in thick, tar like dialect, swapping their words around like mainlanders. They clustered around barrels loaded with burning wood, complaining about the cold and trading crude insults back and forth casually. Thrush moved past, muzzle in the air.

Suddenly Mahealani caught the telltale scent of sugar on the breeze. A trickle of smoke leaking from the door of a bunker betrayed the presence of combustion. They’d tried to obscure it with a cloth. From inside the door came a bubbling gurgle and low voices.

To Mahealani’s shock and horror, Thrush stepped right up and pushed the door open, stepping inside. Mahealani let out a cry strangled by rage and ran in, and impacted with the unicorn’s rump. Thrush gave her a cool look, looked at a trio of shocked zebra sailors, and then smiled. “Rum inspectors!” she said brightly, trotting over to a table where dozens of empty Sparkle-Cola bottles stood. A pot next to them on the fire appeared to be boiling off most of the additives, collecting the crystalized sugar. This was put into a vat with some more sacks of sugar likely taken from the southeast. A dozen or more bottles were filled with the fluid, stained brown. Next to it, a still burbled softly, dripping into recycled Sparkle-Cola bottles.

“Give a sailor a week of shore leave and there will always be rum,” Thrush declared as she walked along. The trio clearly hadn’t been expecting the turquoise unicorn, or her examining the various pots. “Good. You’re using fresh yeast. Not recycled.” She raised a bottle, sniffed it, and took a sip. “Hmmm… not bad. Definitely tasting some acetone there.”

“Hey,” one said, pointing a hoof. “You’re the dumbass we took that boat from!”

Thrush smiled at him, and the vat of boiling soda glowed blue. That smile didn’t waiver as she flung the bucketful right into his face.

The stallion screamed, clawing at his face as he collapsed in a sticky heap. Another zebra drew a sawed-off shotgun, but his head was suddenly engulfed in the hot, sticky pot. Thrush whirled and kicked the side with a bell ringing clang. The third rushed for the door, but stopped short as Mahealani reared up and stomped his head good and hard. After the last hour with the infuriating pony captain, she put quite a bit of feeling into it!

“Ship,” Thrush told the groaning, whimpering, sticky sailor. “The Seahorse is a ship.”

Five minutes later, the three were tied up, and Thrush and Mahealani were dressed in their reeking, ratty, southeastern style clothes. Thrush meanwhile powdered her face in sugar and drew on some stripes with charcoal. “How’d you know there’d be a still?” Mahealani asked.

“Please. Give sailors a week and something will be fermenting. Something they don’t want the captain to take for themselves,” Captain Thrush replied, taking a bottle for herself and stashing it in her clothes. “Okay. We get on the Eye Scream. Make a distraction. Get on the Seahorse. I power it up. Pick up Onesy, Twosy, and Threesy and get ourselves down to Port Nightmare.”

“Port Nightmare? Should just let Eye Scream finish you both off,” one leered. Mahealani gave him another thump.

“And just how are we supposed to get on the Annulus?” Mahealani asked.

Thrush rolled her eyes. “Uh, duh? We have rum, remember?”

Soon the pair were strolling up towards the gangplank of the Annulus. “Hey. Who are you?” a crewmate challenged, narrowing his eyes at the pair. Mahealani narrowed hers back.

“You know who I am. I joined that one time, remember? In the place, with the thing,” Thrush replied as she stepped up casually towards the pair. She made a show of looking about, then pulled out a bottle of brownish fluid and gave it a slosh. “Better question, want a taste?”

The sailor immediately licked his lips and glanced around as well. “That Wigg’s newest batch?”

“So fresh it’ll strip paint,” Thrust assured him, passing him the bottle. He took a drink and coughed. “Literally.”

“Ooooh. Not the best lot, but it’ll keep the cold off,” he said and extended it back.

“When the balls are we getting out of here?” Thrush took it and had a drink herself.

“Whenever the captain’s business with Riptide’s done,” he replied. “Fuck, I want home. These Atoli waters are piss.” He looked at Mahealani and scowled. “What’s with your friend?”

“Her?” Thrush chuckled. “Tragic accident. One day when she was a foal, she got dropped onto a flagpole. All ten feet of stick, right up the ass. Been there to this day.” Thrush gave a stage whisper, “She won’t admit it, but she really liked it.”

That got a guffaw from the sailor, who took another drink from the bottle as Thrush returned it. “Eye Scream’s meeting with Riptide?” Mahealani pressed. What on Equus could the two be meeting over? They operated on opposite sides of the world!

The guffaw faded. Thrush rolled her eyes. “‘Course. Duh. Everyone knows that. Come on. We got deliveries to make before the officers take it all for themselves.” She gestured to his bottle. “Keep it, and if it doesn’t keep you nice and warm, come find me later.” She gave him a wink and then trotted up the gangplank. He looked suspiciously at Mahealani as she followed her up, but didn’t raise an alarm.

“Are you constipated or something?” Thrush asked as they trotted up and the mare immediately moved towards the stern like she knew where she was going.

“What?” Mahealani asked with a scowl.

“Smile. Do you know how to?” Thrush asked. “Honestly, you’re perfect officer material.”

“I’m more curious where you learned how to speak Zebra like an Estori,” Mahealani countered.

“Get a sailor a little hammered and all dialects are the same,” Thrush countered. “Smile and relax. You’re too tense.” She pulled out another bottle and waved it at Mahealani.

“I don’t drink,” Mahealani countered like a thundercloud.

“Crazy too. Tragic,” Thrush said as she took another swing. “Woooh. That’s better. Much smoother.” She thumped her chest with a hoof.

“What are you doing?” Mahealani insisted.

“Looking for the bilge,” Thrush replied as she opened a door in the back and trotted down the first set of stairs.

“Why?”

“Because officers don’t go near the bilge and I really don’t want to meet one.” Thrush trotted down into the guts of the ship. The crab tanks had been converted into cargo and crew space, the bulkheads carved out. Down in the bottom were a coal bunker and the boilers. Crew were feeding fresh coal, meaning the ship was planning to move soon. An officer shouted a mixture of insults and threats from above, but they were steady and with little alarm or urgency.

Behind the bunker, a cluster of sailors were lounging, coated in coal dust. Thrush immediately began passing out bottles of ‘Wiggy’s finest’ and soon shoveling coal was forgotten as the rum flowed. “Come on,” Thrush said as the officer’s insults silenced.

Mahealani followed, walking away as the officer from above was making his way below. As Thrush walked up to the top of the coal bunker, an eruption of shouts and kicks exploded below as the officer discovered the recreating sailors, and the sailors, in turn, took steps to extend their recreation.

“What are you doing?” Mahealani asked as they reached the top.

“You really should learn to trust me,” she said as she grabbed some twine off a workbench, tied it around the mouth of a bottle, and then stuffed a rag into it. She opened the lid of the bunker, and then with her magic lit the tip of the rag. As it started to burn, she quickly lowered the bottle and then closed the bunker lid, pinching the length of string.

Oh. Rum may not burn well, but a bunker full of coal did. The fire’d either burn through the string, or someone would open the bunker lid, and either way the bottle would fall. That would absolutely get everyone’s attention. “We need to hurry,” Mahealani said as they moved up towards the deck.

“Relax. Don’t run till the fire alarms sound.”

“We don’t want to be here when the Riptide shows up. Trust me. You haven’t seen the ship.” Mahealani peered down the way they’d come. The officer’s shouts weren’t quite of the alarmed tone just yet.

“Zebrinican destroyer?”

“Yes. Seas only know where she got it.”

“Six inch turret on the prow?”

“How’d you… oh,” Mahealani said as she turned and beheld the sight of the Riptide sailing into the small harbor. The contrast between the two ships couldn’t be clearer. Where the Annuluswas streaked with rust and welded on bits, the Riptide looked freshly painted. Its hull still had the sacrificial zinc plates at the waterline! While the crew were all Atoli sailors, there was a uniformity in their dress she hadn’t seen in the brief firefight. A flight of leather-clad fliers buzzed around the Annulus like a hive. She'd seen one a week ago, but it'd died quickly and the Sahaani had thrown it overboard before she'd gotten a closer look.

The Riptide slid silently up next to the rusty ship as an alarm started to bang and Eye Scream’s crew started to rush out on deck. For a moment, Mahealani thought it might have been for the fire, but given all the eyes on the Riptide, it was clearly not.

The ship sailed right between the Annulus and the Seahorse. Forty thousand tons of warship and death now stood between them and their goal.

Soon as the Riptide was halted, a gangplank was swung over and her captain walked down, a bored and unconcerned look on her face as she examined Eye Scream’s crew with haughty disdain. Mahealani was careful not to meet her marriage sister’s eye.

Had the fire started? Had it gone out? Been discovered? Mahealani could only stand in the crowd as Eye Scream emerged. The Estori captain’s stripes were almost horizontal zig zags across his frame, and he wore a leather coat that appeared to have a liberal layer of tar covering it. A necklace of nails tickled around his neck, ready to be hammered into the sockets of anyone that annoyed him. Little notches were missing from his ear, nostrils, and lip giving the impression of a perpetual smirk.

“Riptide. You’re early,” he said, stepping towards the mare.

“I’m busy, Yamul,” the mare countered. “Busy busy busy. You have no idea.” Mahealani guessed that to be Eye Scream’s real name. “Where’d you get the pony boat?”

“Ship,” Thrush growled softly beside her.

“Idiot pony tried to cheat me. I spiked her eyes and fucked her ass, and took her boat. Now I have even more to trade,” he boasted with a grin to his crew.

“Ship,” Thrush repeated. Mahealani poked her in the ribs.

“Not interested,” Riptide sniffed. “Just give me the maggots and we’ll be going.”

Eye Scream’s face disappeared. “Riptide, burn the boat, but it’s got an Equestrian water jet talisman. That alone should be worth something!”

Riptide’s contempt broke for a moment as she rolled her eyes. “Oh, all right. I suppose I can spare an extra crate. I know a zebra who might be nostalgic.”

Eye Scream laughed and stomped his hooves. “Get the boxes! Hurry! No wasting the great Riptide’s time!” He was trying to walk the tightrope of contempt and flattery, and when he saw the flat, unamused look on her face, he gave a sickly laugh. “Hurry!” he snapped at the crew.

One of the hatches to the crab pots was opened, and Mahealani saw the streamer of smoke rising from it. But immediately two large wooden crates were hauled out and set on the deck. “Open them. I want to make sure they’re not all dead,” Riptide insisted. Eye Scream frowned, but pry bars were inserted and the lid popped off. Instantly a white squirming shape wiggled over the lip, quivering in the cold. Mahealani couldn’t help herself, she leaned over as well, staring at thousands of the squirming grubs.

“Good. Good. I’ll need them to keep for a while longer though,” the mare said.

Eye Scream rolled his and jabbed a hoof at a pair of sailors. They screamed as their fellows pounced and wrestled them over to the open crates. Begging, pleading, they were tossed over into the box. The lids were then pulled over and hammered back down again. From inside came weak thuds and whimpers that went ignored by the two captains.

“My payment?” Eye Scream said eagerly as the hatch was closed, even as the smoke leaking out increased. Mahealani glanced towards the stern with some consternation.

Riptide sniffed and waved a hoof. A crane arm swung over and lowered down a pallet with two metal boxes. No sooner did they touch deck than Eye Scream rushed over and threw them open. Glittering stacks of imperios gleamed in the cold light. Mahealani stared in shock. Just one held as much as the Abalone was worth. “Where’s the third?” he asked as he scooped them up.

“Get my cargo aboard and I’ll send it with your sailors,” Riptide said. However, no one was eager to step forward and lift the whimpering, softly thumping crates. But Mahealani saw her opportunity. She nudged Thrush and stepped forward, standing on the far side from Riptide. She shouldered the underside of a beam and lifted, the pony on the opposite side from her heaving in unison. They hauled the box aboard while two others got the other box.

Thus for the first time, she set hoof on the Riptide.

Only her husband had been aboard, and he’d gushed on and on about the amazing ship. At the time, all of Northport had been trying to get the new power in their family, so she’d taken it as a neophyte overwhelmed with a restored or refurbished vessel. Even when it’d been shooting at her, she’d stayed far away from the vessel. But now, as she walked on no-slip rubber surfaces and beheld the fresh paint, she was awed and humbled by the vessel. It really did feel as if it’d sailed 200 years without a spot of rust. The few scuffs, scrapes, or patches she spotted reinforced the pristineness of the rest of the ship.

And the crew were no different. Oh, there were plenty of Atoli interspersed with the bizarre leather clad flyers with their garlic scented breath masks, but the rest of the crew were like the ship. Too neat. Too professional. Trained and disciplined in a way she didn’t expect with a mare like Riptide. She didn’t possess this calm poise or menacing passivity, as if any and every one of them would kill her if ordered without even a qualm. She couldn’t even tell what tribe they were. Not Atoli…

The questions were piling up, and now more than ever she just wanted to get away from it.

“Follow me,” one of the sailors said, leading her aft. The rest of the crew was watching the Annulus with cool contempt, and by extension, them. The six inch guns even had their muzzle caps on. The garlic smell was growing more pronounced, and they walked over to a hatch. The sailors pulled them open.

Inside were dozens of things. Zebra in shape, but their hides were glistening white. No manes or tails, instead wet, translucent sheets protruded from their shoulders. Mandible pincers jutted alongside their mouths. Some had darker brown patches. Pony hides. They stared with wide, glassy eyes like wet pearls. Sacks of reeking yellow rock were piled here and there.

They were going to die. She was certain of it. They were going to go down there and be eaten by those things. No, worse. Because there were some in the early stages, their hind quarters and bellies glossy and distorted. They went in the back… spirits… they looked as if they were changing from the back forward, from the inside out. Riptide wouldn’t pay Eye Scream. Why bother? They were going to get thrown down there…

“Quite a sight, eh?” one of the strange, generic looking zebras murmured. “Some south seas symbiote. They crawl in the rear, eat your guts and bits, and replace them with their own. Then they move up and do the same with your lungs and other organs. You can only breathe their air afterwards. Makes them nice and loyal. Don’t suppose you could tell us where Eye Scream gets them, could ya? We’d really appreciate it.”

“N…no,” Mahealani stammered as she set the boxes down and moved back. Two of the wet, white forms emerged, took the boxes, and carried them down into the hanger.

“Too bad. You could make a fortune. No?” The zebra looked amused at her apparent loyalty. “Come on. Grab another crate for your captain, then.”

They were escorted into the middle of the ship, past crew quarters and a mess hall that were neat and clean. No sailors lived like that. None she could imagine. But they opened a storeroom where two dozen more of the small metal boxes were stacked. A sailor grunted as he lifted one, passing it to Thrush. The mare nearly fell over, dropping the box. It burst open on impact and hundreds of bright and shiny gold coins came flying out, scattering all across the floor. The four gaped, and the two sailors from the Annulus fell on their faces, trying to scoop up the imperios.

Mahealani raised one, turning it over. Imperios tended to get rough treatment. The edges would be shaved, the Caesar head scraped by being shuffled around, and a general layer of grime accumulated here and there. This coin had none of that. It looked as clean and shiny as if it’d been minted yesterday.

“Funny,” one Riptide sailor said coolly as she observed Mahealani not trying to collect the spilled coins. “You don’t look like one of Eye Scream’s crew.”

“What?” Thrush said as she sat up, holding a double hoofful of gold coins.

The other pair stopped their scrounging and stared at the pair of them. “Yeah. I don’t recognize them either.”

“What?” Thrush laughed. “Of course you do. We joined back at the thing, remember?”

A bead of sweat dripped down Thrush’s temple.

It left a turquoise streak. Shocked bafflement registered for a moment…

Mahealani reached over and grabbed another metal box and heaved it into the face of the Riptide sailor. Thrush flung the coins at the face of the other as her horn glowed and she drew the sailor’s pistol. The two Annulus sailors scrambled to their hooves from the floor, but Mahealani snatched up another one and flung it down on the pair. Bones crunched under the container as Thrush pressed the gun to the sides of the Riptide sailor and pulled the trigger. The press of bodies muffled the gunshot as it tore sideways through the sailor’s torso.

The second sailor got his gun free, but Mahealani grabbed him around the neck and rammed them both into the wall, the gun twisting in his mouth and breaking off teeth. Thrush jumped on the back of one writhing Annulus sailor, grabbing the hoof of another trying to crawl away. The floating gun pressed to his temple, and he suddenly went very still.

The remaining Riptide sailor flung Mahealani off, her forelegs scraping over his head and dislodging the pistol. As he pulled free, Thrush yanked off her bandana and telekinetically flung it into his face as he opened his mouth to yell. Mahealani bit down on the gun’s grip and jammed it into his side. Three rounds went into the sailor, who slumped over and went still as well.

There was yelling outside, and calls of ‘fire.’ It was now or never. The Annulus sailors were either concussed or pretending to be, and so she stepped over them, checking the hall. All the attention was on the port side. “Come on. Let’s…” she trailed off as she saw Thrush loading herself up with two of the heavy metal boxes. “Seriously?!”

“Expenses! Lead the way!” Thrush said as she huffed and puffed after her.

On the port side, she moved over to the rail. The Seahorse was a mere twenty feet away, and twenty feet down. Mahealani groaned; it wouldn’t be her first cold swim, but she was getting too old for this! “You aren’t going to be able to swim with those!” she shouted at Thrush as the unicorn emerged.

“Let me worry about that.” Mahealani took her at her word, leaping over the edge. Burning coal cinders were raining down on both ships and the Riptide was already starting to move. If it blocked the mouth of the bay, there was no way they were getting out with the Seahorse.

She expected the cold punch of the water, holding her breath and not gasping in reflex. Her legs kicked towards the rear of the pony vessel, where a small ladder dangled into the water. There was a splash and Thrush dove in after her.

Mahealani was halfway to it when something dark and sleek brushed her side. Mahealani swung her head and was shocked to see the gray fin attached to an equine body. A shark tail slashed back and forth in the water. Dark eyes peered up at her. It poked its head above the water, dozens of razor-sharp teeth in its maw.

“Auntie?” it burbled at her.

Mahealani stared. There were very few people who could call her that. “Nihui?” she said back, her teeth starting to chatter. “What happened to you?”

The shark zebra gave no response other than a splash as it disappeared into the water.

“Swimming now,” Thrush said as she paddled past and pulled herself out of the water. Mahealani wasted no time following. Once out, Thrush tossed a towel at her, then ran down below. “I’ll need you to steer. Can you manage?”

“I’ll manage!” Mahealani replied as she ran to the wheel and throttle.

From under her hooves came a hum and a gurgle. “Go!” the unicorn shouted.

Mahealani pushed the throttle forward. From behind her came a surge of water as a jet churned the sea behind her, and the Seahorse’s anchor chain immediately drew taut. Mahealani hit the anchor winch as they started to move, and was glad to hear the rattle of the anchor being pulled up. Then she spotted a rope tying them to the Riptide.

Or rather, tied to two boxes on the edge of the Riptide.

With a splash they were pulled into the water. Mahealani wasted no time with their recovery. The Annulus was half ablaze. If they were lucky, they might save the ship. Some sailors on the Riptide opened fire on the Seahorse as it moved towards the bay, cutting out into open water ahead of the larger destroyer. One of the big guns fired twice, but she was already moving around the point to where Thrush’s crew waited.

They clearly had been ready, running out to the rocks as the Seahorse cruised past. Thrush emerged, the tip of her horn blackened. “Get us south, Onesie, before that destroyer gets a bead on us,” she ordered. “Twosie, make sure we’ve got enough batteries to get us to Port Nightmare. Threesie, make sure Eye Scream didn’t leave a surprise below deck. Foursy, help me pull in our payday.”

“I am not ‘Foursy,’” Mahealani replied flatly.

“Details!” Thrush said as she pulled on the rope. “Ooof, I know gold is heavy, but this…”

Suddenly a black head popped out of the water, clinging to it and the rope. Dozens of teeth grinned at the pair of them. “Auntie,” Niuhi repeated, her dark eyes staring as she clung to the two crates.

“Call her ‘Fivesy,’” Mahealani retorted as the shark zebra pulled herself onto the back of the boat. “I dare you.”

Author's Note

After 10 months, next chapter. I really want to thank everyone that stuck with the story, especially my editors. Covid's been hell on my mental health lately. Thanks to Kkat for FoE and everyone that's continued to support me. Next chapter: back to Roam.