Fallout: Equestria - The Ranger of Seamane

“Time to put our hooves up and let our manes down!”

Everything fucking hurt.

Good, that meant I was still alive, thank the Sisters above. It felt good even as my body screamed at me.

I shifted to get up, feeling the rubble pressing against me while crazed, manic laughter escaped my lips. I was exhausted, sore, and feeling the after-effects of Rainboom.

Holy fuck that worked! Also, holy shit I need to never touch this shit again or I’m going to turn myself into a pastel splatter by accidentally running into a wall.

With a shove of my magic, I pushed the rubble off of me and took in my surroundings. Fortune had favored me slightly at least; despite going through a wall, I was at least indoors and out of the increasingly heavy rain.

I dusted myself off before inspecting my body for any serious wounds. Beyond some serious muscle strain, the effects of coming down from my fucking drug trip, and adding more bruises to my already thoroughly tenderized body I seemed to be alright.

Surprising considering the dent in the ground. I surmised that I must have slid, bounced, and then skipped right through a wall into the building.

With a moment of lucidity and having gathered my location, I attempted to use the walkie on my shoulder only to find it was busted. The impact must have damaged its internals and even a feeble attempt at a repair spell couldn’t get it working again. Thus, I decided to sit down and collect my thoughts.

As I sat watching the water flow north down the Willmanemette River, my Pipbuck continued to click away while the health alerts blipped out one at a time. It was odd seeing my injuries healing and updating in real-time but at least it seemed regeneration fueled by radiation was a thing now.

Well, that’s new. Then again, Crash had said it was a possibility and I hadn’t checked when I was doing my marathon.

With a flourish of magic, the various health warnings my Pipbuck were silenced. I didn’t need to be informed about what I already knew and besides most were certainly just from exertion and the Rainboom’s aftereffects.

One thing Sil had demanded was that I take a loaded flare gun with me. Against the siren call of just laying down and resting more, I pushed my head out the hole I had made and sent a flare skyward. Given how exhausted and sore I was there was no reason to push myself further today. The day was won, I was alive, and I had friends coming to pick me up. There was no reason to put myself at risk by moving an inch.

That and I was still feeling the tail end of the high from Rainboom. Frankly, it made me introspective about my perception of time as I sat there with my EFS off, my slowly relaxing breathing the only way to keep track of time. I almost didn’t feel myself starting to get cold as exposure began to get to me.

-=O=-

The sky had darkened.

Was it just the weather or had I fallen asleep?

Given that the rain was heavier than before it was likely just the weather worsening. I also didn’t have that feeling of discontinuity which generally came from unexpected naps, though the swiftness of the change suggested it has been at least a few minutes. Still, nothing was bothering me as I healed up and waited for my rescue party.

The sound of the gentle breeze and rain falling was rather relaxing and reminded me of home. It likely would be one of the few comforting things in the interior that would remind me of home. So did Sil, Winter, and Ocean but they weren’t the same as the smell, sights, and sounds of home, even if they did warm me with their presence.

That brought my thoughts back to Riptide who was also starting to do the same. Well okay, more than started but still not in the same way. Sure she made my heart flutter but she didn’t make every place we were in feel like home. Not yet at least and that was fine; with some time that would change.

I let out a sigh, my hot breath fogging in the cold air. Somehow that always made me smile a little.

This whole trip had been a clusterfuck, mostly from how little intel we had. Granted, Ocean was the senior in our group so technically it was her place to get all the relevant information for our trip and not me. When she shared what lay ahead of us it was pretty obvious nobody had taken this path in a long time. It was easy to understand why it was so out of date and threadbare; we had boats that made marching across the Seamane Range a pointless endeavor for us.

Well outside of that one bad year, which was where our most recent information came from.

Thank you, Mom.

Regardless, this whole trip ended up being one long exercise of frustration and on-the-fly planning. Which was probably part of why I was picked for this. Well, that and the obvious exposure to Riptide along with the risk that put the town in. At least now we had better information, newer maps, and hell I had a Pipbuck now.

What was interesting about the updated map was that a lot of rural communities had survived just like on the coast. That was of course until you neared a city, something we had seen on our march east. After Alsea, the green fell away to the necrotic undeath and scorched grey-black world of balefire targets.

With a shake of my mane, I pushed the thoughts away and sat back up, willing my EFS to turn back on. It had been about forty minutes and that worried me.

“Well I feel less dead at least,” I told myself. “Still, given the lack of anyone, even with the flare, I best get hunting for them. Good thing I have this revolver.”

I fished out one of the precious few spare rounds for said revolver and got myself back up to five shots with it.

“Comical how big these rounds are that I only get five shots.” I laughed softly. “If five .454 rounds can’t kill something then I need something other than ballistics to do it.”

Scanning around with EFS, I noted a lack of bars denoting life around me which was mildly worrying.

“Okay, that’s enough resting on my rump. It’s time to take a trot.” I muttered as I stepped out into the rain.

A glance skyward revealed that my flare was long gone, which might have been the issue. With the weather the way it was, it might not have even lasted the thirty seconds it was advertised to.

Slowly backtracking along my path, I soon found swathes of destruction; the mines had all gone off and I could see more than a few spots where rockets had been used. It was evident what had happened with the others on my wild run out of town. The surrounding buildings lacked any fresh damage so thankfully the Hydra had ignored them.

It was a small blessing it had such a singular mind, which is frankly hilarious given it had twenty-three brains. Whatever made hydras did not do them any favors beyond that regeneration.

A short coughing spree cleared more of the ash that had gotten into my lungs today. After all, I had experienced today, I concluded that I really should’ve had someone else run from the Hydra; someone who had been smarter than me and worn a mask all day.

Too late for regrets now. Whatever, I seem fine besides a little shortness of breath now and again. Given I’m hacking this gunk up and can just loaf near some radiation to heal I don’t have much to worry about.

A red bar appeared in my vision.

Of course, I had to think that.

Taking a moment to spot the supposed threat, I soon saw a bloatsprite bob into view. With a hiss, I slung a weak bolt of ice at it, freezing the monstrous insect mid-flight. It clunked to the ground and I trotted over to stomp on it hard, shattering it into pieces. I doubted it could even still be alive encased in all that ice but I didn’t want it to thaw out somehow and send its parasitic young at me.

Okay yeah, nature is just fucked thanks to the last day. Like seriously, the actual fuck is with half of the crap out here.

Pushing aside my mental grumbling, I focused on the long road back to safety; the pouring rain chilling me and the wind cutting through my damp coat.

This had to be the third most miserable shower I have had in my life, which oddly enough cheered me up a bit. Unfortunately, the intrusive thought about worse showers left me a bit depressed given it involved Winter in a way that felt rather awkward to think about now.

Well, this is where making new memories comes into play. Guess I need to get the girls into a shower stall and make some fresh memories to be fond of.

I paused for a second and shook my head. Okay, maybe I should just deal with my issues so I can think back on that stuff with Winter in a fond manner instead of longing, painful desire.

The one downside to having to strip down for this run was that what barding I still had was rather useless against the weather. Frankly, taking a second look at it, it was likely a mix of pre-war fetish gear and... well actually no it was just fetish gear; the detachable hoop was for holding the wearer aloft and it was pretty obvious given it wasn’t in a color meant to blend into anyone’s coat.

I think I’m keeping this harness. I don’t know if I’ll ever use it as intended but at the very least I can hook armor pieces onto it. It also does kinda ride up pleasingly.

I felt the warmth of a blush on my cheeks as I stopped in the street, moving in certain ways to better feel how the harness squeezed on me now that I wasn’t entirely focused on blowing up a hydra.

Yeah, even if I don’t wear this for fighting, this is… arousing.

“Moony?” I heard Sil call out suddenly, her voice making my heart jump.

Looking around I saw a non-hostile bar in my EFS. I immediately started cantering off towards it, splashing puddles as I went. I didn’t care about getting wetter, I functionally couldn’t anyway because of the rain.

“Sil!” I called back.

“Moony!” Sil responded the passive bar in my vision splitting as I drew closer.

Rounding the corner I saw Riptide, Sil, and two of the raiders who had come with us.

Quickly both of my mares tackle hugged me to the ground, leaving all three of us a bit sore and more than a little dirty. Worth it.

“That is the last time you run off on your own with a bomb on your butt.” Riptide teasingly scolded me.

“If it can be the last time, I wouldn’t mind. That sucked.” I snorted.

“I see you didn’t lose the gun or harness,” Sil commented while giving me a boop, which I smooched.

“Nope! Also, can we keep the harness?” I asked her.

The two stared at me and then shared a look before I was suddenly deposited unevenly across both of their backs.

“I’ll take that as an enthusiastic yes.” I laughed.

“Yes, now we just need to get back to town.” Sil giggled in response. “Also did you use your flare gun?”

“Yep, once I woke up I leaned out the hole I made and fired it up,” I answered. “It should have cleared the skyline but it might have fallen pretty quickly after because of the weather.”

“Damn, I was afraid of that when the weather started turning on us.” Sil grumped.

“Well next time she goes off on her own we just give her more flares,” Riptide said.

“I am amused that you two still think there is a next time for me to go off on my own.” I giggled. “I'd rather stick glued to your flanks.”

“Well, that’s what you’re doing until it’s time to get out of town.” Sil teased before whispering in my ear. “Yes, in that way, and yes, in that harness.”

That made me feel warmer than I had for the past hour.

“She’s getting a little toasty,” Riptide commented.

“She is,” Sil said. “We should have her checked up regardless. Then we can get some food.”

“And then?” I asked.

“And then you’re not leaving our room, possibly not even our bed.” She answered.

“Mmm, not our room, we should wash her,” Riptide added.

“Good point, she’s probably coated in asbestos again.” Sil gagged.

I had cleaned up before that, damn it.

“Regardless, someone should probably let the others know that you two found me.” I pointed out.

“To all teams, we’ve found Moonlight. Return to town, Over.” One of our escorts said in turn, giving me a cheeky grin. I recognized him as the one to call me Mistress after siding with me.

“Thank you,” I replied, giving a polite nod.

“Of course, we’ll keep an eye out for anything dangerous, wouldn’t want you three to lose the mood.” He chuckled, his partner joining him. “Oh, your other friends have also returned and want you to go by the clinic.”

It was a good time for some humor, frankly. Things were looking good right now and we needed to reap our reward and rest up, enjoy our victory. A check-up couldn’t hurt either.

-=O=-

When we entered Crash Cart’s Clinic we were met with an odd sight. Winter and Ocean were already there and looked a little worse for wear but what was more worrying was the anxiety-inducing copy of me lying unconscious on a bed, riddled with visible bullet wounds.

“Okay, the fuck?” I exclaimed. Winter flinched and I heard his bit click as he bit down, though thankfully his gun didn't fire. “Okay, calm down Winter, I’ve gotten perforated enough today.”

I heard Riptide quietly say, “I swear she was going to say penetrated.”

Sil replied just as quietly. “I think she thought through what she was going to say, for once.”

I gave the two a quick glare before turning just in time to have an Ocean tackle me to the ground.

“OCEAN, CAN YOU PLEASE STOP TRYING TO KILL ME?!” I shouted as something popped in my back.

Strange, that feels a lot better now. I’ll need to thank her for that.

Of course once that thought concluded my mind was immediately overwhelmed with screaming in pain as Ocean applied her knowledge of applying pressure to points of pain on me.

“Let her go or I’ll kick your head off.” Riptide hissed.

“We need to make sure she's a pony.” Ocean hissed in return.

That’s when I felt a slice along my flank and warm wetness trickled down my leg.

“That good enough?” Sil snapped.

At this point, Cart had arrived having heard the commotion. “Let her up, damn it.”

A few minutes later a still shaken Winter and Ocean left us, telling us to meet them in the diner later. Riptide and Sil were reasonably annoyed despite their apologies after the fact.

“I’m tempted to just skip meeting them and go to our room,” Sil grumbled. “Have someone deliver us a banquet and call it a day.”

Cart sighed as he finished treating the cut. “They’re on edge. That thing they encountered has everyone on edge.”

I stared at the copy of myself. The longer I stared the more faults I could see in it; it was like a pony made out of bark but with enough features to reasonably fool someone from a distance.

“You know.” I mused. “They say copying is the highest form of flattery but frankly I just wanna torch that thing.”

“And I would let you do it if not for the stories we’ve had over the decades about something like this,” Cart replied, glaring at the facsimile of me. “Turns out our ex-raider friends have stories about them as well; Leshy I think they called it, some sort of animated wood golem thing.”

The name didn’t ring any bells but my mind went to whispered tales of changelings as I trotted up to the supposed corpse. “Frankly, I don’t give a fuck what it’s called. Did it hurt my friends?”

Cart cleared his throat with a cough sensing my aim. “It hurt Winter, started hugging him to death.”

I looked back into my facsimile’s eyes. Up close up I could see just how disquieting it was; the eyelids were fake and couldn’t move, the eyes themselves akin to something between tree bark and that of an insect’s eye. Whatever this was, it wasn't mammalian.

Pulling back the blanket I saw three holes that went clean through it, which answered how it was disposed of. The damage to the creature was what I’d expect to see on a tree trunk from the rounds Ocean’s guns used.

“Right, do you think it’s dead?” I asked, probing the holes with my magic.

I was unnerved by its strange interior; it was filled with roots, moss, and sap as if it was a hollow log except that the flesh had layers to it like rings of a tree.

“As far as I can tell, yes.” Cart assured me. “While I’m no botanist it has failed to move since. I intend to ship it to the University in Dockland. They’re more experienced with the weird life that has come to call Equestria home.”

“Bind it as best you can in whatever box you stuff this thing in,” I instructed him. “Don’t let Winter know.”

“I hadn’t planned on telling him.” He agreed before adding. “As it is, I hope leaving it in darkness will cause it to cease to grow again. I also really hope this was the only one.”

In my short lifetime, I have learned a few things and one of them was that there was never just one.

“Thank you.” I nodded gratefully. “Now can I bother you for a quick checkup before we head off to get some R&R?”

“Oh certainly! I feel you deserve plenty of R&R after the time you’ve spent here in Four Corners.” He chuckled while pushing his portable terminal next to me. “Now, let me just plug into your Pipbuck before we start.”

-=O=-

I got as clean a bill of health as I could get. A dose of painkillers, some irradiated water, and doctor’s orders to get a few days of bed rest were all I needed. This worked out well since the rest of the caravan needed a couple more days to get up to full strength anyway.

I now regenerated from radiation too, go figure. It was the main reason my crash hadn’t been fatal, just painful. The downside was another notch to add to the niggling bit of self-doubt of being less pony than I was when I left home, the doubts and fears about losing myself compounding over time.

Of course, those doubts and fears were hard to keep in mind with Sil and Riptide around, more so with how news of my biological changes meant nothing to them. Well, beyond Riptide wanting to drag me out into the water because both of us would be okay in it, though I wasn’t keen on trying swimming out; it was fall and cold water was pretty dangerous after all.

In due time, the three of us reached the diner that sat at the street level of our hotel. I was half surprised to see a party in full swing but I remembered we had just bought the town a long extension on its life so a party was warranted.

Winter and Ocean were sulking quietly in a corner booth when I spotted them. Chewing on going up to them, I instead directed Sil and Riptide to join them first so I could get us some food and drink.

“Sure, you know what we want, so we’ll see you in a bit,” Sil replied.

“And I bet more than a few folks wanna give you their thanks in person,” Riptide added.

Sliding through the crowd with skills honed from weaving through the bustling market level of Saint Clover, I made my way to the bar itself. While I wasn’t in the mood for celebratory revelry, I did oblige a few ponies with various toasts to both my health and success as well as the town and its new residents.

Thankfully toasting wasn’t ever heavy on the alcohol, though I did end up with more than a few sample shots of what they had on tap. The upside was I now knew what I was ordering for myself: something hard, harder than my usual taste of cider.

I had a desire to get drunk and wallow, which nagged at me because it was frustrating to want to get plastered out of frustration and depression on the heels of victory.

Oh well. Sometimes the events of life and the mood you get put into don’t line up.

The moment of self-loathing out of the way, I turned to the bartender, ordered our meals, and bought two bottles of Wild Pegasus. I figured I wasn’t the only one who would be wanting a drink after this weird day.

With the bottles and glasses in my magic, I trotted to the rest, keeping the drinks and glass well above my head to keep them from getting bumped by accident; something that had, annoyingly, happened more than once to me. It always sucked to buy something and then a few moments later have it break because of someone else’s carelessness.

Today I wasn’t going to let that happen. Halfway back I bumped into the waiter who had just added to the food my friends had ordered and was trotting away from the corner table. I knew I needed to eat, even if nothing sounded particularly tasty to me. Noodles, potstickers, spring rolls? I’ll take them. Sure they didn’t mix with whiskey but I kinda didn’t care.

I honestly disliked that I didn’t care. It made a small part of me burn with frustration.

Joining my friends at the corner table, Sil and Riptide had me sit between them. While I welcomed having the two next to me I also recognized it was a way of trying to stay between me and everyone else. Especially Ocean.

Riptide for her part had just chugged one of the two bottles of whiskey without coming up for air, though it was probably cheating with how her gills were moving. Regardless, she was very quickly getting very drunk and I couldn’t blame her.

Ocean and Winter? They split the other bottle and downed it three times slower than Riptide did, so I knew at the very least they tasted it.

Sil on the other hoof was staying sober.

When the waiter returned, I decided to order some apple moonshine. I wasn’t mentally prepared to stay sober tonight. As for food, well it was irradiated and for two out of the five of us, that wasn’t an issue. Just the fact that I wasn’t the only one to worry about the low-level rads from food and drink made me feel less wrong in my own skin.

Regardless, the five of us took our time eating quietly as the revelry continued around us. In a way, it was nice to have the cheer and happiness around us while we were in less-than-stellar moods.

When the white noise of party chatter died down, I heard a voice crackle to life over an old PA system; the same system that had, until now, been playing music since we had entered the diner.

The voice of a well-trained stallion began to flow. “And now for the news! First, we’re going to start with our friends out by Dockland. For those of you who don’t know, that's the west coast!” He explained. His energy was infectious, to say the least, and a low hum of chatter started amongst the party-goers. “So many of you out west along the Five know about that nasty old Hydra that’s been waddlin’ about the ruins of The Mill. Well, good news for those who don’t live in the immediate area! Someone finally had the guts to take it out, and what a show it was from the reports I’m getting!”

I could feel eyes turning towards us. It was no secret what we had done.

“I have to say, to the mare who served as bait for the Hydra, you’re one crazy mare!” The DJ laughed. “Still, you had a plan and, given you didn’t die from it, congratulations are in order!”

“Now that the Hydra is dealt with, trade along the Five can get back to normal.” The DJ went on. “Of course, our intrepid mare wasn’t satisfied with just that. She also put down one hell of a raider warlord just before hoof too!”

Well, that much was true; That stallion had been a brick wall of brutality and a worrying amount of cunning to boot.

“So my hat is off to you, Ranger of Seamane! To you and your friends.” He cheered. “Also, bonus points for carrying that big iron on you.”

I was rather confused as to how he knew about that detail.

“And that’s our news for the day. This DJ needs his shut-eye but, before I leave, in honor of our new Ranger here’s Big Iron by-”

I didn’t hear the rest as my attention was pulled into a rather lovely kiss from Riptide.

I forgot her un-Equine nature at times and right now I was being reminded of how weirdly flexible her tongue was. And how sharp her teeth were. Both were making me want to make excuses to leave for the bedroom.

“Well, damn, she beat me to it.” Sil huffed, clearly teasing.

“Well hot damn, she got herself a title.” Winter snorted.

“Ranger of Seamane. Fitting.” Ocean snickered.

Riptide came up for air, or rather she let me get some air.

As I hacked and gasped for air, Riptide just gently petted my mane. “Well, she did a lot of hard and dangerous legwork for the victory today.”

“I mean she did run away from a hydra with a bomb on her flank.” Sil nodded before taking her turn at stealing my breath.

I didn’t resist the smooching. It was making me feel more alive than all this hero talk.

“Plus the raiders she dealt with,” Winter added.

“And the three of you raided that Steel Ranger bunker, that helped a fair bit.” Ocean nodded.

“To be fair, that was Sil’s idea and mostly her work.” Riptide giggled.

Sil broke the kiss to let us breathe but, as I was about to speak, both Riptide and Sil started making out on my lap. I could feel my cheeks burning hot and yet also made me feel better about our situation; that they loved one another as well made me feel far less stressed out about the whole relationship thing.

Regaining some composure and breaking out of the display of affection, I addressed my non-smooching friends while petting the manes of my two lovers. “It was also your work that prevented me from becoming Hydra Food so thank you. Both of you.”

“It was nice that you let us help. I didn’t want to have to knock you out.” Ocean replied. “And… sorry about trying to do so earlier.”

“It’s okay. Well okay, not really but you know what I mean.” I admitted. “Can you walk me through what happened?”

“Sure,” Ocean replied, then took a deep breath. “We were looking for you in one of the few points we thought you might be due to how unreliable the flare was. While searching a building in the area, that thing trotted on in and quickly took to hugging Winter. I guess he was affected by it somehow because he didn’t think there was anything amiss.”

“Sounds akin to mind manipulation magic,” I muttered, my mind going to how we met Riptide.

“That was my thought as well but even knowing that I still had a hard time dragging myself out of some kind of paralysis.” Ocean went on. “It was only after I heard Winter start crying out in pain that I shook it off. Even then it was difficult because until we killed it, it perfectly copied you, cries of distress and all. Once the rounds punched through? Not so much.”

That was worrying but at least this confirmed it was very dead, given the illusion broke once it took two body shots. “Well great, now we need to worry about copycats.”

Winter shook his head. “From what we gathered it’s not common, or at least it only goes after isolated targets. It must have not known Ocean was in the other room or it would not have attacked.”

With that nugget of information, I had more to work on. “For now, stick in pairs at minimum, regardless of the situation. That should help prevent this from happening again. Also, we’ll start with verbal or sign greetings. Thus, if any of us aren’t communicative it’s a good idea to knock that person out.”

Ocean nodded in agreement. “Yeah, that’s what I was going to suggest.”

I sat back in relief just as Riptide and Sil ended their makeout session, both of them deciding to press against me. I quirked an eyebrow. “You two alright or should we?”

“Let’s retire for the night.” Riptide cooed. “As fun as this party is, I think it would be nice to go relax.”

“Agreed,” Sil replied in the same tone.

“Looks like you got your hooves full.” Winter snorted. “We’ll see you in the morning.”

“Don’t get jealous, hun, you’re going to have your hooves full in a minute as well.” Ocean teased.

“Just keep one ear open.” I snorted. “Come on you two, we’ll finish our dinner upstairs.”

Levitating our share of food above me, the three of us parted ways with Ocean and Winter. A quick chat with a server and we got our new room number and key. Given the whole affair with the Vipers a few days ago, I figured we were likely set up somewhere closer to the ground in case we had to bail out.

The trip to our room told me just how drunk Riptide was as she had to lean on me to even walk straight. That wouldn’t be much of an issue if it didn’t also let Sil stay a few paces ahead of us, flicking her tail teasingly as if I needed any more of an invitation.

Thankfully it didn’t take long to get to our room and, upon reaching it, Sil helped Riptide in as I set our food down on a small table. They didn’t even wait for me to finish removing their barding with my magic before I was dragged into bed, both frequently reminding me of the original purpose of my ‘barding’ with little tugs to the harness.

Those tugs reminded me that all I had for barding was something more at home in the bedroom than wandering the soon-to-be wintry wastes. While it did keep me warm from sheer embarrassment, it really wouldn’t keep the wind out. If anything it helped keep things nice and close to me, which was currently Riptide’s muzzle on my flank.

-=O=-

I awoke sometime later, entangled with Sil and Riptide. It had been a fun evening but right now my head was hurting. Hangovers sucked but at least I knew a few things to help them pass, though I lacked any kind of juice or bacon at the moment. Water and something cool to press against my head would have to do. As such, I used my magic to hold the two mares in place while I extracted myself from their loving embrace, replacing the gap with a few pillows for the time being.

Upon entering the bathroom I softly shut the door behind me, letting the green, magical light of my horn be the only source of illumination. Only once the door was latched did I turn on the overhead light and stare into the mirror. I looked... okay. Tired as can be expected.

My once gently curving, spiraled horn now resembled a sharply curved spire, lacking in any spirals. I gently traced a hoof along with it and sadly felt no minute details left off the old spirals.

With a shake of my head, I turned my attention back to the hangover. Opening the tap, I began to drink greedily from the cold water, radiation warnings blinking red in my vision as I did. Not that it mattered, I had accepted the mutation by now. Thinking about it once more, I probably could just remove any negative effects from chems and alcohol by ingesting enough radiation.

This left me feeling a bit off at the thought that I had a method to bypass paying the price for fun times. It also made me realize why ghouls never really cared for chems; given how they regenerated from radiation, they probably did the same for the ‘damage’ from the ‘poison’ of chems.

Even caffeine, which made me realize just how shit being a ghoul was. You probably had to ingest so much more to feel anything.

I shook my head again and focused on just treating myself.

With a stomach full of irradiated water, that likely required boiling for safe drinking, I sat down against the tub and turned the light out. In the darkness, with the chill of the water radiating through my core and my head against the cool ceramic, I finally felt some relief start to kick in.

-=O=-

The sound of the door unlatching woke me, my instincts kicking in and I scrambled to defend myself. Then I saw Sil’s brown muzzle in the muted glow of my horn light and relaxed, letting my magic flow to brighten the room for her.

“That’s where you went. Is everything okay?” She asked, slowly approaching me.

A glance at the Pipbuck clock showed that it had been around four hours since we had come up here, and another two since I slipped into the bathroom to tend to my hangover.

“Just came in here to get some relief from my hangover,” I admitted.

“So no existential dread, philosophical suffering, or other similar things?” She asked, stepping in to gently brush my mane.

Before I answered her, I shut the door to keep our conversation a bit more muted. “I mean there is a part of me that questions who I am when I look in the mirror now.”

Sil nodded then laid down against me, letting me hold her tight. “It’s not just the curved horn is it?”

“That’s the tip of the iceberg as they say.” I sighed.

“Accidental or intentional pun?”

I wanted to facehoof when she pointed the pun out. “Accidental.” I groaned. “But yeah, the mutation, the horn, the new scars.”

“Feeling like you’re losing yourself?” She asked, giving my chest a nuzzle.

“Yeah, something like that. I still see part of myself in the mirror but my mind keeps focusing on the new things, the changes the world is doing to me.”

Sil just held me as I did the same. There wasn’t much to say but just the act of confessing my discontent was enough for me.

“Just remember, you will continue to be you.” She whispered finally. “You’ll be you until you choose to stop caring.”

She was right. I wasn’t the filly running around the belly of Saint Clover having kicked the head of the Guard in the nuts anymore, nor was I the guard pony protecting our home. I was out here with her, Riptide, Winter, and Ocean. Who I was, what I was, wasn't some static thing. It was what I brought with me and caring about what I brought with me.

“Well one thing has always been true, I care about you,” I said as I nuzzled her neck. “And I always have. Maybe not in the way I do now but you’ve always been there for me and I will always be here for you.”

Sil hugged me tighter as we lay there in the mercifully quiet darkness.

-=O=-

Morning arrived, as the good morning alarm from my Pipbuck Zero annoyingly reminded me. The darkness of the bathroom made it near impossible to tell what time of day it was without the damn piece of arcanotech. When I opened my eyes, I saw a cartoonish image of a pony that looked weirdly like myself stretching and being cheerful.

It annoyed me for some reason how the clock now showed the relative positions of the sun and moon for the time of day. How the fuck it knew that I would never know. It even had the lunar phase denoted. Not that I had a way to check that given the cloud cover.

Riptide suddenly opened the door, blinking in confusion at Sil and I snuggling on the cool tile floor, my head firmly pinned between Sil’s and the side of the tub.

“That’s where you two went off to.” She yawned. “Get in the tub.”

Sil was still half asleep as I dragged her and myself into the oversized tub, which was more on par with a hot tub.

“Huh, what’s going on-” Sil started to ask but was interrupted by me kissing her as Riptide filled the tub.

“We’re going to get clean now,” Riptide explained. “Well, okay clean is secondary. Let’s just relax first before then.”

The toothy grin Riptide gave us made me question ever letting her between my legs but the way it was making me feel made me question what I found attractive. Regardless, we had a few hours if not days to relax, which we desperately needed.

And ‘relax’ we did. Thank the Sisters that the town was more than happy to keep us well-fed while we waited for the rest of our caravan to be ready to head out again.

“So, time for another round?” Sil cooed as she rested sandwiched between Riptide and myself.

Riptide grinned at me again and I lit my horn, making both of them moan. Riptide’s horn glowed with her golden magic in response, leading to yet another round of our favorite activity: making one another feel good.

Stars above, I love magic.