Neighfair Military Base
Dusk

Twelve hours; that’s how long I was in that storage hangar pouring over that vertibuck. Scraping preservatives out of tight spaces, checking electrical systems, shocking myself on said electrical systems, getting my mane caught in the same tight spaces I was trying to clean out…

Long story short, I’ve been making myself miserable. A night’s sleep in the cockpit of the vertibuck didn’t do me any good, especially while covered in grease and dirt. So here I am, wandering the halls of the base looking for working showers so I can get all this crap out of my fur and mane.

Yet all I found were Division troops wandering around the base getting power back in working order, fixing leaking pipes, clearing trash, and burying the long-dead former residents of the base. In that way I found myself down at the river by the main entrance to the base attempting to exorcise the filth from my body, my boots, barding and associated undershirt laid out on the concrete wall at the head of the beach while I was up to my neck in the lukewarm waters of the Chicacolt River.

“Too bad I don’t have some decent soap…” I muttered, distracting myself with the tedious task of trying to drag the grime out from under my fingernails. The less than stellar ‘soap’ in this instance was filled in role by a piece of steel wool that I had pilfered from a toolbox in the hangar.

After another few minutes of helpless scrubbing I decided abandoning the feeble attempt at grease removal was the only logical recourse if I wanted to have any fingernails left. Dragging myself out of the river I cast a quick spell over myself and my pants, a simple heating spell that I learned as a child, to dry the water that clung to my fur and garments. “Lovely morning, isn’t it?”

I glanced up at the head of the damaged pier and caught the glare of Kovac, the Stallion technically in charge of this whole operation. “It would be better with working showers.” I retorted.

“I know the feeling.” He called down. “Now get dressed, we got a general staff meeting in twenty minutes and I want you there.”

“Alright, I’ll put on the Sunday’s best!” I called back as I pulled on the undershirt. After a few minutes fighting with my barding, I managed to strap on the shoulder pads and abandoned forgot about getting on the other pieces, instead tucking them under my left arm as I clambered up the slope from the river back to the main entrance. As I walked into the main entryway I tossed the unused barding into the pile of equipment that Gramps had been developing the prior evening. With nothing to stop me I simply rolled up the sleeves of the undershirt as I made my way through the halls of Neighfair’s outer ring.

After a few minutes of walking though the dull and repetitive hallway I came across a set of stairs with a hatch at the top; the control room. The hatch had been left open by whoever had gone through last and the discordant sounds of ponies arguing spilled out and became more audible as I got closer to the top.

“-is madness!” I heard Jericho yell as I finally made it into the control room. “We’ve all seen the reports-”

“What reports?” I asked. “Because unless I missed something I did get an invite to this little tea party.”

I saw Kovac tap a few buttons on a computer terminal before a large map of the Chicacolt area appeared on the main monitor. “We just discussing-”

“-Assuming you can call it that.” Jericho interjected.

“Right… Look, we were going over some reports that came in this morning from a recon flight.” Kovac punched a few more keys and a number of red dots appeared on the map, many of them at the mouth of the Chicacolt river, with a number of others lining the shore about five miles away from Filly’s Pier. “Overnight a large number of raiders positioned themselves on the riverbank, and they seem to have brought friends.” Kovac’s fingertips flew over the keypad once more and the map was replaced with a large picture of the mouth of the river, centered around a flotilla of boats. “Somehow within the last forty eight hours the raiders that called Filly’s Pier home gathered some friends and more weapons, centered around the large ship in that picture.”

“It’s an old cruiser, assuming one could call it that.” Jericho added. “The configuration matches known files for one HMS Chicacolt, an old protected cruiser that was retired to the breaker yards about ten years before the Last Day. It was a one off, obsolete even when it was built. According to what records we have in our archives it looks like she was built primarily for coastal patrol and gunfire support on lightly-defended beaches.”

“And somehow it’s still in one piece after two hundred ten some odd years in a ship-breaking yard, assuming it didn’t get pulled out immediately after the Last Day.” Kovac finished. “Now she’s at the mouth of the Chicacolt river with a small flotilla of old tugboats, fishing vessels and barges. All appear to have been weaponized to some extent with machine guns, belt-fed grenade launchers, mortar tubes, and a handful appear to have been mounted with howitzers and boarding ramps for beach landings. Long story short, it looks like they want the fortress.”

“It’s one hell of a prize…” I muttered. “How many of those raiders are on the ground?”

“Maybe one hundred on the riverbank, about four hundred spread among those ships.” Jericho said. “Minus the combat losses we took at the pier, and we’re at two hundred fourty combat-ready personnel.”

“We’re outnumbered, although we hold a better position.” Kovac pointed out. “Our objective needs to be to strengthen our position further. Dusk, I believe you found a sizable number of field pieces in that hangar you’ve been living in?”

“Artillery? Absolutely.” I retorted. “But those things are full of grease, same deal with the other weapons in the hangar. We need to clean all of them out before we can use them.”

“Figures…” Kovac mumbled. “Juno, get whatever engineers that you can spare on it. I want as many of those guns combat-ready as possible.”

“Alright, I’ll get right on it.” The mare said, immediately as she ducked down the hatch and left the control room with one less inhabitant.

“Now does anyone else have ideas?” Kovac asked.

“We need to buy us some time, that much is clear.” Jerico pointed out. “Anyone got ideas?”

The room went silent as all eyes turned to the map, my own included. “We need a diversion.” I finally muttered. “Something to get all of them to go to one place and stay there for an extended period of time.”

“You’re right Dusk.” Said Kovac. “And I think you just volunteered for a little field trip…”

***

Banks of the Chicacolt River, Two Hours Later
Four Miles from Filly’s Pier
Dusk

“Neighfair to Alpha Team, status report?”

I glanced over at Steeljack and Dart before I sighed. “Alpha Team here, we’re in position.” Our position, understandably, was the upper level of an abandoned office building, not far from the Raider’s camp. All three of us were crouched by a broken pane-glass window that overlooked the riverbank, from where we could see the glint of sun off of the metal hull of the ships farther up the river, and the smoke of campfires from the camp drifting lazily through the air.

“Copy that, stand by. We’re going to drive some of those raiders your way.”

“And they don’t tell us how they plan to do it…” Dart groaned.

“Doesn’t matter.” Steeljack said curtly as he slid a clip into his rifle. “I got a group headed our way along the riverbank.”

I ducked around the edge of the window as if acting on reflex. “You think they saw us?” The sounds of breaking glass of windows on the floor below us was all the answer I needed.

“What do you think?” Steeljack droned.

“I get a feeling that you didn’t know we were bait.” Dart pointed out.

“We were just supposed to tell Kovac how the distraction, whatever it was, was working.” I retorted. “Judging by those raiders horrible aim, I’d say we’re supposed to be the distraction.”

“That’s not very reassuring.” I heard Steeljack mutter.

“Then we’re in agreement.” I said. “Neighfair this is Dusk. What are we doing here, just giving those raiders targets?”

“What raiders? There shouldn’t be any near your watch point.”

“Tell that to the ones shooting at us!” I snapped. “Steeljack, can you get a good look at em’?”

My grey furred companion tried to get a look out around the wall, but the sounds of lead striking the concrete and steel of the wall offered the excellent suggestion to duck back behind the wall. “You want a brief and witty observation or a full report? Because I don’t see either happening right now.”

I could only roll my eyes at Steeljack’s snarky rebuttal. “Can you at least tell how many are down there?”

Steeljack offered but a slight shrug. “Three, maybe four, hunkered down at the edge of the river. Maybe a few more wandering around, can’t really tell from right here.”

“Well that’s better than nothing.”

But that statement didn’t hold; the door behind us by ponies that we hadn’t yet seen and a small black cylinder was tossed into the room.”Flash-”

BANG!

The flash of light that accompanied the small grenade’s cannon-like report caused me to stumble, enough so that I landed on my ass in a pile of old ceiling tiles. “SINCE WHEN TO RAIDERS USE FLASHBANGS?” I screamed over the ringing in my ears.

“WHAT?” Dart hollered.

That’s when I had a sudden tingling sensation in my ears, and the ringing stopped. “Can all of you just shut up?” Another mare yelled from across the room. “See, I told you guys that they aren’t Hellraisers.”

“Of course we’re not Hellraisers!” I spat as I wiped some of the dirt from my eyes. “And judging by the fact that we’re not all dead I can assume that you’re not with those raiders up the river.”

“Wait, you’re telling us that the battleship-”

“It’s a cruiser.” I interjected.

“Whatever!” The mare spat. “You’re saying that raiders brought that thing here?”

“Is there an echo in here or something?” I quipped. “Yes, those ships are controlled by raiders. Same deal with the camp up the river.” As I studied the mare I began to recognize what they were wearing; older riot gear, leather-covered plates of metal patching missing chunks, all topped off with worn out tan dusters.

“You’re all Desert Rangers, aren’t you?” Steeljack asked, apparently having come to a similar conclusion.

“What do ya know, they recognize us!” The mare exclaimed.

“How do they know who we are?” One of the masked stallions asked, throwing the mare’s I’m-The-Greatest moment right to a fiery doom.

I shifted around, trying to find footing, but stopped when two of the remaining stallions pointed their guns right at my face. “Does the name Cosmo mean anything?” I asked.

“Cosmo…” The mare muttered. “All of you, lower your weapons!” She shouted, shoving her way forward and dragging me to my feet. “How do you know that name?”

“He’s a friend.” Steeljack said as he managed to force himself between myself and the mare. “We can talk about it more later, but right now I need your name.”

“My name?” She asked.

I rolled my eyes, my thoughts turning back to the echo comment from a few moments ago. “Yes, your name. I’m Dusk-”

“Well that’s convenient…” She muttered.

“Why’s that?”

“We were sent to deliver you a bunch of pre-war and immediate post-war military files.” The mare retorted. “Some real old stallion with more caps than I’ve ever seen showed up at our camp, gave us the files and all the caps with the sole condition that we deliver them to the ponies in the old base at Neighfair. Said you were with them.”

I glanced over at Steeljack who reflected my concerned expression before returning my attention to the mare. “How long ago did you meet this stallion?”

The mare offered a shrug. “Month and a half, maybe two months ago. Honestly I can’t put a finger on it.”

“You’ve just been walking that long…” I said, getting a simple nod to confirm the veracity of my assumption. “Steeljack, Dart, am I the only one getting worried here?”

“Am I missing something?” The mare asked.

“You are.” Steeljack pointed out. “We haven’t even been here a week.”

“Which brings up another question.” I added. “Who knew where we would be today two months ago? God, assuming he or she exists?”

“Beachhead to Sunny, come in.”

I watched the mare fish a radio out of her jacket and flip the antenna up with her thumb. “Sunny here, go ahead.”

“Those ships are pulling up anchor and we got raiders moving on our position. Wrap up your leftovers for later, we gotta move.”

“Got it, we’re packing up.” She said before tucking the radio back into her jacket. “You all heard Sandstorm, time to go!” The three of us only stood and watched as the group of mercenaries fled the room into the depths of the building.

“Should we follow them?” Dart asked.

“What do you think?” I retorted as I swung my shotgun over my shoulder and broke into a run. “Sunny, wait up!”

It took a minute to catch up with the group of rangers in the depths of the building; by the time we found them half their number were in a waiting room, guarding the rusted and dented door to the building’s elevator. “Trust me, we aren’t going anywhere.” She said with a smirk. “We’ll have to squeeze the rest of us into the next car, so I hope you don’t have a problem with tight spaces.”

DING!

“I think we can manage.” I replied as the doors slid open. “So how’d you get this old thing working?”

As we filed into the car Sunny pointed out a spark battery that was wired into the control panel. “I got that one there running the car controls, and a new battery in the backup generator’s command console got the mechanical components working.” The car shuddered as Sunny hit the button for the main lobby, and it began its slow descent through the innards of the old-world monolith.

“Well that’s just one problem solved.” Steeljack said from the back of the car. “How are we going to get back to Neighfair with a bunch of raiders bearing down on us?”

As the doors opened and I saw the chunks of concrete and pavement scatter through the lobby and in the street outside, I began to wonder the same thing. How are we going to get back to Neighfair? “My best guess? I’d say by the skin of our teeth.”

“So we’re pulling a rabbit out of a hat? Again?” Dart interjected.

I simply nodded and stepped out of the elevator. “Probably. Now let's get to it!”

Author's Note

And there we go, another chapter!

...Honestly I should feel relieved that I've knocked another one off, but I'm really too tired right now to care much. If there's any typos, let me know. I just had to go through and reformat the whole chapter after I imported it from Google Docs, so I'm not sure if making everything bold was the only thing wrong. Again, I'm just too tired at the moment.

But we've introduced the Desert Rangers to the universe in their full capacity, not mentioning them in passing like in The Long Road (which is still on the back burner as I sort out how to end it's story properly, although I think I might get started on it's next chapter) or in the codex entries. And there's the first mention of this old stallion... He'll be showing up throughout Broken Mirror, nudging Dusk and Company in the right direction.

Now does anyone have questions? Like what you're seeing so far? Hell, maybe have some gripes? There's a comment section and the Mirrorverse Codex. Read and comment away, because I want to hear from you fellow denizens of this corner of the internet. Until next time gang!
-Striker