Fallout Equestria: Homelands

By Somber

Chapter 26: Blocked

There was nothing special about the corner of Azimuth and Yajo. The former was a broad, six lane boulevard that cut through the heart of the district, while the latter was a narrow two lane access road that connected the five and six story apartment buildings to the road network. Overhead, a concrete remnant of the capital expressway loomed over the buildings, blackened and streaked with soot as it made its loop through the city. That wasn’t important either. No, what made Azimuth and Yajo special was that, for the last month, Scotch and her friends had been trying to cross it. To just make one block’s advance down Azimuth and get close to the heart of Roam.

The city was too big. Never mind the fire, which was hard because the fire could be anywhere. Nevermind the cremorians. Never mind the many other dangers the city offered. It was the size of the place that killed people. After walking twenty blocks in the heat and smoke, you’d get tired. You’d get sloppy.

You’d get burned…

So far they’d avoided all that by being careful, crawling down Azimuth as the straightest path to reach the government center. Every five blocks, they’d carve out a camp, bring in water and supplies, and use them to keep from being overwhelmed or worn down by Roam. It’d worked. For five months they’d crawled down Azimuth, making forays deep into the ruin. Pyre had been so impressed by their progress that he’d had other Fire Legion emulate their technique.

And it all came to a screeching halt at Yajo. The cause was a collision with two heavy army vehicles that lay burned in the middle of the intersection. Behind them was one of the city’s many designated emergency shelters, which was full of cremorians. Not a problem, just be quiet. But opposite the shelter on the other side of Azimuth, a police station squatted in the bottom two floors of a commercial building. Murderballs patrolled the structure, and the loudspeakers blared constant warnings about martial law and a state of emergency. That covered up the sound of the spherical robots approaching in the smoke and haze. Again, not a problem. Murderballs were just machines. They’d baited them and destroyed them in the past.

No, what stopped them cold was the combination. Shoot the robots, and the cremorians came swarming out. Don’t shoot, and the robots would home in with proximity sensors. The only saving grace was neither chased very far away, so they could always fall back, but they couldn’t make progress…

“Ah, Black Beetle,” Skylord muttered as he peered through the haze at the side of the police station. “He’s a lot more zigzaggy today. Wonder if their software evolved again.” The soot and ash had turned him a mottled gray, a light machine gun on his battle harness. The chains he wore were still as strong as ever. No surprise. Roam was no place to find love.

“Could also be a broken motor.” Scotch stared at her diagram from inside the remains of a jewelry store that gave good cover at the edge of their patrol range. With the wrecks in the middle, you couldn’t see if any Murderballs were hiding just behind them. “You shot Blackie up pretty good last time.”

“Yeah, but I swear the damned things are repairing themselves,” he muttered.

“I still think we should try Diga street,” Majina said as she went through a kata behind them, taking the various stances to keep loose. “There wasn’t that much radiation. Besides, leave Blackie alone. He’s had his love slain by a dragon.”

“Look, Red Death was trying to kill me. It was self-defense. He should just get over it,” Precious said, preening over a dozen sparkly trinkets on her ears and tail. “What do you think, Py?”

Pythia stared at her star chart and the atlas, turned to the pages on Roam. It’d been thanks to the book they’d made as much progress as they had. “I think you’re going to drive off our legionnaires if you don’t stop naming the robots trying to kill us.” Raising her head, she pulled back her hood and sighed. “Even odds. There’s shadows and a lot of different futures. It’s like trying to do a puzzle while people keep shuffling the pieces.” She looked to the south, her brows knitted in worry. “We can make it through. It’s just… unlikely.”

“Eh, I’ve heard worse,” a zebra stallion replied, his voice muffled by the respirator he wore. His large frame was covered with a rubbery orange and red coat. Patches along the shoulder and back were reinforced with plates of dinged up metal. A wide brimmed metal helmet, painted bright red, was adorned by a bracket holding a burned stick of wood. “You know that’s property of the legion, dragon?”

“Let me be beautiful, Torch,” Precious retorted, throwing the back of a claw to her brow.

Torch shook his head. “If this doesn’t work…”

“Plan B. No gunshots. Your zebras will disable the murderballs hoof to hoof.” She glanced over at the dozen zebras in Torch’s squad. Like him, they were garbed for life in the inferno that was Roam.

“We can do that, since we took out Butcherball. Plan C?”

Scotch reached over and rubbed Rocky’s block. “Well, we’ve got stuff for a sacrifice. He makes a wall and we push past. Once the cremorians settle down, we can sneak past to get back.” Everyone knew the unwritten rule: if you got cut off, you were dead.

Torch nodded. “And is there a plan D?” he asked, curiosity bending his mouth into a smirk.

Scotch rubbed the ash off her sweaty face as she thought furiously. “Fall back and plan for next week,” she admitted.

“Diga street,” Majina taunted.

“No. I’m not having my feathers falling out to radiation,” Skylord countered. “Again.”

“It wasn’t that bad.”

“The whole street collapsed into a radioactive waste pit. Fuck no.”

“Just stay on the telephone cables and leap off the crane and we’ll be fine!”

“We’ll try Diga again if we fail. Maybe Bastion can spare some extra RadAway for the attempt?” Scotch asked, looking at the final member of the squad. The Propoli mare casually marking off all of the goods they’d collected. “What do you think, Xema? Might be a good investment?”

Xema didn’t even look up. “Bastion has pre-negotiated all prices and exchanges with salvage teams, Miss Tape. If you want twelve units of RadAway, you’ll need to pay for it in advance.”

“That would be a no,” Precious translated.

“You know, you could make this substantially easier,” Scotch muttered, chafing at the futility. If only she could master the shooty look…

“It’s not my job to facilitate salvage extraction. It’s my job to assess salvage extracted, organize payouts, and have said salvage transported out of the Roam Exclusion Zone,” Xema said, the mare wearing white painted combat armor that, theoretically, was supposed to make her not a target. “At the discretion of the Fire Legion,” she added, with a nod towards Torch.

“That would be ‘I don’t care,’” Precious supplied.

“I know what she said,” Scotch growled and took a deep breath.

“At least we took out the Butcher Ball,” Skylord said with a smirk. “I took out the Butcher. Did I mention I killed Butcher Ball? With a shot straight through its processor?”

“It must be noon,” Precious murmured.

“Still, a good thing,” Scotch agreed, ignoring the smug smirk he gave the others. Butcher had racked up more almost-kills – and kills – against them than any of the others of the murderball family operating out of the police station. Last time, six legionnaires had died fighting it as waves of cremorians from the shelter assaulted them. Scotch would feel better if the remains of the robot were still in the street, but someone else must have scavenged them after they fell back last time. The downside of renown was a mass of carrion feeders robbing them of their prizes.

“Okay everyone. Get into position,” she said, and immediately Xema moved back. If anyone would survive, it would be her. Torch’s zebras lined up, half facing the shelter, half facing the two wrecks that could have a dozen murderballs behind them. Precious and Skylord scampered into the ruin for whatever cover they could manage. Scotch and Majina trotted out, unhindered by the firefighting gear. The shop opposite the jewelry store and police station was a pile of rust and cinder offering little cover, but they tried to hug the girders and rubble as they laid out the net of spark mines wired together, each one augmented by a spark battery.

“Ready?” Scotch asked her.

Majina blew out a breath. “Yeah. Let’s do it.”

“Quiet and fast,” Scotch said.

Majina nodded and started towards the police station. She rose up on her hind hooves, walking closer step by step. It was impossible to know when they’d come, but come they would. They always did…

Majina got to the edge of the wreck, the added meter or so of height helping her peer past the two cars. Immediately she launched herself into a back flip as two metallic tendrils lashed out at her. The murderballs buzzed softly as they rolled into view en masse. To her credit, Majina didn’t scream as she twisted in midair and came down on all four hooves, racing back towards Scotch. The murderballs followed, the orbs popping out weapons at their poles or splitting into two hemispheres and exposing tasers, spike launchers, or other implements of death.

Scotch wanted to meet whoever made these things and give them a swift kick right in the nuts. They had to have nuts. They were ‘murderballs’ after all.

Majina led them into range of the minefield. Hope started to rise in Scotch’s chest as she clutched the detonator. She had to wait, both for her friend and to catch as many of the spheroid robots as she could. “Come on,” she whispered. A few more seconds. Just a few more!

Majina leapt the last few feet, rolling and coming up on her hooves facing the leading murderball. “Don’t mean to shock–”

Scotch mashed the detonator. The spark mines all crackled, unloading a blue-white glow that propagated through the street. Everyone’s manes stood on end as the energy washed through them.

Scotch clenched her eyes shut, waiting for the scream. It never came. Slowly she relaxed. The murderballs continued to roll aimlessly past Majina as the young mare pursed her lips, then glared at Scotch. “You couldn’t wait for me to finish one line?”

“Who were you saying it for? The robots?” Skylord asked as he emerged from the wreckage.

“It’s the principle of the thing! Like not looking at the explosions as they go off behind you,” she said with a huff, her mane frizzing out above her skill.

“Why would they be going off behind me? If I’m blowing stuff up, I want it in front of me,” Skylord countered.

“Yeah, you’d miss seeing an awesome explosion that way too. Why blow it up if you’re not going to watch it?” Precious agreed.

“If your banter draws the cremorians down on us I am going to make you wish the Butcherball got you,” Scotch threatened carefully trotting towards the wrecks in the intersection. “Looks like we got the Beetle, the Stunners, Spiker, and… I think that might be all of them.” She carefully peered past them, at the open doors of the shelter. Two smoldering bodies lay in the doorway as black smoke poured out. There were more inside. A lot more.

Still, it’d worked! Torch’s zebras moved out of the jewelry store, circling around towards her. No one wanted to get too close to the spherical robots. Pythia and Xema emerged and approached.

Suddenly Pythia extended a hoof and yelled, “Look out!”

Scotch’s eyes bulged as she saw the flames of the cremorians flare and whirl. Whatever she was supposed to look out for, it could– her whirling prevented the bullet from going right through her head as the gunshot boomed out from above. A half dozen equines in similar orange and red coats were on the expressway above, aiming down at all of them. Their gunfire rattled down as the cremorians rose and started screaming.

“Which crew are they?” Precious shouted as she leapt over Scotch, covering her face with her scaled forearms and shielding her with her body. They were using medium caliber hunting rifles, the impact thumping hard into the dragonpony’s scales.

“Who cares?! Cremorians!” Torch bellowed as the Fire Legion made a line against the screaming mass of flaming spectral equines, some fully animating the charred remains of long ago and others mere shapes of burning blue and white flame. “Hose ‘em!” Torch bellowed, and three incinerators opened up, sending gusts of flame that seemed to terrify the blazing spectres. The embodied ones, however, raced through the flamers and into the line of zebras. Shotguns opened up, blasting away huge chunks of charcoal and bone, uncovering the specter within. Eventually a flamer would wash over it, and the body would explode like a bomb of bone and ash as the specter fled.

Skylord braced himself and opened fire. The bursts rattled up with far more force than the hunting rifles. One of the ambushers leaning out jerked as two ripped through his respirator. He fell limply down into the seething mass of cremorians sweeping around the doors of the shelter. “Corpse bomb!” someone shouted as dozens of cremorians swarmed the body.

“Burn ‘em back! Burn ‘em before–” Torch ordered, but it was too late. The body swelled even as it hit the ground, pressurized by the shrieking forms. It started to charge, flames leaking out the shattered respirator’s faceplate. The Fire Legion fell back, scattering as it raced straight at Torch, the only one of the Legion that remained in line.

A shape dove beneath it, knocking out its legs. Majina slid past as it fell on its side, rolling to her hooves and racing away as it fell. Torch threw himself to the ground as the corpse bomb bloomed into a great swirling, shrieking mass of cremorians. Blazing blood and bone flew across the intersection as the body disintegrated. They fountained out, searching for anybody to inhabit.

Precious inhaled deeply and let out a plume of green flame. The cremorians swirled like an ashen tornado. Skylord kept shooting overhead, nailing a second ambusher, who thankfully didn’t fall within range of the cremorians. “Grenades!” Scotch yelled as tiny oblongs came flying down at them, but at this range most fell away or rebounded off the rubble. Shrapnel still zinged uncomfortably close, thumping hard into her barding.

Slowly the flamers and Precious herded the cremorians into the doors of the shelter. Torch reached into his belt, pulling off bottles and flinging them into the doorway. The wall of fire would last for a bit. Cremorians might have been ghosts, but they were ghosts of zebras that didn’t realize they could just pass through walls. The ones that could… those were terrifying.

“Fire coming,” Rocky intoned. “Close.”

“Fire!” Scotch yelled, and started looking around. Under hooves, along the street, even walls were possible places. Skylord and the Flame Legion were making occasional shots at the ambushers, who now seemed reluctant to put their heads over the edge.

The crumbled road next to Skylord started to smoke, and Scotch ran to the griffon, who was looking up. She tackled him, shoving him as far from the point as possible. A second later, the fire flowed out, fountaining into the air. It was beautiful, hypnotic, the way it flowed like some awful mix of magma and flame. It spread like water across the ground, ever hungry as it snaked out after them.

“Precious!” Scotch screamed as she ran to Rocky. “Give me the big one!”

The dragonpony grit her pointed teeth but didn’t argue as she yanked off a necklace and threw it to Scotch, who snagged it on her hoof. Scotch positioned it atop the stone block and yanked her mask down. The metal was dinged, the wrench bent, but it’d work. She set the gem down. “This isn’t going to be pretty,” she said in apology as she lifted the block overhead and slammed it down upon the diamond over and over again. Diamonds might be hard, but they were also brittle and popped into a mess of carbon powder and twisted gold.

The stone block flared with golden light and the ground around them erupted. Walls of stone diverted the spreading flame. An arc of rock curled over Scotch and Skylord to block the spattering flame while a berm lifted Majina above the coiling, hungry flames. “Come on! Get past!” Scotch said as she pointed her hoof down Azimuth.

“Scotch!” Precious shouted, pointing a hoof at the station.

Scotch turned and saw the round hatch at the side of the building pop open and spit out an enormous red ball. Its burgundy shell was dented and crudely patched. As Scotch watched, it split in two and extended two bladed spikes from the poles while along the equator two saw blades emerged, whirring in a mechanical scream. “Butcher!” Scotch bellowed.

“Bull! I killed it!” Skylord yelled in rage as the spheroid rolled into the flames, unconcerned. Butcher wasn’t just big, though. It was erratic, the saw blades causing it to bounce and skip and flip with horrible unpredictability. Its polar spikes oscillated back and forth, making the whole thing sway like a snake with almost mesmerizing fluidity. Anyone that fell into that gap between hemispheres would be ripped to pieces.

“Light it up!” Torch bellowed as the Flame Legion focused fire on the maniacal robot. Its bangs and clangs as it rocketed across the harrowed ground was mad laughter amid the malicious whirr of its blades. It ignored the flames, rolling above some and spinning to shield itself from the worst, which merely turned it into a blazing ball of mayhem bringing the ever-present risk of impaling and slashing. The fire and Rocky’s stony berms kept them hemmed in while Butcher could move freely.

“We need water!” Torch bellowed as Butcher speared one of his soldiers with its polar spines, twisted its hemispheres, and threw the body into Skylord as his machine gun dented the burning shell.

“Uhhh…” Scotch felt worry chewing at her gut, but as Butcher bounced towards Precious and her, she pulled out a small glass vial of pure water. It wasn’t the best, but it was special. “Hope you don’t mind,” she said to Rocky as she looked up. “Spirits of the clouds, we need rain. Take this offering and–”

“Hurry up!” Precious snapped as Butcher rammed into her. The dragonpony grabbed the sphere, rearing up on her hind legs to halt its charge. It split wide, blades whirling in opposite directions as motors strained against her hold. She took a deep breath, blasting green flame into the interior, but the fanning whirl extinguished them before anything vital ignited.

“Yeah, that,” Scotch said as she smashed the vial. Spirits didn’t like to be rushed, and they didn’t like to be taken for granted, so she added a “please!” at the end there. The gift was one she’d spent hours producing with a spark battery and some wires, electrolyzing and combusting to make the purest water she could. Maybe it wasn’t snowmelt from the top of a holy mountain, but she worked for it, dammit! She cringed as the orb rocked, threatening Precious’s grip. If it slipped, Butcher would roll right over both of them…

Then the clouds hissed a hot, piss like rain. The flames popped and sizzled for several seconds as they fought the intense downpour. As the flames died, the legionnaires moved off Rocky’s defenses to pile on Butcher. The murderball’s hemispheres rotated wildly back and forth, pole spikes pistoning like mad. One zebra screamed as the spheres slammed closed, crushing a hoof between them. Another’s leg snapped as the murderball somehow rocked sideways.

“I can’t shoot it with all of you in the way!” Skylord shouted.

But Majina hopped atop it, holding a length of rebar in her mouth. She balanced nimbly on the struggling sphere, dancing as she held the pole between her forehooves. With a cry, she slammed in down between the buzz saws, putting all her weight on it. Something inside the robot gave a pop and whine as smoke started to issue out. The hissing rain led to more pops and crackles, and finally the bot went still again. One polar spike kept feebly expanding and retracting, like a twitching leg.

It would have been nice to celebrate, but three zebras were wounded and it was raining. The rain was salty, acidic, and filled with grit and toxins. The only thing it didn’t do was burn. As the zebra fell back, Skylord marched up and carefully fired a burst into its guts. Then another. “Stay dead,” Skylord growled, then looked up at Majina. “Nice job.”

“Thanks, but didn’t we kill this before?” she asked as she hopped down. “Or is this a second one?”

“No. It’s Butcher. See?” He pointed at some patches on the hull. “Here’s where I got it last time.”

“It’s repairing them,” Scotch said as she pointed at the police station. “That’s why it’s never running out or leaving wrecks behind. It must have some kind of repair balls that recover them after a fight.” She started towards the police station. “Come on. If we hurry–”

“Scotch!” Pythia screamed down the street at her, drawing her up short.

A scream rolled over them like thunder, rippling out across the ruined city. The ground shook under their hooves and primordial dread rose in her chest as she looked out at the harbor. “Oh no. No no no…”

She’d forgotten about The Beast.

The gargantuan equine form appeared as if someone had taken an equine, flayed its face to bone, and grew it to the size of a mountain. Smoke roiled off it constantly, and steam rose in a ring about its waist. Great black chunks of firy stone leaked from it to hiss and smoke in the harbor. And now it flung its forehooves into the air, releasing a shower of blazing, burning bombs that arched out over the city like countless igneous falling stars. Some were the size of a pony’s head.

Some were much, much bigger.

“No… no!” Scotch screamed, but Precious ducked under her, lifted her off her hooves, and carried her away. Majina snatched up Rocky and Torch and the rest fell back.

Any ambushers potentially on the overpass were obliterated as flaming rocks the size of houses arced down, smashing into the overpass like Celestia’s mythic hooves. Blazing fragments sprayed down as everyone fled. The strip of concrete snapped under the weight, and she and everyone else was running as fast as possible away from the intersection as the overpass swung to dangle for just a moment, and then dropped right into the intersection.

As the dust and ash settled, Scotch stared at the hundred foot high wall that had manifested directly in her path. Her breathing quickened, her eyes bulged, and she screamed as she charged, smashing her hooves against the mass of concrete and steel in her path, as if she could somehow dig through it via pure wrath!

“Scotch,” Pythia said gently.

Scotch’s hooves continued to beat at the strip. Tears streaked her dusty face.

“Scotch,” she repeated and reached around to hold her. Scotch’s hooves slowed.

“Hey, don’t sweat it,” Precious murmured behind her.

“We’ll find another way,” Majina said, her voice soft and delicate.

Scotch’s hoof gave one last feeble thump against the overpass. She glanced to the left and right. The overpass had crushed the buildings on this side, leaving not even an inch to squeeze through. “A month… a whole month,” she muttered bitterly as Pythia tugged her away from the smoldering underpass.

“At least we killed Butcher. Twice,” Skylord offered as some token reassurance.

“Come on. Let’s get back to the Firehouse,” Majina said.

Scotch joined the disappointed procession back up Azimuth. “How are your guys holding up?” she asked Torch.

“Only three wounded. Good day. Sucks about the road though,” the large stallion summarized. The Flame Legion picked up every scrap of jewelry that remained in the store, Xema meticulously assessing each in her notes. The majority would go to food and medical supplies. “Won’t try Diga, by the way. Just so you know.”

“Yeah. Not a fan of that plan either,” she admitted. She wasn’t a fan of much at the moment. They trudged back to a parking garage where they’d stashed the pair of fire engines. The red paint was cracked and burned in places, but ‘Roam Fire Guard #7’ was still visible on one. The Fire Legion climbed in that one. The other had recently been marked with a different label in white paint.

The Whiskey Express.

She climbed into the cab and stroked her hooves over the steering wheel that had taken them almost all the way across Zebrinica, and now dutifully conveyed them across the hellscape of Roam. “Are we going forward, or back?” the spirit asked as Precious charged the boiler with her breath and Majina settled in with Rocky on her lap.

Scotch didn’t have the heart to answer. With a deep ‘Pock-hiss-pock-hiss-pock-hiss,’ the pistons propelled the fire engine back up Azimuth. She glared into the rearview mirror at the roaring form of The Beast, thrashing its blazing hooves against the harbor.

* * *

The Firehouse was once the East Roam Fire Academy. She and the others had earned a lot of good will helping repair it when they’d arrived with Pyre and the others months ago. The barracks housed hundreds of legionnaires and conscripts, and the academic buildings housed food services and entertainment. Garages held the dozen steam tractors and coal bunkers that allowed the Flame Legion to move around the outskirts of the immense city and prevent the occupants from spilling over. In the middle of the training yard, where students had once practiced extinguishing a variety of objects and structures, a landing field had been cleared for Bastion’s flying machines.

It was a step up from when she’d first arrived, scrounging ruins and sleeping in burned out apartment blocks. She’d helped build a lot of it simply as a side effect of trying to find some way through the outer suburbs of the city and into the older and more important areas towards the core. Pythia’s atlas alone was an invaluable resource, as almost none of the Flame Legion had more than the basic understanding of the layout of the city.

Roam had been almost ideally situated for a capital. The Zebris River flowed down from the north into a natural banana shaped bay. The two peninsulas south of the bay and north of the ocean were called The Horns, raised hills that had been easily fortified in antiquity. The flat land to the north of the harbor next to the river had been the host of migratory tribes for centuries, and when the migrations stopped, transformed into the cultural and business hearts of the city. A citadel built on the west horn had easily defended the mouth of the bay. The shoreline had once been able to accommodate the trade of thousands of ships from all around the world.

Over time, things had changed, of course. The Zebris had been buried and transformed into a network of aqueducts and sewers that kept the city alive. Two smaller rivers had been rerouted and given the same treatment, allowing the city’s waste to be processed far to the east and west of the city. Scotch could appreciate a good sanitation system. And as the population of Zebrinica rose, so too did the size of Roam. The land to the north, west, and east had allowed taller residential and commercial buildings to expand out radially, forming dense satellite communities all linked by road and rail, while preserving the historical heart of the city. The airport had once been outside the city, but Roam had expanded and expanded until it was right next to it.

The war had done few favors for the city. Neighborhoods had been walled off. Rail lines and roads blocked by checkpoints. It’d turned the already dense city into a logistical nightmare even before the megaspell lit the city aflame. The Beast now occupied the gap between the horns, a blazing island at the mouth of the harbor like some grotesque parody of the Pony of Friendship in Manehattan, dooming thousands of ships left in a harbor choked by ash.

The five of them had been given a small garage separate from the main one. She carefully backed the Whiskey Express into the space and bled out the excess pressure. “Thanks,” she said as she patted the steering wheel. “You’re a good fire tractor.”

“One is glad to serve,” the spirit replied. She climbed out of the cab. Everyone else spilled out as well.

“And you’re a good gun! Who was a good gun? You were a good gun, yes you were!” Skylord gushed as Majina helped free him from the harness. “I am going to strip you down and oil you up! Yes I am!”

“Buy it a drink first?” Precious snorted. “At least you got to keep your baby. I had to hand over the Diamond Empire over to Torch and that nag Xema.”

“At least Charity wasn’t here to see it. They would have quibbled all day,” Majina opined as she and Skylord moved the gun over to a workbench. “Though if she did come here maybe she could shake something out of Xema’s hooves. I swear that zebra’s worse than you, Precious.”

“Oh, I’m sure she passes stuff over to Bastion easily enough,” Precious replied, then glanced over at Scotch. “You need the bag?”

“Yeah,” she said, glancing over at a heavy, dangling brown sack. “But not right now. I need to talk to Pyre. Someone shot at us today and fucked everything up. I’d like to know who.”

“I’ll be here if you need me,” Precious replied with a smile and a shrug, clambering up the wall to the second floor and climbing into a hammock made of old fire hoses, pulling out her imperios on a string, and counting them.

“I’ll make sure the Express is refilled. For whenever you’re ready to head out again,” Majina said with a wave by the coal bin.

Scotch spotted Pythia’s tail disappearing through a doorway, and she followed her, leaning into the doorjamb. The concrete walled space had once been for storing garage supplies, but Pythia had turned it into a den. Tiny cards of notes were stuck to the walls, a huge replica of the city map had been painted, copied from the atlas, and a table set up for her star map and scrying. The mare was getting too big for her cloak. It now barely covered her flanks. Her glyph was a circle with a sideways 8 across it, looking like a snake biting its own tail, over a four pointed star. It rested on a particularly wonderfully carved rump, but Scotch focused on her other end.

Pythia pulled back her hood. Her mane had definitely grown out a bit, and her circular stripes were more pronounced. She closed her eyes and sighed. “I should have seen the Beast coming. And the gunshots. I mean, I saw hints of them, but I thought they were Torch’s people shooting.”

“Hey, it’s okay. If it hadn’t been for you, I might have been under that bridge when the Beast had its tantrum. At least you were far enough back the Book wasn’t messing with your vision, right?” Scotch asked as she walked over next to her.

“I’m not sure it needs to, anymore.” She raised her hooves. “I used to be so good at this. The future was just… clear. If there was a shadow, it was more curious than dangerous. But the older I get the more the future’s a tangled-up nightmare and I keep doubting myself!” she said as she gazed at the map. “I’m trying to get us there. I swear… I’m doing the best I can!” she said, starting to shake.

“Hey! Hey. It’s fine, Py.” Scotch put a hoof around her shoulders and pulled her in for a hug. “It’s fine. We’ll get there.” She tried to give her an encouraging smile. Pythia didn’t return it.

“I just… when we set off from the Hoof, I never thought it’d take this long,” Pythia replied. “I thought that we’d just find the answers and sate my curiosity. That was it. Or we’d give up and move on. I didn’t think everyone would stay and… keep trying.”

“We’ll solve it, Pythia. We’ll find out what happened to the Eye, and why people keep trying to kill me. We’ll do it all.” Scotch stroked her mane. “Don’t worry about it. Just keep doing what you’re doing. We’ll get there. I believe in you.”

That got a smile, if a fake one. “Thanks,” she replied before her eyes slid to the side. “I just wish I could repay it…”

A response nearly made it out her mouth before Scotch was able to strangle it and send it back to her amygdala where it belonged. “Don’t worry about that,” Scotch replied, giving her one last pat. “I’ll talk to you later. I need to go check in with Pyre. Find out if he knows who shot at us.”

Pythia didn’t look at her as she departed, tugging her hood back over her face. Scotch could only imagine the pressure she was under. She’d suggested Azimuth in the first place, seeing them following it all the way to Seaside and the temple. And now it’d all blown up with one tantrum by the Beast, leaving them to start all over. That was hard. Scotch just wanted to wrap the answer up in a great big bow and give it to her and they could have wonderful sexytimes and sunshine and rainbows forever! It was hard to imagine that their destination was a mere fifteen kilometers away. A two hour trot, if there wasn’t a city of death in the way.

As Scotch trotted across the yard towards the academy academic building, she remembered Blackjack telling her about Hightower. A blazing prison full of ghouls and death about to explode any second. As Scotch looked west, towards Seaside and a high row of charred residential highrises that were all that saved the academy from suffering a similar fate as the overpass, she thought Blackjack had it easy. She hadn’t had to wake up every day wondering when, or if, they would find a way. If it was even worthwhile at all. At some point Precious wouldn’t be sated with counting coins, Majina would want a happier story, Skylord would want to go back to his Legion, or Pythia would give up, or someone would die, or–

“Hey, pony! You okay?” a conscript yelled across the yard, snapping her out of her fugue. Her heart thundered in her chest as she shook her head hard. If her adversaries had been waiting just now…

“Yeah! Just thinking!” She picked up her pace and got out of the open. Her chest ached from the rapid breathing and hot, polluted air. She stuffed those worries into a box in the back of her head to deal with another day. It didn’t stop her heart hammering away in her chest. You’re fine, she told herself. Everything is fine.

The large academic building of the fire academy was once just a dozen auditoriums and classrooms in two stories connected by a wide, broad hall. The Flame Legion had turned it into a boom town where conscripts and legionnaires could bring their hard-earned scrap and loot and turn it into other necessities. The brutalist concrete architecture was probably the only reason it hadn’t burned down. Even then, it’d been hard clearing out the cremorians.

She passed by the trading post, where Bastion zebras took and assessed talismans and issued the scrip that served as money around the Firehouse. Gold imperios were too valuable to use as currency, being hoarded in reserve for when conscripts could limp back to their villages. She trotted past The Bucket, trying to ignore the line of zebras getting exactly that for a single scrip. She likewise didn’t linger at Smoky’s; Skylord might rave about it but she’d never picked up the habit of eating meat. Not after 99. The Garden was where she might catch a nice meal with imported greens, but it was pricy and she always felt nervous unless her back was to a wall.

Then there was Heat. It’d started as a joke, but then some zebra had scavenged a sex shop of some naughty, lacy, leathery things, and someone else had found some more, and soon some more affable mares and cute stallions had discovered they could make way more for an hour of company than they could in a week of picking through talismans. There was even an open stage where some zebras did dances and the like that could make her blush all night. Sometimes it was the only way to blow off steam…

She trotted past the more mundane stores where weapons and medical care were provided towards the administration offices at the end. The legionnaires just waved her through. Every legionnaire that had been here the last two months knew who she was; the crazy pony who kept pushed deeper into Roam than ever before.

As she reached the president’s office, she saw Torch emerge. Without his respirator, it was hard to tell he had a face. One eye looked out from a mass of keloid, his lips scarred in a permanent leer. “Hey, Scotch. Just filled him in.”

She stood on her hind legs and gave him a brief hug. “Thanks, Torch. Will your soldiers be okay?”

“Damn well better be. If I find out they’re bricking it, I’ll light a fire under their asses,” he replied before pulling his respirator back on, hiding his melted wax visage. “Take care of yourself, Menace.”

She nodded, thumped the doorjamb, and pushed it open. She’d wondered if the academy designers had been inspired by Stable-Tec. The director’s desk looked out at a large window of the academic hall. No doubt he’d seen her coming five minutes ago. Pyre didn’t look at ease behind it, but he did what his legion demanded of him. Without saying a word, he pushed a paper towards her.

“What’s this?” she said as she looked at the names.

“The zebras who attacked you. Torch said they were on the East Sunrise Expressway. Only one salvage team went in that direction. All new conscripts. Volunteers. None of them have been sighted today, so either they’re dead or hiding out.” He sighed and leaned back in the chair. “I’ve left orders that if any of them are spotted to bring them to me, but we’ve got a lot of new people. It’ll take time.”

She looked at the list, not recognizing the names, villages, or glyphmarks. “Is there anything else you can do?”

He snorted. “Lots. I could brand you. Make you a full member of the Legion. I’ll even make you a captain, like Torch. Give you a squad of forty zebras as a security detail.” He gave her a half smile. “Hell, I’ll turn this place over to you and go back to patrolling. Sitting on my ass all day is giving me hemorrhoids.”

“Pass,” she replied with a smile.

“Then that’s the best I can do,” he said with a shrug. “Look, no one who knows you five is going to do shit to you. You’re a celebrity, and you scare them more than a little. Hell, before you came, this place was a camp in a burned-out city. Now we’re a bastion of civilization. Before we had to force people to come here. Now we actually have to turn away volunteers because the survivors going home don’t talk about the cremorians, the Beast, or the fires. They talk about the market or getting some sweet tail at Heat. Of actually getting paid for that sweet loot they found. The general’s looking to start a second location in the west half of the city, if we can find a place as intact as this.” He jabbed a hoof at her. “You did this. You and your friends.”

“Only ‘cause you allowed it,” she replied. “If you or the general had said no…”

“True, but it was you that sold it to me. What was that line? ‘Trade saves the wasteland’? If we’d listen to Xema and the rest of those Bastion bastards we’d still be pooping in ditches, eating crap, and giving every last scrap of loot over to them. And yeah, I know that unicorn probably came up with most of the ideas. Spirits, I’d do anything to get her here if I could. Really put those Bastioneers in their place,” he said with a roll of his eyes and a wave of his hoof. “Point is, you and yours have done right by my legion.”

“I’m glad I helped,” Scotch said, blushing at the praise.

“So rest assured that we don’t want you dead, but there are a lot of people offering a ton of money for your head, Scotch. We can’t tell who’s here for work and who’s here after a quick imperio.” He pointed his hoof at the paper. “If we find any of them, rest assured we’ll make an example, but that’s no good for the next group of idiots that come here.”

She deflated, her chin thumping down on the desktop. “Your reasonableness has defeated my ire. Now I have to live with the frustration.” She pressed her face to the tabletop and snarled, “So much frustration!”

“Welcome to my life,” he replied with a roll of his eyes. “Take solace your continued survival annoys the fuck out of your enemies. I know mine does Flare. Asshole is stuck at a shitty airport shuffling supplies to us rather than having the pick of the loot like before.”

“Right,” she said, trying to do just that. It would help if she knew who wanted her dead and why. Blackjack had it easy. They wanted EC-1101. She was wanted ‘for prophecy.’ “Anyway, speaking of Charity, can I use the radio?”

“Feel free,” he said, gesturing to a table top in the corner covered by electronic equipment.

She trotted over, put on the headset, and turned the dial to the MASEBS frequency. She doubted any radios would be listening for that, but hopefully one person was. She pressed the button, waited a moment, then began, “Green Menace to Goldmonger. Green Menace to Goldmonger. Come in Goldmonger. Over.”

She repeated it twice before a scratchy voice replied. “Two hundred and sixteen. That’s how much you owe me for taking this long, Menace. Where are you?” There was a pause and a belated. “Over.”

Might as well share the bad day. “Got held up again. Looking for a new route. Going to be a while. Over.” The scream that came over the headset made her wince, followed by a pregnant silence. She waited, then continued, “We can’t just drive right there, Monger. There’s so much junk in the way. Can you get out? Over.”

For a moment she was afraid Charity wouldn’t reply. Then, “No. They’re watching me like an imperio on the sidewalk. I need to get there! You have no idea how much you’re changing things!” Again, a late, “Over.”

“I don’t think it’s as big as that. We’re still scrounging things for Bastion. If it wasn’t for you making sure we got the parts and stuff we needed, we’d still be pooping in trenches. Over.” Scotch said with a chuckle.

“When economic centers move, it’s a big deal. Big Bro had his pick of the loot. Now all the good stuff is going straight to Bastion, which cuts him out. He’s just getting shitty village loot. It’s huge, and neither you nor Pyre know how to leverage it! Ugh! I need to be there! Any sign of a package?” A pause. “Over! Over!”

Scotch shook her head with a smile. “Nope. No clue where to look. Know why he wants it? Over.”

“Probably to kiss up to dad. I don’t know. He’s playing games and doesn’t trust me. He seems to expect me to do for him what you’re doing with the Firehouse and doesn’t get that’s not how supply works. I don’t think I’m in any danger, but it’s frustrating! Over!”

“Well, if you need us to do something stupid, let us know. I’d rather cross him than risk losing you. Any other interesting news? It’s been a while. Over.”

She heard papers being shuffled around. “A little. You know Vega’s people? Let’s call them Stabbyface and Spookyface? They’re here looking for you. Got some kid with them but Big Bro and the others are keeping them out. Over.”

That raised her eyebrows in surprise. Tchernobog might know something interesting. Vicious… there was a part of her that really wanted to see her again and a part that really, really didn’t. Not till she’d was sure her thing with Pythia was as dead as she feared it was. “That’s interesting. What’s going on with Vega and the North? Over.” A long pause. She frowned. “Goldmonger? You there? Over.”

“It’s bad. It’s really bad. I don’t think anyone planned for a full-on war up there. Half of Rice River’s hostage and the other half is going broke. Everywhere there’s razorgrass… the Blood are marching teams out to clear it and slicing them to pieces. Some of them are being worked to death. But it’s no good for the other side. There’s no money coming in. People are leaving the east side for Sanctuary or other places. If it wasn’t for Atoli kelp shipments, I think everyone would be starving. And I’m pretty sure it’s just going to get worse the longer it goes on for everybody.” Another long pause, and it was Charity’s subdued tone that worried her more as she said, “Over.”

“What do you mean? Over.”

“Menace, remember what I said about economic centers shifting around causing big changes? Well it’s even worse when they die. Imagine if Megamart or Tenpony suddenly disappeared. Carnico might be shits, but the stuff they made was super vital to other cities too. Sanctuary imported fertilizer. Bastion needs synthetics. Even Roam needs flamer fuel. Nothing’s getting made, and no one has the capacity to make up for the difference. In six months, we could have mass famine and tech failures. If Carnico gets destroyed… Scotch, this place is barely hanging on with the trade it’s got. I don’t want to see it in an absolute dark age. I mean, even more of one.”

Scotch frowned, thinking of all the people they’d seen on the road coming here. The villages and settlements. She waited a moment, then asked, “Is there anything we can do? Over.”

“I don’t know. We’re on the other side of the continent. I can’t think of what we could do if we were there. The wasteland sucks already. Why are fuckers so determined to make it worse? Over.” The defeated voice made Scotch wish she could give the sour yellow unicorn a hug.

“I don’t know either. We just do the best we can with what we have where we are,” Scotch replied, the words feeling inadequate. “Any other news? Hopefully good? Over.”

“Not really. The Bones are fighting each other. Dr. Z’s dead. Someone finally found the bunker. Everyone’s gone. The only good news I’ve heard is someone really, really pissed off Riptide, but apparently she’s also disappeared.” She paused. “The news from Equestria’s better. Or not horrible, anyway. Apparently back home is getting back on their hooves. Over.”

Scotch glanced in the direction of the harbor. “Can the bad things here… get there? Over,” she asked in a low voice. Pyre was looking at her, brows furrowed.

“Scotch, we only have one world. Shit can get everywhere,” came the reply. Then she said, “Big Bro’s calling. I better go see. Remember, two hundred and sixteen, Scotch! Get me out of here before it goes much higher! Out.”

Scotch smiled. “Menace, out.” Then she removed the headset and sighed, slumping in the chair. Vicious and Tchernobog were interesting. What could they be after here if there was so much trouble back in the north?

“Interesting news?” Pyre asked.

“Some good. Mostly bad,” she admitted. “Pyre, what would happen if the Flames didn’t have flamer fuel?”

He leaned forward on his desk. “I’m assuming this is rhetorical?” She nodded. “We’d lose a lot. Flamers are best for crowd control. People really don’t even want to put up a fight when faced with being burned alive. It’s how the Flames keep order with the tributaries while we keep control of Roam. If we had to resort to bullets and brute force… it’d be ugly. Lots of dead. Hate us if you want, but no one wanting to fight us has saved a lot of lives. Why?”

“You get most of your flamer fuel from Carnico?”

He nodded slowly. “Every couple of years we get some tankers from the north. I assume it’s from there. We store it in the airport’s fuel depot.” He frowned. “Why?”

She explained the situation to him, and his face turned hard. “Crap. I never thought about that. The Flame Legion with no flamer fuel? It’d be…” He shook his head and didn’t finish. “It’s no different for the Storms either. They need to run their airships and stuff.”

“Where else can you get it?”

“Bastion, maybe. We can probably make it ourselves if we really, really had to. All you need is a hydrocarbon cracker.” His eyes darted to the radio. He pressed his hooves together and rose. “I need to make some calls and find out where we can get one. You should go.” Scotch nodded and rose from the radio. As she headed towards the door he asked, “Are you heading to the council?”

Scotch sighed. “I’ve wasted two weeks of my life so far. Might as well waste a few more.” And slipped out of the office.

* * *

When Dr. Z had mentioned a council of shamans in Roam, Scotch had imagined various things: a dark underground chamber with a singular table in a shaft of light, surrounded by cloaked equines, their face hidden in hoods. Or maybe a stable like atrium with concerned shamans and their acolytes rushing about trying to figure out how to undo the Beast. In her most romantic visions, it was a school where shamans presented lore and knowledge to newer generations.

Not a burned-out diner with four… four!… shamans.

To be fair, since taking the Firehouse, they’d relocated to the fire academy’s library, but it didn’t change the fact that there were as many shamans as she had hooves. She didn’t count. Still, that might have been fine if they were diligently looking for some solution to Roam’s problems. But…

“Ah, the green, spirit-touched anomaly has returned. Greet it for me,” came the introduction from the leader of the ‘council’ as he stood before a chalkboard covered in glyphs. He might have been an impressive figure, with a strong frame, tightly groomed mane, and broad, vertical Roamani stripes, so long as he never opened his mouth. He had a gelding's voice.

“The illustrious and magnificent Pomprey the Greater, most diligent student of wise Elphabia the Sage, holder of the first mask of Roam, gives greetings to the green, spirit-touched anomaly,” droned the younger stallion reading a magazine nearby. “Heya, Scotch. Torch said that Zenith was cut off. Bummer.” He was in need of a good mane cut.

“Heyas, Cato,” she said with what smile she could muster. “Yeah, bummer is a word for it.” The magazine seemed to be comprised purely of gay stallion porn.

“Inform the green, spirit-touched anomaly that it should be addressing you as Cato the Lesser, acolyte of Pomprey the Greater, holder of the first mask of Roam,” Pomprey said without glancing at her. Really, him acknowledging her at all had taken a month.

Cato echoed his ‘teacher’ in a monotone so flat she could use it as a table. She smirked at him. “Yeah, that’s not going to happen. Where’s Epona?” A flushing toilet was her answer, and a moment later the door to a small bathroom opened emitting a zebra with golden Mendi stripes, and a horn. She also had glasses as big as Scotch’s hoof and a mane that curled without the slightest restraint whatsoever. Her flanks had a cutie mark of a shield on one side and a golden glyphmark that translated as ‘thought.’ “Hey, Epona.”

She immediately froze, her pink eyes wide. “How did you know I was in there? Did the spirits tell you?” she asked in a tremulous voice.

“Lucky guess.”

Epona slumped. “Oh, that’s so much less impressive.” And she trotted over to the chalkboard next to Pomprey.

“And what is today’s thrilling point of discussion?” Scotch asked Cato, forcing as much cheer as she could.

“Does the Beast have a cock or vagina?” he replied placidly.

“Cato the Lesser should not use such a dismissive tone, nor should he misrepresent our ponderings with crude summary! Inform the green, spirit-touched anomaly that we discuss whether the Beast is the great Caesar himself censured into an abomination, as I have posited for months, or the megaspell infused essence of Pyrotessa, the spirit of fire which was housed in the lighthouse at the mouth of the bay!”

“I’m telling you that those are birthing hips,” Epona countered, wagging her rump at him. “Imagine these but wider.”

“Waggle not your posterior at the holder of the first mask of Roam!” Pomprey scoffed and smacked a grainy photograph of the Beast. “See that prominent spire at its hips! The Caesar was renowned for his endowment!”

“I think that was just a spur of rock. It was missing when we saw him today,” Scotch replied, already tired of ‘council.’

Pomprey froze, his eye twitching. “A stallion goes through multiple stages of arousal! It was… obviously cold today!” he blurted, not looking at Scotch as he froze.

“Master’s got me looking for images of the Caesar erect so he can compare ‘spur’ heights to the size of the Caesar,” Cato said with a plaintive smile. “Please put me out of my suffering.”

“Cato the Lesser can depart at any time!” Pomprey scoffed. “The search for knowledge is a struggle all must endure! To grind through every possibility, sift every nugget of proof, and obtain knowledge for the people!”

“Yes, master,” Cato replied, staring at Scotch, still begging for that bullet to free him from his torment.

“Are there pictures like that?” Scotch asked, having a hard time imagining lewd candids of wartime Luna or Celestia.

“Not like he wore clothes all the time,” Epona said with a faint flush. “I stumbled across some images years ago in a magazine. Well... they might have been an actor but they were very... ah... interesting.”

“Thus, my plight. I’d rather get my hooves on some real historical archives, but what we got is what was in the dorms before everything blew up. Some stallion was thirsty...” Cato muttered. He screwed up his face, tilting his head. “Dear Spirits, how does it fit in there?”

Now Scotch was curious about the magazine, but Heat was just down the hall. “Well have you thought that maybe the Beast is a hermaphrodite?” Scotch challenged. “Maybe it’s got both a cock and a vagina? I mean, it’s buried up to its waist in molten rock, but maybe if we can get it laid it’ll stop being such a pain in the ass!”

All three stared at her a moment, and a dry laugh filled the library. The old zebra sat in a rocking chair, a blanket across his lap. His frame was covered with swirling stripes that seemed almost abstractly drawn in his frame. He blinked gray eyes at the four of them, his laughter trailing off as he froze. “I forgot what’s so funny. Oh, hello, pony. When did you get here?”

“A while ago, Osmen,” she replied with a smile.

“Oh. Did you bring a sandwich?”

“Not this time, Osmen.”

“Oh.” And then he laid back his head and went to sleep.

The great council of Roam…

“What if we could arrange a rendezvous for the Beast? Maybe a little action would help mollify its wrath?” Epona suggested, and muttered, “It’d do wonders for me.”

“Don’t be ridiculous,” Pomprey scoffed. “What do you suggest we pair it with?”

“Well, Aizen is a male name,” Epona suggested.

“How… we… a stallion does not fornicate with other stallions!” Pomprey exploded.

“Yes they do, master. Yes they absolutely do,” Cato groaned as he flipped through the magazine, squided up his face, turned the magazine sideways and unfolded an extra page, then another. “How…?” he muttered in bafflement, head tilting sideways as well. Scotch fought the urge to see just what perplexed him.

“The Caesar did not!”

“I don’t know. The Caesar was never really set on an orientation. There were rumors he was lovers with both Ignatia and Claudio,” Epona commented lightly.

Pomprey’s eyelid suggested a blood vessel in his brain was about to solve this debate for them. “Now listen here you half-breed–”

“Is anyone going to get me a sandwich? I’m old!” Osmen whined from his rocker. “Pomprey, go make me a sandwich!”

“I am the first mask of Roam! I–” he started to protest when the dirty magazine flew up into the air, seized by an intense breeze, and smacked into his head repeatedly like a bat.

“Then you should be able to make a doozy of a sandwich! Elphabia made the best daffodil and daisy sandwiches without whining! Now hop to! Chop chop!” Osmen declared as he waved his hoof imperiously at Pomprey.

“I will not–” Twack! “I am–!” Fwack! “You cannot–” Whap!” “Alright! Stop! Stop! I’ll go and find someone to make you a sandwich!” The wind suddenly ceased, dropping the magazine atop his head. He pulled it off and froze, staring at the four-page centerfold. His head tilted, his cheeks burning, before he snorted in disgust and tossed it aside, exiting with a scorched mutter.

“Freedom,” Cato muttered, collapsing on his back.

“Hurmp… not getting my sandwich…” Osmen grumbled, looking around. “Where’d Pomfrey go? I wanted him to get me a sandwich!” The old zebra gave the arm of the rocker a thump, then slumped and resumed snoring.

The council of Roam, Scotch thought with a sigh. May her enemies tremble in fear…

“Someone said you almost made it down Azimuth, but got blocked,” Epona mentioned as she trotted over to where a teapot simmered on a small burner. “That’s too bad.”

Understatement. “Again. This is the fourth or fifth time! Every time we’re about to get into Seaside or the Old Quarter, something happens. A building collapses and blocks the road. A tunnel caves in. The road falls into a sewer full of radioactive waste! A whole overpass falls exactly in such a way to block the road completely!” She sat and stomped a forehoof. “Once or twice I could chalk up to coincidence, but four?”

“Sounds cursed to me,” Cato said, sitting up. “How about we trade? I’ll go out with Pythia and your friends and you stay here and compare rock formations to zebra shlongs.”

“Sure, but Pythia’s not interested in stallions,” Scotch pointed out.

Cato waved a hoof dismissively in the air before him. “Details! I’ll work it out as I go.” Scotch shook her head. Cato was persistent, she gave him that, but that’s all she’d give him.

“It sounds like a curse to me too,” Epona said with a tilt of her head.

“I’m not cursed. I’m spirit touched,” Scotch reminded. And that was all she told them.

“There’s more than one way to be cursed,” Epona said as she trotted over a bookcase once full of old firefighting manuals, now loaded with the dozen scrolls and books the council possessed.

“Sure! I could be censured again. Or censured more! Or censured and cursed! Why not add haunted to the mix? I’m sure that might be a possibility too!” Scotch fumed.

“I mean that you might be working against a curse on the city,” Epona said, and Scotch reined in her ire. The mare pulled out a book Scotch had read weeks ago. “There were countless spirits employed in the city when the megaspell went off. Rites were not fulfilled. Shines and temples desiccated. Violated spirits. And that’s assuming a shaman two centuries ago didn’t lay down something wicked on the city as a punishment.”

Scotch spotted Osmen watching her out of the corner of her eye. Their gazes met, and the old stallion stiffened, flopped his head back, and then began snoring with vigor.

“Okay. Maybe that’s a factor,” Scotch grudgingly conceded. “But if I am working against some kind of curse, how do I break it?”

“An atonement to the spirits. A sincere and contrite apology. An offering or sacrifice of self,” she said in a lecturing tone that reminded Scotch of her teachers in 99.

“But what am I atoning, apologizing, or sacrificing for?” Scotch asked, her aching chest giving her a reminder. “I know what it’s like to be censured. I made an invitation. Things got screwed up. I could apologize for that. But what did I ever do to Roam?”

Cato coughed delicately and Epona averted her eyes. “Well,” the mare said softly, “Ponies did blow up Roam.”

Scotch’s eyebrow twitched. “That’s not fair. I didn’t do that! That was two hundred years before I was born! Am I supposed to apologize on behalf of all ponykind for every megaspell?!” She thrust an accusatory hoof at Cato. “Are you supposed to apologize for every balefire bomb dropped? Are griffons supposed to apologize for everyone they killed on both sides?!”

“Wouldn’t it be better if everyone did?” Osmen asked from his rocker.

Scotch took a deep breath. Mad at Pomprey was one thing. Osmen was like her father and Xarius back in Rice River: respectable. “It wouldn’t. An apology doesn’t change anything. It’s just words.”

“I suppose it is only that,” Osmen said in a note of resignation, leaning back and closing his eyes. “Unless you make it more.”

Scotch shook her head and turned towards the exit, trotting out. It was impossible. One pony couldn’t apologize for the world. She’d once known a mare who had tried. She’d even wanted to be her, once upon a time. Then she got a taste of what that was like. No one could save the world. Nopony could apologize for millions of deaths. Not Blackjack. And definitely not her.

* * *

“You’re pensive,” the mare said as she stroked along Scotch’s spine. There were a lot of reasons to enjoy Lamia. Her circular Starkatteri stripes radiating out from her brow. Her citrine eyes. Her long mane. Her rump. Oh, her rump! The silk ribbons she wore emphasized every bit of carnality Scotch cared to look at. The fact she knew every erogenous zone on a pony’s body. Her bed in Heat was only big enough if two equines were really close, which really was the point. Mostly though, because she was a dream of something she wanted with someone else.

“Had a bad day,” Scotch murmured in the wet afterglow. “Better now.”

“Mmmm…” Lamia replied. The mare didn’t talk as much as Pythia did, and never about things like spirits or the future. Lamia was a mare of the present. The future didn’t matter and the past never brought up. She lived in a perpetual now. Scotch envied her that. Scotch’s mind was always torn between the two.

Scotch rolled onto her side and snuggled against the mare. Lamia didn’t smell like Pythia. Lamia was more cinnamon and cloves, not notecards and dusty cloak. “Lamia, would it matter if I said I was sorry for the megaspells? For the war?”

She arched a waxed brow. “It would be very silly, I suppose. It wouldn’t change anything.”

“Right,” Scotch said, sighing against her neck. “Still, I’m sorry for the war. And megaspells. And stuff.” Did it sound as stupid to the mare as it did to her? She knew Lamia was too professional to give an honest answer.

“I am not,” the mare replied. “The war was bad, and the megaspells terrible, but it was only because of them that I met you.” She leaned down and kissed Scotch’s brow, making her smile. Then she looked at the hourglass next to the headboard. “I’m afraid we’re almost out of time, unless you want some more.”

“Tempting…” Scotch groaned, but then stretched and rolled off the bed. She needed the bag. “Will you be dancing later?” she asked as she pulled on the firepony barding. “I love to watch you dance.” That and Scotch liked to imagine it was Pythia on the stage when she did.

“Tomorrow, perhaps,” Lamia said with a final parting kiss. Then Scotch stepped out. A zebra stallion sitting on a bench outside her room immediately rose in anticipation, as Scotch trotted out. She walked out into the foyer where a mare and stallion worked the poles as surrogate patterns, gyrating and swaying and stroking as provocatively as possible. She envied how happy they appeared.

Lamia might be an escape, but she wasn’t a release. For that, she needed the bag. She trotted back across the yard to their garage. Majina was doing her balancing and tumbling practice, rolling effortlessly forwards and back on milk cartons, alternating forehooves over hind hooves in tumbles that would have had Scotch banging her head on the floor in minutes. Pythia was nowhere to be seen, which was good. She didn’t know how much she knew about Lamia. It was impossible to know. Skylord was mid re-assembly.

“Precious,” Scotch said, the dragonfilly looking down from her dangling hammock of hoses. “Bag.”

Precious nodded and slipped out of the straps, dropping on to the Whiskey Express and walking over to the dangling canvas sack stuffed with sand, rags, and old hoses. The dragonfilly moved behind it, grabbing it in her claws and bracing her body against it.

And then Scotch proceeded to kick the everloving shit out of it! She did alternating kicks. Applebucks. Single leg bucks. Side kicks. But especially the full body kicks that threatened to take the bag clean off its dangling chain. Only Precious stabilizing the sack prevented her from hurting herself, keeping the bag in place.

When she was finished, what Lamia had done for her loins, the bag had done for the rest of her body. She was sweaty, sore, and too tired to think about what Osmen and the others had said. Apologize? To whom? For what? How, even? It was impossibly pointless.

“Thanks,” Scotch said to Precious as she caught her breath. Her lungs were trying to bore their way out of her chest. Good. It distracted her from the situation.

“Was Lammy wearing a cloak?” her friend asked with a smirk. Scotch snorted, kicking the bag one last time to vent her disapproval of the question, nearly breaking it right off its chain and into the smirking dragonpony’s face. Then she walked towards the door leading behind their little garage, with someone shouting something as she left.

Behind the garage, they’d arranged a shower that was essentially an elevated hose and garden nozzle over a concrete slab. Two sheets of metal gave the most privacy one could hope for. Scotch could hear the water going, guessing it was probably Majina after her own workout. “Hey Maj…” Scotch said as she stepped around the divider.

Spirits, she’s so beautiful…

Pythia’s face was turned up into the spray, the droplets flowing over her face and down her mane. The droplets ran along the elegant curve of her neck and her delicate shoulders. Along her sides, tracing the path of her ribs and spine. Down along her hips and over a haunch that could not be more mathematically pristine. Along her legs to depart from hooves that somehow looked as if she’d just gotten them polished. Her eyes came right back up along her belly and forelegs and finished at her face, which now was looking back at her with a yellow eye, the water seeming to trace along the circular stripes of her face.

Lamia was a distraction, a fabrication, an act of desperation, compared to this.

“Hey,” she said with a smile as she turned off the hose, falling to all fours.

“Hey,” Scotch said, her chest hollow, her heart hammering like a drum. She might as well have never gone to Lamia and saved her scrip. Pythia tossed a towel over herself like a cloak and trotted past. “Py,” she said, the young mare freezing mid step as she looked at Scotch. Ten thousand things boiled in her mind that she wanted to say. Sorry. I love you. I need you. I want you. “We’ll make it. I promise. I won’t give up.”

Pythia smiled and closed her eyes, gave a small, jerky nod, and continued back inside.

Scotch groaned, turned on the hose, and sat down hard on the wet concrete.

Poor pony…

“Shut it or I’ll take you out of my saddle bags and soak you,” she muttered.

You want her. Need her. Trust her…

She glared down at the bag.

Love her…

“I am going to shove you into the latrine. You might turn it all into an evil poop monster, but it’ll be worth it,” she growled down at it.

We loved her too.

Scotch frozen, tepid water dripping off her mane and into her eyes. She should just bury the damned thing. In concrete. Tossed into the ocean… But she was also tired. “What are you talking about?”

The many voices snickered in unison. Shall we show you? Shall we tell you who you’ve given your heart to?

Ignorance was the first defense. Knowledge the second. Knowing herself was the last. She was ignorant, but not enough to protect herself any. But she likewise couldn’t trust anything the book told her. It was evil. It was wrong.

“Why don’t you tell me who all of you are? Why did you think putting all your souls together in a blender was a good idea?” she asked back.

Her saddlebag started to vibrate, and she turned off the hose, sitting and pulling it free. The pages opened with a wet crunch paper should not make, flipping open to two apparently blank pages. Lines began to draw, images form, and as Scotch stared, she felt as though she were being drawn in. The lines, shapes, images resolved into black and white pictures. Color filled in as she found herself standing on a balcony overlooking a city.

The Hoof.

Not precisely the Hoof as she remembered it, but Black Pony Mountain loomed off to the east, the volcanic plug dark as she recalled. To the north lay the sea, filled with countless ships. West were the hills and mountains that would one day hold Canterlot. She could even see where 99 would someday be built, just to the south of Star Point. That was the limit of her familiarity…

All around her were zebras, walking and talking with great excitement. The air held the hum of expectation, like a festival. Some zebras wore elaborate silken robes, others heavy leather smocks. A few wore chains, carrying around loads behind a busy zebra. Scotch was standing on some sort of balcony on an immense tower. A tower so tall the air was chill and brisk… and yet it didn’t seem finished.
“Hey! You!” a stallion snapped at her, glowering in the way all authoritarians did. “Who are you? What are you doing just standing there?” His bronze armor gleamed in the sun as he glared.

“At ease, custodian!” a stallion called out as he trotted towards them. “My companion was simply pondering some imponderables. You know how it is!” He was a tall, lanky zebra, with crude lenses held in copper wire frames perched on the end of his muzzle.
“Of course, Stargazer. My apologies. I was merely being diligent!” the large stallion blurted at once. “I had no idea she was one of your own.”

“Yes yes! On your way now,” the stallion said with a dismissive wave of his hoof. When the ‘custodian’ trotted off he beamed a smile at her. “Morningstar! How wonderful for you to have finally arrived. I swear, things would be so much easier if we’d found the Fallen One back home. How was your trip?”

“I… don’t know?” Scotch asked as she looked around. “Are you the black book?”

“Black? Whatever do you mean?” he asked in bafflement.

“I just… what is this place?” Scotch asked as she gestured at the immense building around them.

“Ah, what indeed? The future? A testament to zebra wisdom and will? A monument of engineering? A dreadful eyesore? Yes, what is this place we’ve created? I see! I see! A most fascinating question! How to answer?” He trotted back and forth. “Literally, it is the Tower of Wisdom. Figuratively, it is the organization of our people into a monumental social alignment we hope to expand to all sentient species of Equus! Metaphorically, it’s a penis. I mean, all towers are, wouldn’t you say?” he said with a snicker.

“And you’re Stargazer?” she asked, not sure if this was some kind of elaborate ruse or not. She remembered the tunnel the book had made before. It had seemed normal enough too… till it wasn’t.

“And you’re Morningstar?” he asked in that smiling, slightly mocking tone before poking her shoulder. “Of course I’m Stargazer. Who else would I be? A custodian? A functunarium? A laborium? Are you sure you’re well after your trip? You should lie down! I’ll have them bring you a meal and some concubines for enjoyment!”

“No! No no no.” At the moment, that was the last thing she needed. “Just… start slow. Imagine I just teleported here from… somewhere else and I have no idea who you are or even who I am.”

“I see,” he said with a troubled frown. “Well, I’m Stargazer. I augured the great blizzard six years ago. Predicted the Yonjan quake last year. And you are… well… you are the Morningstar. One of the most critical minds of zebrakind. I must say this is all quite unusual… but it’s probably just some mental exercise geniuses engage in, eh?” he said with a grin and a wink.

“That other zebra didn’t seem that impressed with me,” Scotch said, glancing in the direction the armored zebra had departed.

“Pffft. Custodians. They’re muscle, not intellect. There’ve been issues with some of the laboriums protesting their role in the great work. Nothing that could threaten us in the tower, of course!” he added with a strained laugh.

“Mor-ning-star!” a mare gushed, heavy in body and draped in silk that emphasized all the wrong features. “I’m so glad you made it! It’s been ages, dearest! Simply ages!” She trotted right up and embraced Scotch, kissing both cheeks. “I’m so glad you finally decided to join us!”

“Morningstar’s performing a mental exercise, Dove. They’ve wiped their mind of all foreknowledge and are rebuilding from scratch,” Stargazer said with a slow nod of his head.

“I see! Brilliant minds work so oddly,” the mare demurred before she blurted. “Oh, but you’re missing it! Both of you! There’s a fight!”

“No!” Stargazer gasped, grinning in delight. “Who?”

“Come and see! Come and see!” she giggled, jiggling as she trotted back the way she came, towards the center of the tower. Scotch, having no clue what else to do, followed with Stargazer. What was the book’s game?

The mare led them into a vast central chamber with hundreds of seats arranged around the oval room. Two raised lecterns stood facing each other, and a pair of robed stallions occupied them Due to the egg-like shape, the voices were conveyed to the seats arranged around the pair, filled with dozens of zebras who were listening raptly to the discussion.

One of the pair was a healthy, fit, adult stallion with a scar down his sternum. He gazed defiantly, contemptuously, at his opposite: an elderly zebra with a long, wispy beard. “Our service to the Fallen One will be rewarded a thousand times over! The power such a being can grant for a token assistance makes such a sacrifice trivial! My life is an example of its magnanimous generosity, Ophidius!” his voice boomed.

“I have no doubt, Amadi, but there is assertion and there is proof. The Fallen One may have granted you empowerment, certainly, but is it any different from one over enamored with any spirit? I would not bind my soul with a spirit of stone if it meant I would never break a leg, even if such a thing would be quite a benefit to me in my age! Knowledge your pact has sadly robbed yourself of. For in that binding, what may be lost forever?”

“The resurrection of the Fallen One is the single greatest priority of zebra kind! Of all souls of Equus! We came here and here we found a fallen god! The process of its resurrection is clear, and the reward apparent. Why be subject to the feebleness of age or the misery of death if means of prevention are at hand?”

“We die and are born again from Equus. That is the way of things. Would you stop the joy of eating to end the discomfort of excretion? That is a poor exchange,” the old stallion said with a shake of his head.

“I would end the pain of famine! And if some of you wish to stuff your muzzles while others starve, so be it!” Amadi roared.

“Famine can be ended without the resurrection of a being we know next to nothing about. But to reverse said resurrection after it is restored may be far more difficult than the restoration itself,” the old zebra said with a thin smile. “Forgive me if I am skeptical of the promises of a dead being promising me unlimited power with no price attached.”

With that the old zebra stepped down. Amadi continued to shout insults, but the crowd broke as well, and his diatribe was lost in the sounds of dozens of conversations starting. Ophidius’s eyes met Scotch and he broke into a wide grin. “Ah, Morningstar. You finally arrived! I trust your trip was enjoyable?”

Scotch really didn’t know how to respond, and fortunately Stargazer came to her aid, “Revered Seer, Morningstar is undergoing a mental exercise, renewing their thoughts and connections.”

“Really. Is this an appropriate time?” Ophidius asked before giving a sigh and shrug. “Very well. Very well.” He cleared his throat. “Morningstar, it is a pleasure to make your acquaintance. I am the seer, Ophidius. I welcome you to our Tower of Wisdom. Your intellect is known far and wide to all Zebrakind, and it is our hope that you may solve our great dilemma.”

Everyone was staring at her expectantly and she gave a weak smile. “I suppose I can try, if you tell me more about your problem.”

Ophidius glanced at the others and started to speak, when Amadi shoved Dove aside. “Morningstar! Good! We’ve wasted too much time with dithering.” The powerful zebra stallion declared. “Tell these others I’m right so we can get started.”

“Started with what?” Scotch asked.

Amadi stared as she stared back, trying to image what kind of expression a ‘mental exorcising zebra’ might have. She settled on bored as she couldn’t imagine much else. “The genius is seeking fresh information anew, not to sift through old heaps of ideas,” Stargazer explained.

Amadi gave a soft tch. “We need to begin resurrecting the fallen star at once. Only then can it bestow its blessings upon all as it has me,” he said, touching the scar on his chest. “Surely you see the sense in this.”

Scotch stared at him, feeling a chill sensation creep down her spine. This was a memory, wasn’t it? “You’re talking about the Eater of Souls?”

Amadi rolled his eyes with a dismissive scoff. “Not you too. Where did the Zencori make up these ridiculous labels? The fallen star must be restored and returned to the heavens. Only then can Equus heal from its impact; and in doing so it has promised our people blessings beyond imagining.”

“Assertions with no evidence whatsoever, Amadi,” Ophidius countered. “I’ll return to the lectern if you like, but I’ve not been ‘blessed’ with supernatural vigor, and would like some time before another round.”

“Take all the time you need. Sooner or later, you’ll do the right thing, Ophidius. And I’ll continue the debate until you do,” Amadi said, giving Scotch a haughty stare before turning on hoof and trotting away.

“Ass,” Dove muttered as he departed. “He binds a spirit into his chest and thinks himself blessed.”

“Ass or not, people listen to him,” Ophidius replied with a weary sigh. “I’m always wary of someone determined to give me what they’re certain is best for me.”

Then a young mare slipped through the crowd, “Why not, father? You’re always happy to give others your advice, whether it’s wanted or not.” A mare the same age as Scotch stood next to him, giving him a nuzzle and a wry smile. “Especially if it’s not.”

Scotch stared at her and received a curious arch of her left brow. It didn’t help that she had a beauty that made Scotch’s heart skip a beat. “Morningstar. My daughter, Unukalhai. Quite possibly the one seer with greater acuity of the future than myself. Unu, the great philosopher Morningstar.”

“Charmed,” she replied, and gave a smile that broke and melted Scotch’s heart all at once. Then the colors drained, the shapes flattening into crude lines, and the lines retracted into the edges of the page. Scotch stared as the last thing she saw was Unu’s clever smile as it disappeared with the rest of the lines.

“Wait! Wait! What was that? Who was she?” Scotch asked as she beat on the pages. “Why’d you stop?”

She held up the book and shook it, as if expecting blood or monsters or Unu to drop from it and land before her. But the book, presented with a perfect opportunity to make a catty comment, lay limply in her grasp.

Then she became aware of a mare standing over her. Golden eyes and a placid, wry smile beamed down. “Scotch Tape,” Errukine murred softly down at her. “How nice to see you again.”

Author's Note

This was supposed to be published two months ago. Sorry. In other news, I'll be at BABScon this year. I hope to see folks there!

Thanks to everyone that's stuck with me and enjoy the story. Thanks to Kkat for creating FoE and thanks to my editors and everyone that's supported me on patreon and elsewhere. I hope that the next chapter will be more timely.