Fallout: Equestria - Sunny Skies

Chapters

Preface
Chapter 1: Back from the Grave
Chapter 2: Starprancer
Chapter 3: Dreams From the Past
Chapter 4: Wintermail
Chapter 6: Grape Vine
Chapter 7: A Trial By Darkness
Chapter 8: The Alicorns of the North
Chapter 9: The Stench of Intertwined Fates
Chapter 5: An Elderly Cyberpony is Assisted Across the Street

Preface

Once upon a time in the magical land of Equestria...

I sat on the edge of the clouds looking out into the great valley, the heartland of Equestria stretching out beneath me. It was a perfect day, the sun in all its brilliance shone down from a beautiful blue sky. The clouds, both those around me and those making up Cloudsdale in the distance, were pure and fluffy. My eyes worked to absorb the majesty of the land below. The valley’s rolling hills stretched out for miles before meeting the surrounding mountains, brilliant green covering everything. A lake glistened in the sunlight on the far side of the valley, majestic waterfalls throwing off rainbows as they cascaded into the reservoir. At the top of the waterfalls a magnificent marble city clung to the side of the mountain, its multicolored domes inspiring awe.

I was basking in the afterglow of hard but rewarding work. A massive storm had been developing over the Everfree Forest and I, along with pegasi from Ponyville, Canterlot, and Cloudsdale, had been called to help break it up. Well, my uncle and cousins had been called to help and I came along, eager to see some real weather ponies at work. There wasn’t much that a little filly like me could do, but I had helped as much as I could and was now reaping the benefits: the most perfect view, on a most perfect day, of the greatest land in the world.

Sitting there on a stray tuft of cloud, I experienced the purest moment of my life. I’ve always cherished the memory, no matter how fleeting it was. As a young filly, I had always wondered why ponies talked about how we lived in the greatest and most loving place on the planet. In that moment though, I saw the majesty of my people and their ideas through the wonder of the land we had been born upon.

Over the years I thought back to that moment, drew strength and inspiration from it. The mere memory of such an awesome scene brought light to me, even in the greatest darkness, and inspired a sense of purpose.

It seems so far away now.

If you’re expecting me to start rambling about virtues and enduring pain or talking about how absolutely punishing the “Wasteland” is, you shouldn’t stop reading. I won’t do any such thing, but that shouldn’t deter you. Honestly, I don’t believe in virtues or angsting over moral choices, just doing what needs to be done as efficiently and effectively as possible. I’m not some toaster repairpony or a Stable princess that’s just running around trying to find myself or save the Wasteland, pondering the moral ambiguity of my decisions while also ignoring whatever wrongs I might set in motion. If I’m completely honest, I believe the most dangerous thing in the world is some jackass that’s been labeled a hero. Bit ironic coming from a war hero I guess, but it’s not like I’m some caring, timid creature.

My birth name was Sunny Skies, but I’ve never used it on account of my appearance; a black coat and indigo mane didn’t really match a pleasant day in any way. My father had taken to calling me Nyx after a storybook character I and my unique coloring reminded him of. However, nowadays I’m more commonly known by the name I gained on the battlefield.

I guess at my core, I should be called a warrior; I’ve been fighting for most of my life. I was issued a set of steel plate armor and wing blades to serve my nation when I started off. I would have never imagined that by the time I finished, soldiers would wear suits of mechanical armor fitted with weapons firing beams of magical energy while a whole library worth’s of information could fit in an oversized wristwatch. During that time, I rose to become one of Equestria’s greatest defenders. A huntress feared like Death itself. The scourge of the changelings. Terror of griffons and minotaurs. A black angel of Equestria’s armies. The zebras saw me as agent of the stars, preying on the souls of the good. It didn’t matter if it was foe or friend, most looked upon me as a cold-blooded creature of malice and death. The dark lieutenant of the Lunar Menace: Nightmare Shadow.

In an era long past, I walked the earth as a noble and cunning warrior. Now, I find myself wandering the desolate remains of a world I can no longer recognise. My home is gone, my nation warped almost beyond recognition. Only the bones of the once proud society I served remain.

I can’t even recognize myself. Sleek metal and plastic augments cover large parts of me. My coat is rich and silky, unscared by my life’s experiences. My face looks almost like a child’s if it weren’t for the eyes. My left is lifeless, a camera masquerading as a retina, as unnerving as it is unconvincing. The right is the one that really scares me, though. It’s the eye of an ancient creature, one that’s seen the end of eras and destruction beyond expression. It shows a being that’s cold, lost, beaten down, and worn out; one I never thought I would be.

It pains me to my core to look back on what has been lost, to the point that I wonder how I’m supposed to go on. Pain and suffering across the world. Death and destruction on a scale that’s almost beyond comprehension. The triumphs of armies and march of science... all lost to the ash. Nothing gained, nothing learned, nothing left.

I will never again know the feel of grass beneath my hooves. I’ll miss walking down the streets of a town teeming with life and growth. I’ve only the memories of those closest to me, my friends and family long gone. Even my enemies lie defeated, having gained nothing themselves.

It’s all enough to make a mare feel ancient and alone no matter her surroundings. Little more than a relic that can be spoken to. A teller of stories full of grandeur and wonder, gathered in a past life, that bear more semblance to a work of fiction than any fact the modern age knows.

I constantly face oblivion itself and often wonder why I don’t embrace it. To finally let go of the world and all that I associate with it.

I guess I’m just too stubborn to admit defeat and go quietly into the night. The thought of not facing down the void with a warcry on my tongue and fire in my eyes truly scares me. It’s bad enough that everything I fought for has been lost, but to finally lose my fight too? That’s a tragedy I won’t stand for. Besides, there are still things in this world left for me to do, just as there are things those in this world could learn from me.

After all, some things never change.

Chapter 1: Back from the Grave

Chapter 1: Back From the Grave

“Hello.

“My name is Scootaloo, you might know me... (sighs) I'm the vice-president of Stable-Tec. If you’re hearing this, that means Omega-Level Threat Protocols have been enacted and you are... are now face- going to....

“S-sorry..... Just, damn these things!

".....

“All Right... I’m talking to you as vice-president of Stable-Tec. You have been appointed as Overmare of the Stable-Tec life-preserving Stable Number 13. You have been chosen for your sense of loyalty and duty, both to the ponies around you and to this company. And while the Stable-Tec HQ is probably... rightfully... nothing but blasted rubble now, our ideals live on.

“Your Stable has been selected to participate in a vital Ministry of Awesome operation as well as a Stable-Tec social project. The first goal of your Stable, like all others, is to save the lives of the ponies inside. Stable 13 is designed to house a much larger population as well as the assets of the MAw's 'Operation: Windigo'.

"As our only completed Stable in the far north, Stable 13 has to provide for the preservation of the north's crystal ponies along with earth ponies and unicorns. But you also have a higher purpose beyond saving the lives of individual ponies. We here at Stable-Tec and the Ministry of Awesome understand that it doesn’t do ponykind any good to save ourselves now only to annihilate each other later. We must figure out where we went wrong. We must find a better way. And we must be ready to implement it as soon as possible once the Stable doors open. ...And survive what our current leaders have managed to do to Equestria...

"Those damn bastards have ruined the world and driven us to... this.... Fuck all of them.

"I hope your heart's still in the right place, Rainbow Dash.

"Sorry, I'm so sorry. I wish we could have prevented this. D-done better.

"I'm getting off topic, again.

"The designs, instructions, and objectives for your Stable's social project are sealed in your office's safe. Here, I will discuss your Stable's purpose in Operation: Windigo.

"Your Stable has been equipped to house 33 cybernetically altered Shadowbolts in suspended animation. They are tasked with cleansing the world of...... political and social contamination in order to pave way for a better, brighter future; free of the influences of our corrupt past.

"We deserve to be cleansed...

"The Shadowbolts will be kept in stasis until they are awakened by executive command from the Mare of the Ministry of Awesome, Rainbow Dash, at which time they are to be assisted to the best of your abilities in preparation for their mission.

"However, if at any point you believe that there is a threat to the safety and security of the ponies in your charge... as a whole... take any necessary steps to rectify the situation; be it stopping the experiments or breaking protocol and waking the Shadowbolts yourself in a dire situation. In any other circumstances, however, it is crucial that you keep to the directives provided, and keep Stable-Tec appraised of all results as per your instructions.

“Thank you and good luck. May none of this ever have to come to bear..."

[End Recording]

SYSTEM BOOT SUCCESSFUL…

SYSTEMS CHECK COMPLETE = 100% READY

LAUNCHING MOA/STABLE-TEC PIP OS 23.6.012

...

BIOS LOADED... LAUNCHING
REANIMATION PROCEDURE STARTED
SPARK CORE REACTION INITIATED...

Ugh, I did way too much drinking last night…

INITIALIZING...

Ouch, this is the worst case of pins and needles I’ve ever had! And the hangover isn’t helping the situation.

NEURAL FUNCTION STABLE.
BIOLOGICAL FUNCTION STABLE.
LIFE SUPPORT SYSTEMS CALIBRATED.
CRYO-STASIS DISENGAGED.

ALL SYSTEMS GO.
Nah, I’m not going anywhere.

My entire body felt like a pincushion. A cold, frozen pincushion that was now starting to sting as warmth worked its way back into face and body. The sensations kind of ran a line between pain and relief. Pushing the feelings aside, I force my eyes open.

Ah, there we go: some unidentifiable shapes in a dark blur. I blinked a few times. Ooh, my whole face is numb and tingly. There’s the cybernetic eye giving me something. My other eye was finally focusing, granted a dark steel box isn’t the best place to be trying to get one’s eyes working again. Fortunately, the front of the box was opening up. I could already hear the muffled chaos outside.

The door lifted open to show a filly sitting in front of my would-be tomb. I tried shifting my weight but find I’m suspended from my wings. My legs are attached to dozens of cables, leaving me almost unable to move. I was trapped, Celestia knows where, I couldn’t feel anything in my legs or wings, and I was at the mercy of some child!

Who was in complete terror of me.

Get it together, stupid brain. The filly hasn’t hurt me. She’s just a normal, if scared, unicorn with a fantastically sparkly coat.

I couldn’t see if she had a cutie mark because her flank was covered up with a blue and yellow barding adorned with the number 13. The attire struck me as oddly utilitarian for Equestria.

Blue, yellow, utilitarian, and thirteen; those all meant something together, but my mind was still too frozen to think straight.

‘Wait, stasis and, oh Celestia, it’s on the tip of my tongue… STABLES! This filly is wearing Stable 13 barding and that is where I am; inside Stable 13.’

Shit!

I should wake up in the Shining Armor Memorial Hospital, a horde of specialists easing me out of suspended animation. Maybe some Royal Guards keeping an eye on the proceedings from a distance. If I’m waking up being attended to by dwellers in Stable 13 then that means… Oh, Celestia. I-it’s gone. Pinkie was right. The end came. We failed…

I started shaking uncontrollably, my brain filling with static and feedback from my body. My vision told me that something was sensing an oncoming panic attack. I grit my teeth before letting out a wail. The filly shrank back and there was a fair bit of yelling from outside my field of vision. I didn’t care, I’d lost everything. I started thrashing against my bonds, feeling almost nothing in my legs or wings.

“Let me down!” I screamed.

The filly looked up at me in fear. “Y-y-yes, m-ma’am,” she cowered. “B-b-but please st-top struggling so much, you’ll break something.”

Part of my mind yelled to ignore her and rip my way out of my prison. A logical part of my brain informed me she was right and I should stop acting like a scared foal. I shot the filly a nasty look but stopped moving.

Her horn lit and levitated out a sheet of paper. Looking between her cheatsheet and me, she started removing wires, plugs, hoses, and restraints. At last she removed my exterior power supply and finally focused on the large lever that worked the gantry my wings were attached to. Her face screwed shut with exertion as her horn flared. After a few moments of struggle I heard a jerk and a screech of metal. The filly stopped and took a breath before resuming her efforts. Almost instantly there was another jerk above me and gravity reasserted itself on me with a resounding crash to the floor.

“A-are you alright?” The filly loomed over me as I tried to get my hooves under me.

“How long have we been down?” I asked, dragging myself up. I was hit with a bit of vertigo and had to lean against the inside of the stasis chamber.

“I-I don’t know.”

“You don’t know?” I looked up at her and she flinched back. “How long has the Stable been sealed?”

She took a few steps back and started shaking again. “About t-two hundred years, I think.”

I fell to my rump, eyes falling to the floor. “Two hundred years?” The words echoed through my mind, loss and disbelief flooding my thoughts.

“Shadow.”

The ashes of everything I knew wouldn’t be around. My heart might have started beating faster and my breath might have gotten short if it could.

“Shadow.” There was a hoof on my shoulder that gave me a shake. Looking up, I saw five grown ponies. One mare, a young orange earth pony with a sparkly coat, wore the blue and yellow of Stable 13. The other four were images out of a sci-fi horror film; their legs were metal, from their backs sprouted wings with sword blades in place of feathers. Their glowing red eyes held no warmth as they focused upon me.

“You with us, Shadow?” asked an enhanced blue pegasus. She was familiar, Sky was her codename. I tried to recall anything I knew about the mare but found any other memories were locked behind a wall of ice.

“Mmm,” I answered shakily, still in a daze.

“Shadow, please,” the stable pony was addressing me now, which finally snapped me back into reality. The mare hugged the filly that opened my pod to her leg. She looked worse for wear; bags surrounded her eyes, her face was littered with small cuts upon older scars, and a riot shotgun was slung around her neck. “We need your help. My Stable’s been breached and we’re being overrun. I need you and your soldiers to help repel the enemy.”

“Give her a moment, Overmare,” Sky said. “We’ll move out now before the enemy has a chance to seize too much real estate. Shadow, you take a moment.”

I hadn’t really absorbed the discussion but nodded anyway, shock still dominating my mind. Sky Blue turned to the other three cyberponies and they started moving off. The Overmare lingered however, looking at me with an odd expression: something between fear and pity, maybe both. I returned her gaze for a few moments before our staring contest was brought to an end when an explosion in the distance rumbled through the building.

The Overmare looked toward the room’s entrance then back to me, her expression becoming irritated: “Get yourself together.” She scooped the filly onto her back then turned to leave.

“Wait.”

She turned back to me, question tainting her grim resignation. I couldn’t understand where I wanted to go from there. Part of me wanted to tell the Overmare to go fuck herself and leave the Stable to its fate. Another section thought that part should go drown in a bucket of motor oil. Yet a third part was horrified that the other two were capable of such ideas and a fourth was sitting in a corner crying. My mind was still trying and failing to function properly. It wasn’t anything I should be worried about yet, cryostasis was known to cause amnesia (among many other--usually--temporary issues) but I really didn’t need to be trying to remember how to think while the lives of these stable ponies were hanging in the balance.

“Are you okay?” The Overmare was looking back at me with concern.

“Yeah, I’ll be fine. I just need a moment.”

“We don’t have one. We-” At that moment the Overmare lifted her hoof to her ear and tilted her head as she listened to an ear bloom. “Luna damn it! Hold on, Blaze. Aria, start evacuating into the Security wing.” She looked back at the filly on her back. “Go to my office and hide, Star.” The filly gave a nod and jumped from the older mare’s back, scurrying off.

“What’s happened?”

The mare regarded me for a moment. It was a look I knew all too well, an officer fighting a battle that there was little to no hope of winning. Ponies were dying and here I was sitting on my rump.

She finally took a deep breath. “They’re pushing through the lower levels of Maintenance and I don’t have enough guns or ponies that know how to use them to hold the bastards back.”

“I’ll go help Maintenance.”

She gave me a skeptical look but shrugged it off; she didn’t have a better alternative to trusting a cybernetic death-machine with mental issues anyway. Nodding for me to follow, she walked towards the pod room door.

She pointed to the right, down a hallway. “Look for a buck named Socket Blaze, he’s my Chief of Engineering. I’ve sealed all of the security doors to funnel the bastards, but the bottom door in Stairwell A is damaged and they’re using the breach to try and flank the majority of my forces in the Mall. Get down there and stop them. Head down this hall to Stairwell D and-”

“Go to the bottom, make my way to the main access hall, Stairwell A’s entrance should be at the end of the main hall and up the left branch after getting past the reactor block.” Yay, go memory. “Yes, Ma’am,” I snapped off with a crisp salute, the motion feeling surreally natural.

The Overmare regarded me quizzically for a second before answering: “Yeah, get down there and secure it,” adding a stressed, but almost sweet: “Please.”

I nodded and we parted ways, the Overmare headed the other direction toward the Atrium. I turned down the hall and galloped to my objective. I could see a detailed schematic of the entire Stable in my mind's eye; my vision had a waypoint set at down the hall and small arrows all around. That was my advanced Eyes Forward Sparkle. The arrows and blips indicated creatures around me in three dimensions, blue for friend, red for foe, green for neutral. It was one of the functions of my integrated PIP. Ha! I was kickin’ memory loss’ butt. I was even moving and thinking at the same time.

I reached the bottom of Stairwell D without issue, exiting into a dimly-lit, musty hallway and slowing down at the junction with the main corridor. I saw a concentration of red blips in the corridor and listened for a moment. Over the din of the Stable’s machines I heard the heavy thudding of belabored metal hooves, a hissing and groaning of hydraulics, the general hum of magi-tech processors. Five sets of Steel Ranger armor were moving up the hallway beyond, in my direction. That left two red and several blue blips that were other ponies. Quietly sneaking up to the corner, I stole a glance down the corridor.

The Steel Rangers must have just broken through; they were moving carefully up the hall in a spread out column. Each was equipped with weapons that were hilariously overkill for the confined space. The classic grenade machine gun/missile launcher combo, sets of miniguns, a beam rifle duo, there was even a Ranger with an Anti-Machine rifle mounted up.

“Secure this floor,” I heard an amplified voice say. “Tea, secure the other stairwell. We’ll start moving up after we’re done with these Tribals. We’ve got a great haul here so don’t damage anything, the Elder will have our asses if we do.”

There was a whimper, followed by the sound of a skull being crushed and one of the blue blips on my E.F.S winked out. “We surrender, you bastards!” a stallion yelled, his voice gurgling in his throat. A burst of machine gun fire and another two blips disappeared.

I gritted my teeth, rage building up in me. I didn’t know what was going on here, but I wasn’t going to allow anyone linking themselves to Equestria to slaughter civilians or prisoners of war. Rangers had been sanctimonious asshats the last time I had met any, but two hundred years apparently only saw them blossom into truly egocentric bigots.

One of the soldiers- no, these ponies were thieves; there was no honor in what they did. One of the thieves was moving down the hall toward the junction and me, alone. Good to see that the Steel Ranger mentality of ‘Lone Wolfing It’ was still alive and well. I sulked back into the darkness of the hall, lying down on the floor in a closed doorway. I curled into a ball to hide most of my body.

The Steel Raider -- Tea, I guess -- got to the junction and stopped. Then, she started moving down toward me. “On your hooves, Tribal.” I laid still as she closed the last few steps. “I said O-ugh!”

Tea’s voice died as I leapt up and delivered a crushing hoof strike to her chest, buckling the armor over her sternum in and sending her back a step. Before she could recover I reared up on my back hooves, the augments holding me easily in a bipedal position. My forehooves lashed out and gripped her helmet. I wrenched her head around at an angle it was never meant to achieve, mechanics in the armor snapping with bone. Neck broken, Tea’s body gave out and fell to the ground with a thud.

“What the hell was that?” Another of the Rangers said. ”Tea, are you alright?”

Still standing on my back hooves, I reached up to the ceiling with my wings and forelegs, grabbed onto a water pipe, and hoisted myself up. After nestling myself amongst the pipes, cables, and ducts over the junction, I had to simply exercise my patience. The three other Steel Raiders slowly approached the intersection in a basic, spread out wedge formation.

Catching sight of the armored pony on the floor, the leader called out: “Tea? Sweet Tea? Damn it! Tea’s down. Fuck these Tribals! Rangers, delta formation!”

The leader was standing almost below me when I pounced right between the attackers. I drove my tail into the back of her helmet, the spearhead at the end slicing through armor, bone, and grey matter. I then clicked a mental switch, entering the unnatural, slow motion world of Stable-Tec’s Arcane Targeting Spell. I sat there for a long moment sizing up the two next rangers in the procession. I didn’t really need a spell to land any strikes but it was always nice to have a moment to assess a situation.

They were standing too far apart for me to decapitate both in one fell swoop of wingblades, so I needed to make a decision. The ranger to my right had started taking a step back and was turning around, probably making to run away from the demon that had been provoked. The stallion to the left, however, was turning to bring his battlesaddle’s pair of assault rifles to bear on me, earning him my immediate attention. I stepped beside my mark and with a swipe of my wings, cleaved through the thin armor at his neck.

At the same time, I whipped my tail around and hit the second ranger across her helmet shattering the visor and warping the side. I could hear her choking on her own blood and see the pure, unfettered terror in her pink eyes as she looked at me. I looked back feeling nothing, lost in my instincts as I brought up a hoof and crushed her head against the wall.

I looked away from the four Steel Raiders that I had just decimated and checked my EFS; there were only two living things on this level right now. One red blip and one green hiding inside one of the stable’s environmental control rooms. Being that I had seen five blips in that area before, the two were probably scoping out their spoils after eliminating the last few stableponies. They presented a problem because I couldn’t very well go get the stable’s air talismans or ventilation systems shot up trying to get at a pair of these thieves. Additionally, the Rangers would probably be looking to exploit their break through or wondering what happened to the squad in the basement. Already, I could see red blips moving down the stairwell to my floor.

My problem of how to deal with the two blips in environmental solved itself when the red one moved towards the door. I ran to the door in question and waited. Just like clockwork, the door slid up to reveal a sixth Steel Ranger. He wasn’t even able to register what was in his way before my hooves slammed his head into the door frame. In the room beyond was a unicorn wearing a red robe, a pendant I recognized as the logo of the Ministry of Wartime Technology stuck on the front. I paused in my vendetta as I looked at him. This unicorn was dressed up like a cult member with the MoT’s symbol proudly displayed on his chest.

Was that what had happened to the Steel Rangers? They had devolved into some technology worshiping cult of thieves?

The unicorn was having trouble processing that his escort was dead at the hooves of the robo-grim reaper that was now turning her attention to him. He looked at me with equal measures of fear and awe before his rational mind reasserted itself. He levitated a plasma pistol from the folds of his robes and took aim at me. I feinted up and then dove down to the floor trying to confuse him. Unfortunately, he was wearing a Pipbuck and slipped into S.A.T.S. The plasma pistol shot five times in rapid succession and hit me once in the back, near the root of my left wing. The unicorn’s hits didn’t help him much as I rolled right up to him and bucked him in the head, shattering his cranium.

I was dragged from my combat trance by the pain in my back where flesh had been burned away by the plasma bolt. My healing and repair talismans were already mending the damage, but my melted hide still hurt. The damage to my metallic wing was detached from my senses; my limbs were numbed almost to the loss of feeling and I could only really tell that the wing was moving sluggishly.

Despite the fact that there were now no Steel Rangers on the floor, I was hesitant to say I won. Not a single one of the stableponies had survived. I couldn’t stew in my failure, however, because three more red blips had reached the bottom of the stairwell and were spreading out into the hall. I looked to the robed ranger and quickly scooped up his pistol.

Moving back to the door I prepared for another round. My three new targets approached slowly and cautiously. The hallway had five Rangers lying broken in pools of blood; the small column was wise to take it slow.

They had almost gotten to my doorway when they stopped, of course I was showing up on their EFS just as they did on mine. Of course, the Rangers knowing my location could prove disastrous for me; they could coordinate and pin me down in one of these rooms easily. It would have been wise for me to retreat back to Stairwell D and lock the reinforced door before making my way back up to the stasis chambers and our armory…

Damn it! I bet a rifle, a couple of mines, and some spark grenades would be perfect for holding off wave after wave of Rangers. Well, scratch the spark grenades; I would get far more fucked up from those than my opponents would. A gun with small dimensions and a high rate of fire would be optimal really. At least had a plasma pistol now, I remembered plasma weapons being pretty powerful.

C’est-la-vie. I would have to live with my lack of foresight (damn amnesia) and persevere in accomplishing my goal of keeping this floor. Maybe after that I could start flanking around up through the main stairwell and get in behind the main force. Infiltrating, then causing chaos and disarray in the enemy lines sounded very me.

By this point my opponents had grown tired of waiting -- Rangers and patience always had mixed like water and oil -- and were preparing to breach the room. I stood back from the wall and waited as one of the rangers went across to the other side of the open door. I slipped into S.A.T.S. just as he was crossing and fired several shots into his side. The pony fell to the ground, his armor glowing and sparking. Seizing what I hoped would be the other two’s surprise, I launched myself around the door and into their faces.

Neither Ranger was caught off guard-- the one on the left put two shotgun slugs in my side before a wingblade raked across her face. The other opened up at point blank range with his machine guns, peppering my hide even after I delivered a hoof strike to his chest that collapsed his sternum and two shots into his visor. I staggered from the hits, my muscles trying to work around the lead buried in my flesh. I wasn’t even close to dying, the holes were already closing up as my healing talisman started working, but I wasn’t well either. Something had hit my blood mixing pump (my lungs, liver, and heart all in one) leaving me short of breath and with my blood pressure dropping as the repair talisman worked. A moment to heal would be in order.

“What the fuck!?”

There was another Ranger standing at the end of the hall. Celestia damn it. seemed I wasn’t going to catch a break when I desperately needed it. The stallion had caught me in the hall leaning against the wall in pain and injury. My only saving grace was that he had yelled at me instead of shooting me. His body language indicated disbelief and some fear but quickly changed to anger when I looked up at him.

“You fucking bitch!” he screamed.

I just sneered at him around my pistol. He aimed his battlesaddle at me and we both fired in unison, my bolt hitting his visor and melting through to his face while he missed wide, hitting the wall behind and next to me.

Of course he used a rocket launcher, fucking cheater.

My skin was melting; my lungs burned as they filled with smoke, my eyes could no longer see, flesh cooked on my bones. I couldn’t move, couldn’t feel anything but pain. It was happening again. All I could hope for was that this time I would find death’s sweet embrace. Instead, I started drowning.

I laid for who knows how long trapped in my nightmare before I inhaled a coppery liquid off the floor. I woke coughing and sputtering on what I quickly identified as my own blood, I was lying in a sizable puddle of my vital fluid. Around me, the aftermath of the missile’s explosion painted the walls with char, shrapnel, and the gore of the fallen and me.

I wasn’t well. My PIP had crashed leaving me without EFS, SATS, or any way to monitor my body’s systems. Not having a bearing on my surroundings or self didn’t help my trembling and shortness of breath. After coughing on my blood again, I lifted my face off of the floor and tried to push myself up a wall, slumping into a sitting position. I started taking deep breaths in an attempt to ward off my anxiety but was met with limited success. My cognitive disarray was the result of blood loss and shock just as much as my rising panic. I once again found myself cursing the jackasses that thought stasis pods were a good idea.

Looking around, I saw the nine Steel Raiders that had perished at my hooves and several others along with the blasted remains of the three dozen stableponies that they had slain. The walls were scarred from the battle and the floor was painted red. However, what I found unsettling was the quiet. My artificial ears could shrug off concussions that would scramble organic eardrums, but I still tapped a hoof on the floor to see if my hearing was intact. My ears were working perfectly; I heard nothing except the buzz of lights and the quieted roar of generators.

Surely the Steel Rangers would be going about their spoils or the stable ponies licking their wounds and assessing the damage of the attack. Both would have had paramount interest in the lower maintenance levels where some brutal fighting had taken place right next to a lot of the Stable’s most valuable and fragile equipment. The dead state of my surroundings only put me further on edge, trembles advancing into a full blown fit as I seized about and desperately tried to take a full breath.

Hoping to distract my mind, I looked back at my body to assess the damage. Most of my flesh had been healed by my talisman, so that was still working fine. My silky black coat looked like it hadn’t even been touched other than a few spots of fresh, pink skin that was still missing its regrown hair and the stray piece of shrapnel that stuck out of me as I digested it. My augments hadn’t weathered as well; the reinforcing spines that covered my spine was in decent condition, as were my my legs and wings, but the hump at my wings showed some serious damage. The unicorn’s plasma bolt had burned through the metal skin revealing the delicate wires and hoses beneath, leaving the shrapnel from the missile to rip through it. The sapphire between my wings was also cracked, meaning that my flight talisman was ruined. That would not be easily fixed.

Looking back had been a bad idea, a very bad idea. Visions of spidery surgical robots ripping away my flesh and a longing to feel the wind flowing through my feathers added to the swirling mass of anxiety in my head. The panic gripping my heart was joined by the jaws of a healing chamber’s claustrophobia and damnable whirring. My mind was being beaten with visions of fire, metal, machines, burned landscapes, and mountains of dead; the terror of my enemies as I purged them of life becoming my own. I saw the faces of friends who offered a second’s solace before I remembered their deaths.

I was trapped in a Stable, buried alive, drifting in an endless darkness; alone and forgotten forever.

I tried to get up and run but my legs moved lazily, what muscles I had seizing uncontrollably. I stumbled to the far junction, past the corpses of my victims and collapsed against the wall, hugging the corner for support. Snot and tears ran down my face as my body was violently shaken with sobs.

It took an eternity for my fit to finally pass, my perception of time lost to the never changing glow of the Stable’s lights and my lack of a clock. I left indents in the walls where I hugged them but felt marginally better afterward. My internals had finished repairing themselves while I was out of it and I was able to reboot my PIP. My flight talisman had failed, meaning flying was a bust. My EFS also seemed to be glitching out. I still stood, grabbed my pistol, and made my way up Stairwell A and past the residence floors to the main atrium.

Stable 13 was the largest shelter Stable-Tec built. Meant to house about two thousand ponies and 33 cyberponies, about twice the size of a normal stable. Of course, as one of only three planned Stables in the Crystal Empire, 13 would be tasked with guarding the last crystal ponies in existence in addition to the MAw’s contingency plans.

I exited into the Stable’s atrium. The space looked like a battlefield: Stableponies, Rangers, and a few cyberponies lay all over the massive communal space. There were also many piles of ash and goo, the remains of those who had fallen to energy weapons. Nothing stirred, the dead silence only broken by my hoofsteps, the clacking of my dogtags, the buzz of lights, and the sound of generators that had faded to a soft hum.

I took a closer look at a cyberpony. He wasn’t one of us Windigos; he was an earth pony in Stable barding. His cybernetics were nowhere near as advanced as my own. He was a pony with a few bits of tech attached instead of the permanently-changed, full-on cybernetic organism that I was. I found it odd that a Stable would have access to this tech and that they would find need to use it. The buck’s front right leg had been amputated and replaced with a prosthetic. He also had one of his eyes replaced, a large scar running over the socket. There wasn’t any industrial accident I had ever heard of that would cause injuries like that.

Finding the atrium crypt-like, I wandered the halls of the stable finding nothing but more dead. Working my way to the upper parts of the Stable, I found mountains of ash and burned bodies in the more secure parts of the stable. Making my way through security, I found the hallway that lead to the Overmare’s office. I was still in wonder of what had happened today in the stable and why I wasn’t awoken much earlier. If there was a place where answers could be found, it would be the nerve center of the stable.

I had just rounded the corner before the door to the Overmare’s office when shots rang out. I jumped back from the door as the wall was peppered with pistol fire. A voice called out: “Fucking die, you shit-spewing, metal traitors!”

“Hold your fire!” I yelled back.

“Shove it up your ass, you bitch!” The voice was familiar, one I had heard recently… Oh, duh. It was the Overmare; this was her office after all.

“Overmare,” I called out, “I don’t want any trouble. What happened here?”

The Overmare let out an almost mad cackle. “What happened? I think I’m talking to the most unconvincing, lying piece of shit I’ve ever had the displeasure of communicating with. YOU and your fucking popsicle buddies killed everypony in my Stable!”

“What?” I asked in disbelief as I stuck my head out to try and look at the Overmare’s face. She nearly put a bullet between my eyes for the trouble. “Celestia, stop shooting at me! I’m not trying to hurt you.”

“I told you to go fuck off. There’s nothing here for you or anypony else!” Her declaration was cut off by a coughing fit. I stuck my head around again while the mare struggled for breath.

She was lying on the floor of her office right in front of the door, a nickel plated magnum revolver in her jaws. The earth- no, crystal pony looked bad: a nasty burn covered the side of her stable barding, her back legs were pointing the wrong directions and there was a nasty bruise across her face. Her updo, typical of crystal ponies, was a frazzled, charred mess.

“What’s your name?” I asked.

“What kind of question is that? You want to make sure you get the plaque right on your trophy?” The Overmare fired three more shots at me, one sparking off of my right shoulder. Revolvers carried six shots, she had started with two, almost beaned me when I poked my head out, now three more; she should be out. I took a deep breath and stepped out into the open, hoping that I wasn’t dealing with a seven shooter or a miscount on my part.

The Overmare snarled at me but was helpless to stop me as I slowly approached her. “I don’t want to hurt you.”

“No. You just want to rid Equestria of weakness, treachery, and anything resembling diversity,” she said as she struggled to get the cylinder of the revolver open.

“What does that mean?” I asked.

“I don’t know what you short-circuited abominations were fucking blabbing about. I was too busy trying to save the lives of the innocent ponies you were all massacring! May the fucking Princesses roast you all on spits in Tartarus.”

The Overmare had opened her gun but I casually batted it away with the broadside of my wings. “Please, just stop and le-”

Click

“Shit.” I could feel the barrel of a gun pressed up against the back of my head.

“Damn it, Star.” The Overmare looked like she had seen a ghost; her eyes locked on whomever was holding a gun to my head in fear. She broke contact with my assailant and looked at me desperately. “Please, do whatever you want to me, just let her go,” she pleaded with me.

I slowly made to turn around and saw a revolver with a dark color scheme hovering just behind my head. The weapon was wrapped in the green magical sheen of a unicorn filly: the same filly that had woken me up. She had a bright white crystalline coat and a rusty red mane that she shared with her mother but I had also seen somewhere else. The two pistols also seemed familiar as well but my memory was still a jumbled mess. I hadn’t had a full eight hours in over two hundred years and now sleep deprivation was starting to weigh on my already addled brain.

Wait, there’s a filly pointing a gun at me. “Look… Star, I don’t want to hurt you or your mom. I’m just wondering what happened here.” I tried to put on a warm smile which was difficult given my appearance, even without cybernetics.

“Star, put Moonbeam down. I think she’s telling the truth,” the Overmare said in a kind, honeyed voice that still oozed fear. The filly obliged, moving the pistol away from my face and darting to her mother’s side.

She put the blued revolver down next to its nickel counterpart. They were a handsome set of sidearms. Moonbeam had a mirror-like, deep, dark blueing; its immaculate ebony grips showing off a silver crescent. Its sister was just as beautiful; the nickel plating had a slight gold hue to it, giving the reflections it cast a warm, sunny feeling. The ivory grips shone majestically as they showed off an effigy of the sun.

That was it! Moonbeam and Sunshine: I had seen these guns before. “How did you get these?” I said, gesturing to the matched revolvers.

“They’re family heirlooms,” the Overmare answered. “Why.”

I looked at both of the other ponies for a second, a stupid grin breaking out across my face. I had to stifle chuckles that only got worse from their concerned expressions. The Overmare set me with a firm look as she wrapped a hoof around her daughter. “What’s so funny?”

I released a small chuckle at her. “I’m just imagining Moondancer hooking up with somepony. Let alone her becoming a mother.”

“You knew Moondancer?” The Overmare questioned.

“Uh-huh, she and I were friends of sorts.” Moondancer had been a quiet, antisocial nerd who was a very sweet and caring individual if one got through her shields. I had always been amused how such an unassuming pony made it a habit to walk about with a magnum strapped to each of her rear legs. Then again, my everyday carry was usually a 10mm machine pistol and snubnose revolver so I wasn’t one to talk. Our jobs kind of called for us to be prepared for confrontation.

The Overmare had gone back to giving me an assessing glare. I returned it as neutrally as possible, wondering if I could at least converse with her now. Finally, the orange crystal pony spoke: “You really have no idea what happened here, do you?”

“Not really,” I answered. “I have amnesia and almost ate a missile; I’m a bit out of it. I’m sorry for what happened here. It’s my fault that my troops-" I think they’re my troops "-got out of hoof.”

“Don’t blame yourself too much,“ the Overmare said. “It’s my fault that the Rangers even found our Stable and I decided to wake you all up despite Moondancer’s warning.”

I wanted to ask about what Moondancer had to say about her last great creations but decided that learning about my current environment would be a better option. “What happened with the Steel Rangers?”

“One of my trading parties was followed back here by those damn tech-hoarding zealots.”

“What trading is there to do on the surface? Why even leave the stable in the first place?”

“We didn’t leave Stable 13 on our own volition. It was supposed to remain sealed for centuries until an outside society established peace. It’s not like there’s much to rebuild society with here in the frozen north. However, about fifty years ago there was a fire in the maintenance wing that damaged several of our air talismans and destroyed the recyclers. Faced with the stable starving, my grandmother, Stargazer, led an expedition south looking for food and parts; anything to help save the stable. She had one hell of a time from the stories she told me; fighting off raiders, battling with wild beasts, and adventuring around the whole north. She was successful, the stable was saved.

“My grandmother led several other expeditions around the whole ‘wasteland’.” She emphasized the last word with her hooves. “That’s what the surfacers call it. The Great Stargazer made it to every corner of old Equestria and saw all kinds of things. Even helped build a couple settlements and brought back a few refugees to diversify the blood in the stable.”

“There are settlements on the surface?” The thought flew in the face of everything I knew about balefire holocausts.

“Uh-huh, only a couple here in the north but down in what was Equestria proper there's stuff that one could almost call civilization. That’s who I was sending teams out to trade with.”

“But why would a stable need any outside aid? Aren’t they supposed to be self-sustaining?” I asked.

“Emphasis on the ’Supposed to be.’ From what I’ve learned, Stable-Tec only designed these things to function for a couple decades not centuries on end. They’re over engineered like crazy but not perfect and our Stable has had it harder than most. A lot didn’t have a chance to fill like this one so there’s been more strain on our equipment. With the fire and several other accidents my mother projected that the stable would be toast in thirty years, leaving all of us with nowhere to go. We’ve done well cannibalizing a couple abandoned stables here in the north over the last few years. My family has been trying to build a secure future for our dwellers.” The Overmare took a deep breath, a couple tears running down her face. “That was how we started drawing attention. We needed supplies and equipment that we didn’t have here so we would scavenge tech, fix it, and then trade with the surfacers for what we needed.”

“Oh.” I looked at the Overmare with new found admiration. She was young for her command; barely old enough to have started a family of her own and she was the caretaker of thousands. She had been trying to secure the future of the ponies she had been trusted to protect. I reached out and touched her on the shoulder, smiling as I said: “Even the strongest fail. This Stable would have failed long ago if it weren’t for you and your family. You’ve done proud by my book, uh…”

“Oh, Nebula Skater,” answered, gesturing to herself before pointing to her daughter, “and this is Starprancer.” The white unicorn filly gave me a small wave.

Nebula looked at me hard, creasing her brow. “If you’re the leader of the Windigos, then that would make you Shadow…” I nodded rather absent-mindedly to her. “Moondancer wrote about you in her logs. I think there’s a message for you on my terminal. It’s Overmare’s log #557.”

“Ok.” I moved away and toward the Overmare’s terminal. It was unlocked and I found file 557. The letter read:

Dear Shadow,

I know that this is rather cowardly but I can think of no other way to convey my deepest apologies. I will be blunt; it has been twenty years since I sealed Stable 13 from a world that had been bathed in balefire. Rainbow is dead, as are any of Operation: Windigo’s targets. In light of this I have been left to ponder what to do with the 33 cyberpegasus supersoldiers that I have on ice in the basement.

This stable lacks the equipment and resources to allow you all to integrate into the general population. Additionally, there is the question of the mental stability of augmented ponies; I was never able to research Generation 5 examples properly but my early observations’ similarities to Generation 3 and 4 are not promising. I also can’t in good conscious just throw you and the others out of the stable; I might as well pull your plugs now and be done with it. I have therefore decided to leave you and the other Windigos in stasis until you can be properly rehabilitated or are desperately needed.

I know I’m essentially sentencing you and the others to a very slow death, and I don’t expect you to forgive me. I only hope that one day you’ll be able to understand me and that I might find peace with what I’ve done. Everything I’ve done.

You were such an inspiring and caring pony, Sunny. I know that you’ll have the strength to carry on once we’re all gone, to hopefully make the world a better place. And one day, we all can enjoy piña coladas on some white sandy beach in the ever after.

Good luck,

Moondancer

I reached up and wiped the tears from my face. I did feel anger and betrayal at one of my closest friends abandoning me, but Moondancer had acted with good reason in the interest of others.

“Hey,” Nebula called from the floor, “there are a couple bottles in the left bottom drawer of the desk. When you’re done I believe some drinking is in order.”

I couldn’t agree more; a drink sounded like a fantastic idea. Sliding the drawer in question open I found a half bottle of apple whiskey, a sealed bottle of Wild Pegasus malt whiskey, and a few glasses. “I like your taste, Nebula,” I said holding up the Wild Pegasus.

“Finest the Wasteland has to offer.” She said with a sickly grin.

I took the apple booze and glasses over to my new companions. Starprancer was nuzzled into Nebula’s side, sound asleep. The orange mare herself looked bad, her vibrant coat had lost its sheen and was growing pale. Her breaths were short and quick.

I pulled the stopper out of the bottle of apple whiskey and poured two glasses of the sweet amber liquid. I passed one to Nebula and took the other in my hoof putting the bottle between us. “To friends at the end of the world,” I said smiling tearfully.

“Hear, hear.” Nebula finished off her glass in one gulp and let out a long sigh before going for a refill.

The Overmare was caught back by the venom in my voice. “What happened to you? I can’t imagine you just wound up like that.” She gestured to my metal legs. “You get fucked up to needing that but you’re still even tempered and... normal. None of it seems to be affecting you badly.”

“The strength, speed, and semi-invincibility is pretty great, especially to a cripple who was never going to walk again. This is my salvation really.” I waved my wings around; their sinister blades gleaming. Tears started running down my face and I felt the first trembles.

My new friend sensed my apprehension and held her glass up: “To salvation.”

I took a shaky breath and clinked my glass to hers: “To salvation.” I noticed that she had started crying at the words. “Are you alright?”

She turned and looked back at the filly snoozing against her. “Please, Shadow, I need somepony to… t-to…” She started weeping quietly.

Salvation indeed. I placed a hoof on the dying mother’s shoulder: “I’ll protect her to my last breath and do my best to see her grow into a good mare.”

“T-th-thank you” She wrapped her hoof around mine and held it; I couldn’t feel her warmth and she shook like a leaf, but I appreciated the gesture. I didn’t think I had it in me to help raise a filly but with Celestia as my witness I would see Star through to adulthood if it killed me.

Nebula refilled her glass and downed it just as quickly. I followed suit and asked her about the surface. We went back and forth for hours trading stories about her new and my old world. I was told of the great exploits of the illustrious Stargazer and tales of Nebula’s own time in the Wasteland. Grand epics of raiders, rangers, refugees, scavengers, alicorns, the Enclave, and heroes that rose above it all. I told her of my misspent youth and some of my many tales from The Great War. It had been too long since I last got drunk with a stranger-turned-friend. I will admit that I don’t remember much of what happened that night, but I know that we shared a good time, and that neither the alcohol nor Nebula Skater survived the night.

Author's Note

Well congrats for making it through the first chapter! I'm still pretty green with this whole writing thing but hopefully Shadow and her tales will be enjoyable. I've had a lot of this rattling around in my head and figured I would go mad if I didn't get it out.

Of course, thank you to Kkat and Somber for FO:E and cyberponies respectively.
Proof read/edited by ClickClackTheBrony

Not really perfect but pretty good song for Shadow:

Up and out :trollestia:

Chapter 2: Starprancer

I’ll admit right now, I have a bit of a socially awkward streak and a rather abrasive personality. I had a rough at home situation growing up and I spent the prime of my life essentially working as a professional assassin during one of the most brutal conflicts in history. I had issues on top of the general depression, exhaustion, and crushing anxiety about everything hanging over my head. I wasn’t exactly the best person or of the right mindset to be helping a young filly grieve the loss of her mother.

Not that Starprancer needed any help from me.

She was nowhere to be seen when I woke up, groggy and a bit hungover. First, I elected to just lay on the floor and let a headache throb. However, the haze actually cleared out of my head after a few minutes and I didn’t feel like my memory was locked in ice. I wouldn’t have gone so far as saying I felt good when I finally opened my eyes and sat up, but I felt a whole lot better.

That feeling lasted for about as long as it took my stomach to flip. I doubled over and tried to vomit but nothing came up. The sensation of needing to throw up but not being able to was terrible, like a sneeze that wouldn’t come out combined with being strangled and punched really hard in the gut. It left me dry heaving with every muscle left in my body but my synthetic stomach not allowing me release. Fortunately, it eventually passed.

With my confidence in wellness dashed, I lifted myself off of the floor, stumbling around the Overmare’s office and into her attached apartment where I found a bathroom. I shuffled into the small room and went straight to the shower stall at the back. I idly hit the faucet and then collapsed, curling into the fetal position as the warm water rained on me.

The warmth eased my aches and quelled my nausea a little. I also hadn’t realized how dirty I was until I saw the water going down the drain was a murky rusty brown. There had been a lot of dirt, soot, and blood in my coat, to say nothing of the gross, crusty, after-birthy shit left over from cryostasis. I was more than happy to lay there and let the water work its wonders for an eternity.

However, it was at this junction that Starprancer finally discovered me.

“What are you doing?”

I cracked an eye and looked over to the door to see the white unicorn standing in it, a confused look across her face.

“I’m taking a bath,” I mumbled.

“But that’s a shower, not a bathtub. And you’re just laying in it, you’re not going to get clean like that. You have to scrub or something.”

“Mmmm,” I grumbled, meaninglessly. “I’ll get up in a minute.” Just as soon as this migraine dies down and my back aches a little less. I closed my eye and pressed my head into the wall, trying to force a piercing pain out of my brain’s left hemisphere.

“Oh... “ she said, looking at me and shifting her weight around awkwardly. “I was just wondering how much longer you were going to be. I was trying to go to the…” She trailed off and stole a glance at the toilet.

“I’m not stopping you,” I mumbled.

The filly’s face went beat red and she moved to take a step back. “Are you alright? You’re acting weird, but you’re also a weird pony so maybe this is normal for you…”

“I’m having a terrible morning to be honest, I don’t usually act like this at all,” I yawned. “But, I grew up with three sisters and three brothers and then joined the military, I highly doubt I haven’t seen whatever you have. Unless you mole ponies have been up to even weirder shit in here than I thought.”

“Mole ponies?” Star got caught up on my new slur before gritting her teeth at me and using her front leg to cover herself. “That doesn’t matter, you just met me! Do you know how inappropriate that is? I’m a kid! And you’re naked too!”

“Ponies don’t usually wear clothes…” I said tilting my head at her. “Or do they?”

“Yes!” she snapped.

“Wait, really? Why? You all live in a big climate-controlled concrete box. You have literally no need for clothes at all.”

“Because running around naked is weird!” She stomped her hoof defiantly at me.

The sight of the pre-teen puffing out her chest in anger, ears pinned back against her head, was hilariously unintimidating and downright adorable. It honestly reminded me of when I got into arguments with my little sisters and they would take a similar pose of defiance. I giggled and felt my vision swim a little, an odd fuzzy feeling settling across my body as I stared off.

I then felt a wave of freezing water crash over and jerked my head into the side of the stall. I hiccuped violently a few times and felt a wave of dizziness pass over me before my stomach flipped again. I resisted throwing up though and just held my hoof in my mouth, biting down on it. The little burst of pain that would help ground me was gone but the motion itself was enough to steady me. I let the cold water flow over me, my teeth digging into my forehoof’s plastic shell.

“Shadow… Shadow, you’re fine, just breathe and keep calm. C-come back, p-please…”

I hadn’t noticed the set of hooves right in front of me but I slowly followed them up to see a soaked to the bone and very upset Starprancer. She slowly reached out and rested her leg on the side of my head, rubbing along the stubble where my mane used to be. “You’re fine, right?”

I shifted and sat up a little. “Yeah… Just a little spell.” I swallowed down the weight in my gut and looked at the filly, trying my best to seem unphased.

She looked like it was her that had the episode. In sharp contrast to the composed comforting look she had given me, she was shaking and her face was warped with tears that were barely restrained or maybe already flowing down her water slicked face.

“Are you alright?” I finally asked the filly the question I should have had ready when she woke up this morning.

“I-I-I... “ She shuddered and looked down but otherwise retained her composure. “The ponies that have been to the surface do that. Get that far off look in their eyes like their mind was carried away by some monster and their body doesn’t know what to do. My granny did it a lot and Mom had started doing it.” Her voice caught, “I-I… I hate seeing that look, it scares me.”

I reached out and bought the filly into a hug. “I’m sorry,” I said quietly, rubbing her back gently. “Forgive an old mare’s quirks and shakes, I should have been holding together better.”

“It’s fine.” She looked up at me with her beautiful set of emerald eyes. They were weighted down with sorrow and pain but there was steel in them too. She had a strong spirit.

I nodded and sat there for a minute, the water still pouring down me. It dawned on me that Starprancer was soaking wet in her clothes and probably getting cold. That I was in what amounted to a mass grave that was probably going to start stinking pretty soon. That I would have to figure out a plan of action to get myself and Star from this crypt, through an assumedly frozen wasteland to... somewhere where we could… do something?

I shook the issue of a long term plan from my head, right now I needed to focus on our first hurdle: leaving Stable 13 and getting out of the Crystal Empire. And before I could do that, I should really finish my shower.

“I think I’ll be good on my own, Star. You take care of yourself, I promise I won’t peak, then get changed and we’ll see about getting gear together and seeing to your mother.”

“I already took care of Mom,” Star interjected quietly, “I took her down to the incinerator this morning. I couldn’t just leave her there.”

I was stunned by the declaration, I figured she was a strong kid but that was rough. I gave her a few pats on the back before releasing her. Star shook the water out of her mane and stepped out of the shower stall. Grabbing a towel, she looked over her shoulder, “Not a peak.”

“I swear on my father’s grave,” I answered with a faint smile as I closed the shower curtain.

“And make sure to use lots of soap, you smell really bad!”

“Thank you for that, Starprancer.” I rolled my eyes as I moved the tap back to a warmer setting and stepped under the spray. I found several bottles of surprisingly nice and wonderfully scented shampoos and conditioners and set about scouring my slimy, filthy coat. My mane had been shaved off as part of the prep for cryostasis and the soaps weren’t effective on my augments’ carbon fiber shells so I had only get a brush out and scrub my body, neck, and face.

I felt some of the stress and anxiety wash away with the grime. When I stepped out of the stall, I felt settled and ready to move. I toweled off and stole a look at the black beauty in the mirror making the matured disabled veteran look work for her. The matte gray augments complimented my coat’s glossy pitch black and looked pretty cool in my opinion. My left eye was unsettling, though. It was a bright icy blue, like a husky dog’s, in sharp contrast to my natural deep cobalt color, and the iris softly glowed red.

Whatever, I could grow my bangs out and cover it up later.

I walked out the door and stopped halfway into the hallway. “Hey, Star! Are you gonna freak out about me walking around naked?”

“Yes!” came from somewhere in the apartment. “What’s so hard about covering up a little bit?”

“What part do I cover up” I asked, looking at my chest and back. “My ribs, my wings, that little floof at the top of my chest? ”

“NO!”

“Is it like my flanks? Wait, it’s the calves, isn’t it?” I teased. “Come on, mine are plastic, you know how insensitive that is?”

“Your mare parts and stuff!”

“You can’t see any of that unless you’re staring under my tail, you little perv.”

“UGH! JUST!... Just go down to security and find something to wear and stop being weird!” she shouted out, sounding thoroughly flustered.

I chuckled a little and started walking back through the Overmare’s apartment, through her office, and down to the security wing. The floor was strewn with casings, shrapnel, soot, and bodies. The walls were scorched, chipped, cracked, and in places one could see the rock the stable was carved into exposed. I walked through the carnage, long since jaded to the sights of battle. Eventually, I was able to find Stable Security’s equipment lock up. The arsenal had been completely raided for weapons but the other gear was mostly untouched.

The security ponies had an extremely diverse selection of outfits, ranging from plain vanilla Stable-Tec Security uniforms to hilarious ensembles of gear I could only assume passed as proper attire on the surface. Combat armor with spikes welded on randomly, massive leather trench coats, all manner of old helmets mashed together with random visual implements like goggles and welding shields or even an old colander turned into a face shield. It seemed like a wardrobe for a really cheesy, dumb play or maybe a fetish dungeon, certainly not a paramilitary organization.

As much fun as I had looking through the silly knick knacks, I had trouble finding anything that would fit a mare of my stature. The only wasteland looking thing that I found big enough for me was a musty old cloak with a matching desperado hat, which I promptly declined. I would be damned if I was walking around looking one of the smugglers from the far south that I started my career chasing.

Abandoning the clown collection I started looking through the Stable’s more conventional barding and struck gold: a seemingly untouched set of winterized Stable combat barding sized for a large stallion. The suit was essentially a heavy duty jump suit, durable waterproof fabric on the outside done in Stable-Tec’s blue with yellow trim, with a thick fleece thermal insert on the inside that could be pulled out in warmer weather. A large hood of the same material laid over the tall collar to make sure a wearer stayed warm and dry from nose to hoof. The legs had shin guards integrated into them and heavy soled boots on the rear hooves. The chest featured a black tactical vest with ballistic plates, ammo pouches, and mounting points for holsters or a battle saddle. Finally, there were a set of Stable-Tec’s awesome saddlebags that you could put damn near anything in, and a healthy dose of extra pockets.

I wiggled into it and found myself quite satisfied. It was a bit tight in the chest and around the back of my shoulders while quite loose around my stomach, but it fit well enough overall. It wasn’t very stealthy and would chafe if I didn’t wear anything under it but it was armored, blocked a bit of radiation, and would keep me warm while packing all of my stuff away.

With my new attire equipped, I turned and walked back to Star to find her in what I could only assume was her bedroom, packing a pile of salvaged goodies from around her home. I was honestly surprised with how expedient the filly was. A beautiful crystal hair comb with a butterfly resting on a flower, a few books, and her revolvers were sitting on a night stand, apparently the only valuables she was taking. She was sitting in front of a pile of food, meds, and ammo for her guns.

The white unicorn turned to me when I entered, her magic shimmering around horn and guns for a second before she realized it was me. She smirked, “Going native? Super cyberponies shouldn’t really need armor.”

I rolled my eyes at her. “It doesn’t matter how ineffective it is, getting shot hurts. And I would look pretty stupid if I died of hypothermia. Besides,” -I looked back along the uniform- “it’s nice. Really just needs wing holes.”

“I don’t think you want to go around showing off your wings, Shadow. Most surfacers don’t like pegasi.”

I remembered Nebula telling me about how the pegasi had sealed themselves above the clouds, abandoning Equestria and founding their Enclave. I could see how that would breed deep resentment for my race but, “I couldn’t care less about what wastelanders think of me. It’s not like they’ll start freaking out just because I’m a pegasus.”

“True,” Star nodded, “most ponies wouldn’t know how to handle a cyber-manticore-pegasus.”

“Manticore?” I looked back on myself and instantly made the connection. The wings with a long scorpion-like tail. “Oh, I guess there is some resemblance.”

“Some resemblance?” Star snarked.

“Whatever, molepony. My colors are all wrong and I don’t have bat wings.” I scoffed at her. “You got everything together?”

“Mostly,” she answered, “I need to get this packed away and see if my pipbuck’s done.”

I looked down and noticed the filly’s oversized wristwatch was missing. “What’s your pipbuck doing?”

“I started downloading my list of read later books from the digital archive when I woke up this morning.” She blushed a bit and focused on stuffing boxes of apple cereal into her saddlebags. I gave her a funny look that she caught out of the corner of her eye. “What? Reading calms me and I’m gonna need a lot of material if I’m never coming back here and Pipbucks have ridiculous memories.”

“I didn’t say anything,” I told her simply. “Is this all we’re going to have or are we going to be able to find more gear?”

“We should raid the store rooms near The Door. They’re going to have lots of food we can travel with and medicine and caps.”

“Caps?”

“Bottlecaps,” she clarified. “They’re what the surfacers use for money.”

“How does that work?”

“I don’t know. It just kinda does.” She shrugged.

I rolled my eyes again. “And you call me weird.” I reached past Star and scooped up what was left of her stash sticking it in one of my saddle bags.”I need to go to my locker and then we can roll out.” I turned and trotted out of the room, looking back to see a filly that just realized she was saying goodbye to her childhood home. “I’ll be down by the stasis chambers, Star. You catch up when you’re ready.”

She gave me a tearful nod as I departed. I walked through the Stable’s oppressive silence to the wing where I had rested for two hundred years. Instead of returning to the stasis pods, I went into the wing’s private armory. It had been mostly stripped by my loony compatriots, but the mechanized rack with our trunks was still intact. I punched in my code and after a whirling of machinery received my locker.

I opened the box and pulled out a few items: a folded up black and purple dress uniform, a few folders, my cybernetics’ user manual, a small statuette of a cyan pegasus. Finally, I found a black and purple Shadowbolts flight suit with a matching set of yellow goggles. I pressed the fabric to my face, luxuriating in the cool, smooth, soft, elastic material. The flight suit was perfect as an undergarment for my new armor. The hooded bodysuit was made from an amazing material that was designed to keep a pony as close to their natural body temperature as possible through swampy suffocating humidity, blazing desert heat, high-altitude flying’s biting chill, and anything in between. Additionally, it also offered a decent bit of protection against magical energy and bladed weapons. The suit would do a wonderful job keeping me from chafing and was way too nice to leave behind anyway.

I got out of my barding and slipped into the flight suit without a problem, the thing fitting like a glove as I threw the auto-tinting goggles around my neck. I dug around in my locker again until I found my rucksack. I extracted my fieldcraft kit from it, took out some heavy thread and a needle, and pulled over my barding. It was simple to make a pair of cuts to the back of my barding and stitch seams around them to keep the holes from expanding. I was just finishing the simple mod when I heard Starprancer’s hooves behind me.

“You were a Shadowbolt?” she asked, the awe plain in her voice.

“Mm hmm,” I hummed affirmatively, working on setting the last stitch in a secure knot. “One of the first.”

“Wow, that’s really cool.” She walked over, wearing a winter vest, boots, and cloak over her jump suit, and started marveling at my dress uniform and its many medals and ribbons. “That’s a lot of awards. What do they mean?”

I put down my finished barding and leaned over to her. “That one,” I pointed to a brass fleur de lis hanging from a dark maroon and olive drab ribbon, “is the badge of a Royal Marine Corps Recon-Sharpshooter, first cool one I got way back in the day. That,” I pointed to a black storm cloud with a winged skull the side and a green, purple, and black lightning bolt shooting out the bottom, “is a Founder Shadowbolt flash, to honor those of us that were around when it was just one flight of ponies over Vanhoover. I’ve got a few silver and bronze battle crests, Distinguished Service Shields, a couple of theater ribbons. My purple heart and POW medal.”

“This one though is my favorite, though.” I leaned away from the uniform and reached into my locker removing a small red velvet box. Opening it revealed a golden six pointed star. In the center was the stylized sun of Princess Celestia overlaid with Luna’s crescent moon. A laurel wreath of green crystal ran in a circle around the star’s points. A ribbon of Equestria’s blue and yellow was folded away underneath for when the medal was to be worn around the neck.

“It’s gorgeous. What is it?” Star asked not taking her eyes off the gold as she gently lifted it out of its case to look at it closer.

“My Celestial Star of Valor, the highest honor there is in the Equestrian Armed Forces.”

“How’d you get it?” she asked finally looking up at me.

“Well,” I shivered, “I think you can hear that story when you’re older.”

Star pouted as I turned back to my locker, pulling out a suppressed assault carbine. I had rarely carried three guns; it was nice to have another firearm beside your sniper rifle that wasn’t a pistol, but the added weight wasn’t usually worth it in my eyes. Especially since I almost always had at least a spotter with me carrying something for close-range. I didn’t have that luxury now so I would have to buck up and carry two rifles. It probably wouldn’t be too bad being a cyberpony, anyway.

I loaded my webbing with carbine magazines and slung the small rifle around my neck. Next, I pulled out the long hard case of my sniper rifle. An intercepted Zebra report had given my signature weapon the nickname Scythe and I was overcome an old sense that I could take down anything with it in my hooves.

It was an old, full sized, bolt action rifle that still bore most of its walnut stock, complete with a menagerie of wear marks, a crude carving of “Born to Kill” over the receiver, and a stylized print of a pegasus skeleton wearing a cloak and leaning against a scythe on the comb. An old machine gun bipod was mounted to the end of the forend. The top looked more modern though, featuring an aluminum rail assembly in place of its traditional wood and iron sights, letting me quickly swap between scopes. Finally, flash hider/suppressor-mount hung at the end of the muzzle. It was a beautiful old gun and something that was innately familiar to me, its smell and feel oddly comforting.

I placed the rifle into a padded fabric drag bag, attached it to my daysack, the bag containing most of my necessary gear; and strapped the whole affair to my back, the rifle hanging off my left haunch. I raided through my locker and rucksack for anything else of use or sentimental value, squirreling it away in my saddlebags or pockets. Finally packed, I turned to Star. “You ready to go?”

She nodded but a bit of light went out of her eyes. We left the arsenal and proceeded through the atrium up to the Stable’s entrance. This place was also in rough shape, the Stable ponies having set up a solid defence at the entrance that the Steel Raiders had decided to deal with using excessive explosive force.The whole place was pretty much coated in char. Star went to a store room off to the side that contained piles of valuables. She quickly topped off our saddlebags with food, meds, caps, a small spark battery powered space heater, and anything else we figured we needed.

With that finally done, I figured we were about as ready for the Wastes as we could be. I walked out through the massive cog shaped door, only to stop and look back at Star. She looked at the door like a dragon’s gaping maw. I sighed, “Starprancer, you can’t stay here.”

“Where are we going?”

“I…” I grimaced. I didn’t really know. Technically, I still had directives under Operation Windigo to fulfill but I couldn’t think of anything that would still be a pressing matter after two hundred years. I guess, I could see if the Princesses were dead and check up on whatever was left of Rarity. Make sure a few dark dirty secrets stayed buried. Destroy a small mountain of documents and experimental tech. But none of that really answered Star’s question.

“I don’t know,” I said. “We’ll travel south out of the ice and see where to go from there.”

“That’s it?” she asked, an angry edge creeping into her voice. “That’s your grand plan? Just wander south and hope for the best? You know what the world is like out there? We were safe here. The Rangers, the Enclave, the scum that passes for ponies; none of them could get to us here. This was our home! What’s going to happen to us out there?”

“You’re going to survive and thrive, Star,” I said. “Nothing lasts forever, I know it’s going to be rough but we have to keep moving forward. You need to be strong, face what the world throws at you head on.”

“This was never supposed to happen, Mom was smarter than this. There was no way they could have found us, no way!”

“Star, stop,” I said.

“Shut up, Shadow!” she snapped. “You’ve been frozen for two-hundred years, you don’t care about what happened here.” Tears were streaming down her face. “I saw you walking around, you don’t care that they’re all dead or that it was monsters like you that did it. You don’t know-”

“Don’t you dare!” I snarled. “Don’t you dare tell me I don’t know what it’s like to lose people.” Star jumped, backing away at my exclamation. I lowered my voice, but my cold glare remained.”Don’t you dare discount my loss, I’ve got nothing left in this world but a few nicknacks, two promises, memories, and you.”

The silence stretched out between us. I became aware of a tightness in my chest and the slightest tremble of my lower lip but I held strong and stoic. Star looked at me in shock and fear before a horrified expression spread across her face. “Shadow, I’m so sorry. I-”

“It’s fine, Star, we lash out when we hurt. Nothing I haven’t gotten before,” I said somberly. I cocked my head toward the outside. “Come on, we’ve been dawdling too long.”

She nodded tearfully, looking over her shoulder into the stable as she started walking toward me. I wrapped a hoof around her and escorted her out as she wept quietly and absorbed the last look at her home she would get.

Once out of the Stable, I left Star sitting in front of the door as I trotted over to a control panel, ejected my Pip’s uplink cable, and sent the message to close the door. The great slab of steel slowly rolled over to cover the entrance before pressing forward, sealing the shelter turned tomb.

I walked over to Star again. She simply turned to me and pressed her face into my chest as she burst out sobbing.

Starprancer didn’t seem to be one for tears. She only cried for a few minutes before she was dry, leaving her solemn and quiet. I rubbed her back and hoisted her up onto my back, turning to give our surroundings a proper look.

We were in a large underground intersection: concrete, war propaganda, and bodies all around. The area was faintly illuminated by flickering lights and a bit of sunlight coming down a large staircase across from the Stable door. On each side there were tunnels that went off into darkness. The space was massive, scaled for thousands of ponies to easily make their daily commutes to work.

If my memory was correct, we were beneath the Shining Armor Memorial Hospital and Research Center. The facility was enormous; featuring one of the largest, best-equipped hospitals in the nation, Hub offices for the Ministries of Peace and Arcane Science. Iit was at the forefront of medical developments throughout the War. Many of the medical miracles that revolutionized the world were created here including most mass produced healing potions, surgical robots, healing chambers, and stasis pods. It had also earned the nickname of “Death’s Cradle” for its role in megaspell development and some other projects carried out in its basements.

The area was scattered with the remains of Stable Dwellers, Steel Rangers, Windigos, and an odd fourth party. Dozens of robotic ponies with gray, rubber skin laid about. I don’t know who finally figured out how to make a robot that actually looks like a pony but kudos to them. “What are these?”

Star looked over my shoulder at my discovery, concern and interest spreading across her face. “That’s a synth.”

“A synth? What in Celestia’s mane is a synth?”

“They’re these really advanced robots,” Star told me. “Mom said that they are really strong and attack ponies on sight. They showed up about a year ago, the surface crews had lots of problems with them because they wander all over the city.”

“Well running into these things sounds like it will be fun,” I said dryly, shaking my head. “They just showed up?”

“Yeah, Mom and the other grown ponies thought that they had escaped from the Hospital or one of the military bases around here.”

I simply nodded.

“So,” Star turned back to me, “where are we and where should we be going?”

“Well.” I consulted the maps of the area stored on my PIP. “That,” I pointed to the stairwell up, “should come out in the Crystal Plaza near 23rd and Amethyst. That,” I pointed to our left, “leads to the main reception of the hospital’s research center and this way will take us to the metro station.” I turned to our right and started walking into the darkness. “If we follow the metro lines south we should arrive at the train station. From there we just follow those rails south to whatever’s left of Winnieappolis and further into the heartland. That should work right?”

“I guess. I’ve just never been outside before. Mom was going to start letting me come to the surface with her after my next birthday.” She looked longingly toward the stairs upward.

“We’ll be exposed up on the surface and at the mercy of the elements.” The subterranean space was freezing and the constant draft coming down the stairs seemed to be the main cause of it. “You’ll be outside all you want after we get out of town.”

“OK,” she said dejectedly as I started the downward trek to the metro station.

Part of me had wanted to listen to her and head up, just to see the sun again. But I had promised Star’s dying mother that I would take care of the unicorn and I liked her. I had only just scratched the surface but she was smart, motivated, persistent, and adorable, even if she had a few rough spots. I really didn’t want to get her killed by making a foolish mistake.

The two of us descended the tunnel to the Metro station in silence. Eventually, we arrived at a fork. One path was marked “Pink Line” and lead off to the left; the other was “Blue Line” and turned into a stairway leading deeper into the ground.

“Where do we go from here?” Star asked.

“I… don’t know,” I had only spent a bit of time in the Crystal Empire and had flown most places. Consulting the maps and plans I had stored in my PIP was met with limited success since the schematics numbered everything; tunnel “M-1A” didn’t sound very pink or blue. The interchange we were standing at was a mass of curved lines that nopony without a drafting associate’s could hope to understand.

I kneeled down so Star could jump off of me. “Look around on the walls for a map of the routes and lines.”

Star nodded and we both moved to different sides of the massive hallway. The walls were covered in countless posters all preaching about the war. “Better wiped then striped.” “Victory! Just a wing beat away.” “Knowledge is power.” “Keeping Equestria safe.” “We must do better.” “Pinkie Pie is watching you FOREVER!” (still makes my skin crawl) “Restore Harmony” “Know your enemy!” “Secure your future-Today!” Join a ministry. Join the Army. Join the Navy. Join the Air Forces. Become a Steel Ranger. Gawk in awe at the Shadowbolts. Watch out for Zebras. Secure your place in a Stable-Tec Stable. Drink Sparkle Cola, damn it!

I found myself getting lost in my memories. Things had gone so far in so short a time, I remember coming home and simply becoming lost in what my nation had become. I would sit and watch ponies race about their daily lives Studying their posters, food, clothes, technology, and society like the outsider I had become.

“Shadow!” I jumped as Star’s little body showed off a hidden volume, echoing around in the tunnels.

“Easy, Star,” I answered. Looking around I located the green glow of her Pipbuck’s light up the tunnel where we had come from. “I’m coming.”

I trotted over to the filly who was sitting in front of a full length sign. The lights for illuminating it had burned out but Star’s Pipbuck lamp showed it to indeed be a map of the greater Crystal Empire and its subway network. I was quick to pick out the junction of the Pink and Blue lines just south of the central, snowflake-shaped city of Amor. The Pink Line ran east to west from Cryolite to Fort Haygen. The Blue Line went north to south along the length of the built up areas, running under Amethyst Ave, down to the Wintergreen Landing train station. “Wonderful, the blue line will take us right to the train station. Come on, Star.”

Star started to follow me but stopped, looking at the wall. “Did ponies really believe these posters? Zebras look nothing like that and I don’t think a soda has any medical value. You pre-war ponies were silly.”

“Wartime. And yes, yes they were,” I answered. Star turned to me looking confused but didn’t say anything.

The stairs lead down to another junction; straight ahead went down to the platform while the left lead out onto a bridge to the other side of the line.

“Goddesses.” Star’s quiet proclamation carried through the massive space in a growing cacophony of echoes. The station was a massive elongated dome that would have made a good event arena. The cavern was breathtaking with its crystal walls, chandeliers, and massive arch that supported the Pink Line and its platforms overhead. The whole space was lit by scattered glow-crystals casting ghostly hues of pink, yellow, purple, and blue.

“And you wanted to go up to the surface,” I gently elbowed Star as I went down to the platform. I stopped once I got to the edge, looking down at the tracks and listening.

“What’s the matter?” Star asked

“Two of these tracks are for the wheels of the train car. The third carries electricity to power the train.”

“Cool!” Star, never stop being you. “So, what’s the matter then?”

“I’m wondering whether or not there’s still power to the track. Neither of us is going to survive a thousand sparks running through our body.” I answered, turning back from the edge of the platform.

“You really think that that the power would still be on? After two hundred years?”

“The lights are still on. Most things were ridiculously over engineered and a lot of stuff seems to have passed the test of time.” I was sifting through the bones and rubbish on the ground. The Dwellers of Stable 13 had cleared away any of the ancient deceased that might have littered the space outside their home however, the same could not be said of this train station.

“Ah, this should work.” I lifted a metallic medical brace, trotting back over to the edge and dropping it on the third rail. Nothing happened.

“We’re golden,” I said, dropping down onto the tracks. I then turned and stood on my back legs to lower Star down.

“So, we just follow these out of the city and just keep going south?” Star asked looking slightly vexed.

“That’s the general plan,” I looked over at her. “Should be smooth sailing until we get into the Heartland.”

My statement lasted for six miles of barren, quiet, completely peaceful, abandoned underground track. We had just gotten past the station at 45th St. when I started hearing things. Hooves on concrete echoed down through the tunnels along with what sounded like snakes hissing.

“What do you think that is?” Star asked in a whisper. She had moved much closer to me.

“I don’t know but hopefully it’s not more than we can handle.” I hefted the Equestrian up and flipped the carbine’s safety off. Star opened her saddlebags and started pulling out her revolvers. “No,” I put a hoof on her shoulder and she looked up at me, her brow creased.

“Whoever it is will be able to see your magic.” The frown on the filly’s face deepened but her horn dimmed. She even turned off her Pipbuck’s lamp, leaving us in near total darkness. The only light in the space came from a few scattered maintance lights that persisted. Everything else I saw through my cybernetic eye’s night vision.

Moving on confirmed that the hissing wasn’t snakes. The sound had a harmonious tone to it like a set of chimes playing just the wrong notes. There were dozens of sets of hooves slowly shuffling around. A head I saw equine shapes meandering about; an odd blue/white glow in the center of the creatures. I stopped us twenty hooves away from the “ponies.”

This situation stank to high hell. There were almost fifty creatures blocking our way forward. They seemed docile but my ears tingled and I was getting ghost sensations in my wings. What ever they were, they weren’t safe to be around. I entertained the thought that we had stumbled across a group of synths but they weren’t acting like the killer robots Star had described. Then there was that hissing, it didn’t sound like anything I had ever heard before. It was beautiful and unsettling at the same time; like an angel choir’s impression on rapture.

The pitch of one hiss grew higher and one of the ponies shuffled up closer to us. Star was pretty much under hoof as I shoved the interloper away from me. This proved to be a bad idea as it pounced at me, biting down on the hoof I brought up to block it. The carbon-fiber and acrylic shell of my limb was crushed in the jaws of the monster I had provoked.

“Fuckin’ hell!” I yelled as I yanked the limb out of the thing’s jaws in a spray of hydraulic fluid and oil. Star let out an ear splitting scream as she was doused in hot fluids, the noise drawing echoes from the walls and creatures. I brought a wingblade swinging around at the monster’s neck and severed its head. I had just enough sensation in my wing to know that it required a lot more effort then slicing through a neck should.

Another monster let out a scream and threw itself at me. I staggered back on three limbs and brought my wingblades back to bear. My swipe nicked off the things hide and I reared up on my back hooves to avoid it taking a chunk out of my face. I then brought my hoof bearing down on its head, slamming it into the concrete and shattering its head. I took a few steps back and brought my rifle up.

A green light flicked on behind while the blue one ahead shone on me like a spotlight, getting brighter. The second the horde saw the green light a horrible scream went out through it that froze my blood and oil alike. I instantly pumped a couple rounds from my carbine into the skull of the nearest monster. Its head splintered and then shattered into fragments.

In the green light of Star’s Pipbuck I got my first good look at these things. They might have been crystal ponies at some point, now however they were abominations. Their glimmering but discolored coats were cracked and warped. Almost as if they had been melted just to cool and splinter when the creatures moved again. Each mouth was a mess of razor sharp crystal shards. Their milky white eyes looked positively evil in the green light.

I let instinct kick in as I moved deftly, subconsciously prioritizing targets and taking them down with controlled bursts. At the minimal range, I didn’t miss any of my shots but I also wasn’t inflicting enough damage; the bastards could take three or four rounds to the head each to kill.

“Shadow! There are more ghouls behind us!” Star screamed at me. Sure enough, more zombies were streaming out of an access tunnel a ways back and making a beeline for us. Our situation was deteriorating rapidly and me turning away from my opponents only made it worse. I turned back to face the rear end of a massive stallion in the middle of a buck. I couldn’t dodge as he kicked me in the head, my vision went blurry and my carbine slipped out of my mouth as I staggered. Another one of the bastards took a swipe with a front hoof that knocked me to the ground, blood running out of my mouth and nose.

Bang! – Bang!

My silenced carbine’s report had been noticeable, the sounds of the angered hoard were loud, and Star’s scream had made me cringe. The blast that filled the tunnel as Star fired Sunshine and Moonbeam was like being kicked in the head again. The sound rumbled throughout the miles of subterranean passages. She hit her marks though; the two zombies that had been double-timing me collapsed bleeding what looked like mercury from their wounds.

Bang! – Bang! – Bang!

“Shadow, get up!” I felt Star’s magic wrap around me and lift. I got my hooves under me but was seeing double and still crippled. Not the worst situation I had ever been in, my carbine was back in my mouth and spitting lead instantly but I was still losing ground. There were too many of them and we were surrounded.

I moved back and took a look around the tunnel for an escape route. There, an abandoned subway train stretched back past the access tunnel spewing ghouls. We could jump on it and use it to get around the hoard, then run for our lives.

“Star, get in the train!” I tracked the filly’s movement through the shadows her Pipbuck’s light cast, falling back toward our goal. When the change in light had indicated that she had gotten into the train cars I turned and ran.

It proved a bad idea as I was tackled to the ground, my face getting rubbed in the ancient grease and dirt. The ghouls started beating and chewing on my wings and back but didn’t damage anything; my barding was already serving me well. I thrashed my wingblades and tail around fucking up the ghouls’ legs and getting drenched in their ichor. Getting to my hooves, I started lashing out with my wings and swinging around my scorpion tail. My plasma pistol soon joined in as I skipped reloading my carbine, however it seemed to not be too effective against the crystal coats though.

I was almost beating the tide back when the blue light shone on me. Instantly, the ichor on my clothes started to burn me like napalm but left my clothes unscathed. I screamed out and fell writhing in pain, trying to get the magical fluid off. From the ground I could see the origin of the ghostly light that was killing me. The ghoul’s coat looked like an oil spill, hues of a tainted rainbow reflecting off the poisoned skin. The blue magic coming from its mouth and eyes was healing the fallen ghouls around me.

At that point my world of pain gained an emerald tint to it and the sound of a set of very loud revolvers tearing into the pack ringed in my ears. I was lifted off the ground and levitated into the train the door slamming shut behind me. “Shadow!” Star grabbed me by the face. “Please get up. D-don’t die!”

My pain stopped as soon as Star moved me out of the blue glow. I took a shaky breath and tried to get up. My stomach wretched and I felt light headed, collapsing again. The frantic ticking of Star’s Pipbuck indicated that the blue light and ichor were throwing off radiation. I was probably poisoned which kinda pissed me off. Even with all my Celestia damned augmentation I had no real way of dealing with the effects of radiation poisoning. My healing talisman would repair any damage my organic body endured, including cellular destruction caused by radiation. However, the rads would still impair my nervous system, cause cellular degeneration, and eventually mutations. In short, it wouldn’t kill me, but it would leave me in a semi-conscious world of pain and delirium until I asphyxiated, cardiac arrested, or starved. At least, I would get mauled to death before that happened.

No, I wasn’t going to die. I had survived too much to finally fall to a bunch of magical abominations in some tunnel; I was going to go out fighting an army of super-mutant zebra cyber-alicorns for the fate of the world when I felt like dying. Star was going to do great things in life, I could tell that much from the way she acted. Neither of our stories were going to end here.

Of course fighting didn’t seem like a viable option either. I struggled once again to my hooves and picked Star up with my teeth. Swinging the filly on my back and covering her with my wings, I turned and broke into a gallop down the train. I skipped opening doors between cars and simply jumped through the windows in cascades of glass. In no time, I was at the last car and face to face with the ghouls entering it.

Ugh. Why can’t these fuckers just be too braindead to do anything? I thought these things would be brain dead but it almost seemed like they were strategizing. We had been lured in and surrounded by them. “Star, hold on,” I said weakly. My mouth tasted like blood and oil, breathing was becoming hard as my lungs filled with fluids and Star dug into to my neck. My computers were showing me warnings but I ignored it all as I slammed my intact foreleg through the three ghouls on the train. Arriving at the doorway, I leapt and pumped my wings. My flight talisman might have been shot but my wings could still move enough air to launch me over the horde at the end of the train.

I landed hard, breaking something in my chewed on leg and bouncing off the floor. I was back on my hooves and running without missing a beat though. The ghouls had to have been organized, there were now over a hundred of them in the tunnel and more were pouring in.

Bang! – Bang! – Bang!

Star’s revolvers knocked down anything in our path as I raced away from the main mass of ghouls. We had only just gotten past the 45th St. station; if we could get back there we could exit to the surface. There wasn’t going be ghouls wandering around the street, right?

When Star and I had first gone through the station it had seemed completely abandoned. Now, ghouls were jumping down onto the tracks en masse. I had been hugging the wall but as I arrived at the station I cut across all four sets of tracks, avoiding the ghouls coming off the edge of the nearest platform. I made for the center of the platform on the other side of the tracks which was mostly ghoul free. With another great leap and pump of my wings I was off the rails and up a creek.

There was a stairway up at each end of the terrace; the one in front of me was collapsed, rubble blocking any ascent. I skidded on the tile floor as I came about and made for the other stairs. This path was also blocked; twenty ghouls stood between me and my exit. I was cut off from the surface. Thinking quickly I bounded onto a long bench, at the end of it was a Sparkle-Cola machine. I once again employed my wing-assisted jump, leaping up onto the soda machine and using it to hurl myself over the ghouls.

I spread my wings and landed with a tile splintering crash halfway up the flight of stairs. My face took another bashing and yet more warnings appeared in my vision. All of it ignored as I ran, following any routes that lead up with the ghouls at the base of the stairs in pursuit.

Up three flights and through a few junctions, the horrible hissing sound continued washing over the space behind me. A couple times ghouls managed to jab at me. One sharp corner left me stumbling as my brain struggled to sort out the movements of my body in its oxygen starved state. A ghoul jumped on me and dug its teeth into my lower back, I still trucked through the weight and bucked it off.. As I continued on, everything around me started to loose definition. My vision blurred, nerves numbed, and thoughts ground to a halt. I was only able to watch through my eyes as a spectator on my own life. My body ran like it was on autopilot while my brain sputtered on a lack of oxygen. I barely absorbed events as I jumped a turnstile and continued running. The next feeling I had was cold air blowing over my face.

I was hit with a wall of freezing cold air at the bottom of icy steps. I struggled to find purchase as the stairs were lost in a sheet of ice that turned into a snow drift. I still managed to drag myself up and could see daylight ahead when a ghoul grabbed onto my tail. The weight dragged me down the ice. Another ghoul jumped for me but was blasted away by Star. I whipped my tail around, throwing the ghoul off and shattering its head. I was back to scrambling up the sheer ice instantly. I reached the mouth of the ice cave that subway station’s exit had become and basked in the first sunlight I had felt in two hundred years.

The sky was a clear, clean blue with the sun beaming down brightly. Even with the wind numbing every patch of skin it could touch the sun’s rays were heavenly on my face. I burst out into the open air running with the wind in my mane and sunlight on my brow, feeling the best I had in years.

“Shadow, stop.”

Why would I ever stop? I was free! I had escaped war, maiming, depression, abandonment, and a nest of demons. Not even the constraints of society or duty weighed on me any more. I was free to chase the Sun or anything else I pleased.

“Please stop, Shadow.”

I ran, soaking in my new found freedom. Basking in the glory of Celestia’s sun and reveling in the moment. The past and future ceased to exist for me. There was no war. No death. No pain. No loss. No regret. No metal. No fear. For a brief moment my world was nothing but the sun, the wind, and my face. Everything was here here and now. I could run like this forever.

“Please, you’re hurt.”

But I couldn’t. My legs and wings were metal that was heavy in more than a physical sense. My breathing was pained. Black and flashing red notices filled my vision. The weight on my back, the pressure around my neck, and tears in my mane anchored me. I imagined that my heart twisted in my chest and tears started streaming down my face.

“Shadow, STOP! You’re bleeding.”

I looked back at the small, tear-streaked white face. Behind her the snow was streaked red and black. I felt sick now: my breaths were short, my guts twisted, my head was light, and my heart heavy. She really is such a smart and observant filly, I though, I shouldn’t be running around, I need to rest. Just lay down and sleep everything off. I would wake good as new then I could go frolic in the sun and wind.

I just needed to stop and rest. The snow looked pretty soft, like a nice comfy cloud. It would be the perfect place to rest.

-Thud-

Author's Note

Edit 1-7-18: Finally reworked this. I've felt like the opening of this chapter was probably the weakest part of this story since I wrote it, but for the longest time I couldn't come up with an idea for something better. Hopefully this is though. I feel like it is, does a far better job showcasing Star and her background. Thanks for reading :trollestia:

Some of this didn't work...
I like how the ghoul scene turned out and it was a good introduction to the dangers of the Nothern Wastes but at the same time its not as good as ch 1. ClickClack (my pre-reader) said that the characterization in this chapter was weak and I'm inclined to agree. However, I've made some edits and additions to help. Plus, the next chapter should be a good one for Shadow's character development.

Note: the rate of uploads wont be this fast in the future. I worked on this fic for a month and a half before publishing anything and am only on Ch. 5. Additionally I'm off to collage so I'll be pressed for time to write for a while. I'm still doing this, it might just move a bit slowly

Thanks for reading and any feedback would be wonderful :yay:

Up and Out

Chapter 3: Dreams From the Past

The sea was red with blood, the white beach stained.

The once fertile dirt had been pulverized by artillery and gunfire, nothing growing but the body count.

Families cowered in their homes as we swept through their neighborhoods like floods of brimstone.

I laid motionless, camouflaged as I looked down on the unsuspecting. Purging life as a voice in my headset deemed fit. My blade struck like lightning and my rifle’s report was thunder that shook nations. My pen wrote letters of destruction using the blood of my own soldiers as ink.

The stink of the dead, the cries of the wounded, and the pain of the living filled my senses.

Almost twenty-five years of service weighed down on me with a mass greater than the moon.

Again, I walked the fields outside Stalliongrad, Hoofington, and Vanhoover; wandered the Reignland, the Saddle Arabian deserts, and the jungles of the Tenochtitlan Basin; prowled the streets of Canterlot and Roam alike; stood on the beaches of Gryphonia. All around me I saw my fallen friends and foes. Families that had been torn apart, members dead and homes burned.

I saw those I had killed. Zebras, griffons, minotaurs, dragons, ponies, and more paraded past me. The victims of my work would make a formidable army all on their own they numbered so many.

I looked at them as they marched by. I recognised many of them but it was hard to forget someone that you stalked and killed like a game animal. Others were little more than shapes, a being that I only remembered as an additional tally to my name.

Many were horrified by what I accomplished. The families and peers of my victims spoke of me like I was a demon. The zebras said I was some monster straight to the depths of nightmares and darkness; an eldritch terror that lived off of the blood and souls of those she purged of life. I could understand their pain and fear; those filing by were children, parents, lovers, siblings, and dear friends. I understood their feelings, I was no stranger to the loss of loved ones; it was what drove me. We were all soldiers, matter less if we took up arms or not, we lived by the same law: it was kill or be killed.

No matter how much or little I remembered of them I had no pity for any of those people. Sympathy yes, but no pity and certainly not regret. I had scars from my actions, both physically and mentally, but I lived with them the best I could. It didn’t matter how much blood or sleep I lost, I would do everything again if I had to. My suffering was worth the lives of my friends and preservation of my nation.

I watched the ghosts file past as death filled my nose and screaming rang in my ears. I felt nothing, just a cold detachment. I knew that I couldn’t let myself feel this, my mind could take the strain but my heart would collapse under the burden if I let it.

It was then that I started to see others. They were ponies, ponies that I recognized, that I had lead. Dash had been looking for the best sniper she could find but she had soon decided that I was better off as a leader, I was too smart to be some grunt pulling triggers. I had always strived to do the best at what I was asked but in the end, an officer always had losses and sacrifices. The blood of my own was on my hooves the same as that of my foes.

So much blood. Flowing from me like a river, the gushing flow of them all mixed together with the ash. My composure shattered. The void in my chest bursting outward as my tears burned my face like scalding oil. In that second I could feel it, the vile blackness that dwelt in me. The icy presence of death and fires of terror flowed from it like a spring; giving me strength but also leaving me but cold and ashen.

The pain in my very soul was unbearable, the fabric of my being feeling alien and evil. The zebras said that it was the influence of the Stars, some divine curse damning me to my red path. I could only hope they were right.

xxxxXXXXxxxx

I woke feeling ill in body and mind but in far better condition than I had any right to be. I was wrapped in warm, cozy blankets and felt the best I had since I had been put in that stasis pod; maybe even before then. Of course, my guardian angel was on watch.

Starprancer had placed me in a large bathtub with the space-heater. The shower curtain had been drawn and supplemented with another blanket to contain heat. The filly was curled up in a blanket by my head, her cloak thrown over the top for added warmth. She was looking at me with a concerned expression and her face was streaked with tears. I lifted my head to look at her properly.

“No, don’t move,” Star forced my head back down into my blanket. “How do you feel? Any pain? Nausea? Are you hungry?” she asked with her quiet little voice.

Physically, I felt fine. I was a bit hungry, my head was fuzzy, and I kind of wanted to stretch. “Do you have something to eat and drink?” She levitated over a canteen of water and a pair of sickly apples. I ate the apples eagerly and drained the canteen. “Thank you, Star.”

“It’s fine,” the unicorn answered.

“Are you OK?”

She looked down and nodded.

“Star, look at me, please.”

She continued to look down as a couple tears ran down her face.

I took a deep breath. “I’m sorry; about everything. I shouldn’t have led us into that horde of ghouls or underestimated them. I’m sorry about collapsing on you and leaving you on your own. I…. Just…. Thank you, Starprancer.”

The filly didn’t look up at me, she just shook slightly and took a few steadying breaths. When she had regained her composure she looked up at me with her big emerald eyes, full of hurt and pain. The filly’s coat had a dark, flat look to it that I didn’t like at all. She told me “You’re welcome” in a quiet whisper.

I sighed and brought a hoof around Star’s shoulder, pulling her into a hug. I knew that pressing the filly would only end in a sorrowful break down so I changed the subject. “How bad am I? My PIP is down so I can’t tell.”

Star pulled her face out of my shoulder and stole a glance at me before returning her eyes to the tub’s bottom. “You had radiation poisoning, burns, lots of bruising, a concussion, some hardware issues, and you lost a lot of fluids. I turned your PIP off after I got your error codes downloaded onto my Pipbuck, it was just eating up power screaming about how you were going to die and crashing.”

“Well, I’m still here, so you did wonderfully,” I managed lamely.

Star let out a giggle, some of the color returning to her voice and coat. She looked up at me incredulously: “Taking care of somepony on the brink of death is pretty easy when their body does most of the healing itself then flat out tells you what else is wrong with it and how to fix it,” she said, smiling. “I’ve been administering fluids and Rad-Away for the past three days, but I haven’t been able to work on your augments.”

“I was down for three days?” I asked as I rebooted my PIP

“Well, you might’ve woken up earlier, but I programmed your computers to keep you unconscious while I was out scavenging,” Star said as she floated a packet of Rad-Away to me. “It’s about time for your next dose.”

“You were messing around with my programming?”

“Yeah,” she said questioningly as I drank the gritty, orange flavored vomit that was Rad-Away.

I had to take a deep breath. “Star, please don’t mess with me like I’m just some toy. You have no idea how unpleasant glitches are when they’re affecting your health and perception of the world. I could wind up cross eyed, allergic to ponies, lose my sense of touch. Hell, I could die, or wind up thinking everything is inside a computer and I’m the chosen one to free Equinity.”

She shrunk back from my glare, “I’m sorry, Shadow. I just didn’t know how what would happen with you waking up alone in a bathtub.”

My glare softened,

“It’s okay. You didn’t know better.”

An awkward silence fell upon us for several seconds. “Here,” Star said, trying to move on. She moved the blanket on the shower rail, letting the frigid air waft in, and levitated in a bucket full of scrap metal and a couple cans. “Your computer also told me you needed aluminum, steel, and oil order for your cybernetics to mend themselves but, uh... I didn’t know what to do with them.”

Well according to my system monitor, my front right leg was still scrap and my other three had at least one major component in need of unfucking. However, I was much more interested in exploiting an opportunity to mess with my friend. “Same thing you do with any other food.” I just smiled at her as she processed what I had told her.

“Wait… You- you have to eat it?” She tilted her head to the side in the most adorable way. “Wouldn’t that hurt?”

“You lose feeling in your mouth eventually.” I answered as straight faced as possible. I reached into the bucket, dug out an aluminum can, and chomped down on the metal. My face tingled a bit as my augments started converting my meal, the metal magically gaining the consistency of taffy. “Mmm, aluminum isn’t really like any other flavor I’ve ever experienced: like a malt with a tangy aftertaste.”

Star sat and looked at me in confused horror as I ate all of her gathered scrap, then drank the motor oil. “You need this bucket?” I asked the filly with a big smile

“Yes!” Star snatched the steel bucket from my grasp with her magic. She giggled again and I couldn’t help but smile as she returned to her normal state, “You’re weird, even for a cyberpony. But, I guess you’re super duper advanced.”

I thought back to the augmented, non-Windgo ponies I had seen in Stable 13. “What’s the story with the cyberponies in your stable?”

“According to Mom and my teachers, Stable 13 had a lot of doctors from the big hospital. They brought their technology with them into the stable when the bombs fell but the stuff they had was nowhere near as advanced as you. There was only so much material in the stable and not much reason for augmenting anypony so most of it just sat around.

“Then after Great-Granny Stargazer opened the Stable and ponies started fighting and getting hurt on the surface; they dusted all of the augments off and started using them on the injured. We still only had a limited supply of stuff though.” She looked down and scuffed a hoof on the floor again.

Moondancer’s decision to leave the Windigos on ice made even more sense now. Almost every scientist I knew during the war was an obsessive nut and they would have pissed themselves if they had learned about us. In all likelihood most of us Windigoes would have been ripped apart for our tech and then the stable ripped apart for materials; they might have even opened the Door while the surface was still glowing.

“Why don’t you need gemstones or spark batteries?” Star asked. “All the other cyber ponies need to charge their augments. Then again they also have to get their stuff fixed by somepony when they get hurt. You just keep going and eat metal to fix yourself. Do have to eat gemstones too?”

I smiled at her. “Well, like you said I’m a much more advanced model. Moondancer got her hooves on some super-secret cybernetic research and improved or modified it to fit Rainbow’s liking. Some older designs actually involved eating gemstones to charge spark battery packs, but Rainbow didn’t like the idea of us being weighed down with jewels so Moondacer used spark cores instead. I shouldn’t need to charge for another hundred years or so.”

“Wow! And you wouldn’t die of old age before getting there? Being a cyberpony sounds awesome,” Star said looking at me in wonder. A wonderful dazzle in her eyes.

That comment made my smile falter in spite of Star’s response. “It has its perks. Honestly though, I would give everything just to feel the wind in my feathers again.”

“What happened that you wound up like this?” Star waved a hoof at my whole body.

I just exhaled and closed my eyes. “It’s a very anticlimactic end to a long and painful story.”

“Oh,” Star looked down again, scuffing her hoof as she quietly said: “You wanna talk about it?”

“Not the end, no,” I sighed. “Too much pain and nothing to learn from.”

“Well, what about before that?” Star asked. “You had a life before the war and stuff didn’t you? You don’t seem to be like somepony that was born fighting zebras or something.”

I smiled at her. “You actually want an old war vet go on about back there and then?”

Star just cozied into her blankets a bit more. “I’ve always wondered what it was like before the war. And I kinda wanna know more about you.”

“Well, I was born and raised in Fillydelphia; the City of Sisterly Love. It was always a city of makers and movers; lots of manufacturing and shipping. It could be a pretty rough place but that just forged strong ponies. I lived in Maneyunk, which was one of the better neighborhoods, with my father and siblings. I was the third eldest of nine and the only pegasus in the household. Dad was a unicorn who owned and ran a grocery store. My mother was... never around for long. She was an earth pony with a love of the sea.” I grimaced at the memory of my mother, “Always thought she was making up for not being born with the freedom of wings like the rest of her family.

“When I was young, I spent a lot of time building a strong work ethic and economic know-how with my father at his store, but I specialized in finding my way into lots of trouble.” I chuckled, “I knew all of my principals, deans, and resource officers on a first name basis. Hell, the right of passage for the cops in my precinct was escorting me and the occasional sibling or friend home.

“You don’t strike me as a troublemaker, Shadow,” Star said with a smirk.

“I was a little bad ass, but it wasn’t my fault that other kids thought they could get away with teasing me. Plus being big, black, and brash earned me a reputation as a filly you didn’t want to fuck with.”

“Language, Shadow,” Star chided.

I chuckled a little but was caught up in memories. I tapped a hoof against my cheek then smiled. I reached under my collar and extracted my dogtags and a small necklace that I wore with them. I held an amulet on the chain in my hoof. “The day I met my first zebra and got this was pretty entertaining,” I said with a nostalgic smile.

“Now, it was the beginning of summer,” I pressed my head against the side of the tub, “about five years before Nightmare Moon returned and the Elements of Harmony were discovered. I was toward the tail end of my fillyhood…

xxxxXXXXxxxx

“Nyx?”

“Mmm,” I groaned into my pillow.

“Nyx.”

Please leave a message and I’ll get back to you as soon as possible.

“Nyx!”

Go away voice, I need five more minutes.

“SUNNY SKIES! Wake up now!” My father’s voice roared up through the house. Or it might have been Dew Drop’s, my older brother was a spitting image of Dad nowadays.

“I’m up! I’m up,” I yelled as I rolled out from the soft embrace of my sheets. I pitched over the side of my top bunk and came to a graceful landing, yawning out: “Good morning, Glimmer.”

“Morning, Nyx,” my sister said from the closet. “Hey, should I wear this dress or this one for my interview?” She levitated out two pretty dresses and scuffed her hoof against the floor, looking down. “I just don’t know which would look better.”

I smiled at her. “Glimmer, you’re my sister: you’ll look good no matter what just by association.”

Pause and wait for her to open her mouth, cut off retort. “That blue one with the gold trim should be perfect. It brings out your eyes and compliments your mane.”

Glimmer smiled and blushed a little. My older sister (by like five minutes, we were twins) was a cute thing; she had a nice off-white coat that turned almost gold in sunlight. Her blue mane was more muted than mine and she had it grown out much longer, but the flowing locks just aided in drawing attention to her brilliant gold eyes. She was the envy of every mare in our class and there were dozens ponies drooling over her. Poor Glim-Glam hated attention in general and what some of her… admirers did could drive the introvert to tears. Of course, few of them bugged her much after a stern talking to by me.

“You’ve already got F.I.T. in the bag; what are you interviewing for now?” I asked as I arched my back in an enormous stretch.

“I need all the scholarship money I can get, Nyx. Dad’s already having trouble putting Dew Drop through school and I don’t think the family could survive if you went off collage too.”

“Yah,” I answered a big smile plastered on my face, “they would all die of shock.” I eased out of my stretch and trotted over to my sister, giving her a hug. “You’ll be fine. You’re graduating two years ahead of the rest of us and already got college lined up. Plus, you're one of the smartest ponies I know and gonna blow those interviewers away.”

“Thanks, Nyx.”

I let her go and started to trot out of the room, “Good luck!”

“Thank you.”

After leaving my room I proceeded downstairs by jumping over the banister of the stairs and gliding the four stories down to the ground level in lazy loops. I proceeded to the back of our townhouse and into the kitchen. “Is it all gone yet?”

“Surprisingly not,” Dew Drop said from the stove top where he was pouring the last of the pancake batter onto a skillet.

“If Nyx is getting to the breakfast table with food still around I have to wonder if you all are finally slowing down. Maybe you all will finally stop eating me out of house and home?” Dad quipped from the table where he was serving enormous flapjacks to my four little siblings.

“I think you might have jinxed it, Dad.” I went over to him and gave him a kiss. I then took to wing and fluttered over to my older brother, noogying him from overhead.

“Get off, Nyx,” he said waving a spatula at me.

“Nyx, no flying in the house,” My father scolded me as he trotted over with an empty serving platter, which he placed in the sink. He then levitated three plates next to the stove as Dew was finishing the last three flapjacks. The food was doled out, coffee poured, and the three of us ate at the island that separated the kitchen proper from the dinning space.

Dad and Dew Drop looked almost identical. They were both rugged unicorn stallions with white manes and dark grey coats, but Dad had some white around the muzzle and eyes. Their main difference was in the eyes; Dad’s were gold like Glimmer while Dew shared the teal eyes Mother and I had.

“So, is there anything exciting going on around the store today, Dad?” I asked after washing down the last of my pancake with the last of my coffee.

“Not around the store but I need you to go to Dragon Town today,” he said as he refilled my mug. “I got asked by Mrs. Radish to get some stuff for her.”

“How’s Mrs. Radish doing?” Dew asked, “Her back still troubling her?”

“Ye, that’s what she asked me to get her. The doctors prescribed some sort of herbal, zebra voodoo treatment.” My dad shook his head and waved his hoof around as he tried to describe the remedy. “It’s been working well for her but the ingredients are hard to find.”

“Interesting, I would think proper Equestrian medicine would be able to fix anything that can be fixed. I don’t know why doctors would resort to using such primitive techniques.”

“Aww come on, Dew. Just because something is different to what they’re teaching you in med school doesn’t mean it’s wrong.” I teased. “We all grew up with extra sauerkraut or a teaspoon of rum as the standard household cure-alls.”

“And that might just be part of what’s wrong with you, Nyx,” he shot back. I was inhaling to retort when the sound of hooves storming down the staircase cut me off. Glimmer rounded the corner and came galloping into the kitchen wearing the pretty blue dress.

“I’m on my way out so…” She trotted over to the table and group of younger siblings hugging and kissing each of them good bye. She then moved over to the island.

“What’s the occasion?” Dew asked gesturing to Glimmer’s attire.

“I have an interview for a big scholarship today,” she answered as she hugged and kissed Dad. “Bye, Daddy.”

“Oh Celestia, my daughter has grown up into a such a smart and beautiful mare who’s already off to university,” Dad said with tears in his eyes as he wrapped Glimmer in a bear hug.

“I guess the Fillydelphia Institute of Technology technically counts as a higher education,” Dew snarked earning him a smack upside the head from me.

“None of your Pranceton elitism in the house,” I snapped.

“My children have grown up so fast,” Dad oozed. I found myself wrapped in his golden aura and carried over into the hug. “Just now my beautiful eldest daughters will be off to make names for themselves in the world, right Nyx? Going to university, getting jobs, finding stallions, and starting families.”

“Daaad,” Glimmer and I whined in unison. Dew was chuckling in the background.

Dad released us from his grasp and we staggered away. After getting her bearings, Glimmer asked, “Dew, Nyx, I was wondering if, after my interview, we could do lunch together?”

“Sure, I’m free around lunch,” Dew answered.

“I’m sorry, Glim, but I’m going over to Dragon Town on an errand for Dad. It's such a long trip, I probably won’t be back for lunch. Or even dinner.” I threw a hoof over my eyes for added effect.

“I don’t want none of your whining, Nyx,” Dad stated. “I’m done with your shenanigans; you’re still on thin ice after your brawl with the Dinker Brothers in my store.”

“It wasn’t my fault! They were calling me ‘Nightmare’ and, and…” I shook with anger. Glimmer reached over and hugged me.

“Nyx, you need to learn how to walk away from a fight,” Dew said in his most serious tone.

“Hahahaha,” I laughed, “Me. Walk away from a fight?” Glimmer and Dad laughed with me.

“You’re like your mother; won’t let anything go,” Dad said with a proud but uneasy smile. “Y-you’re a fighter, Nyx; a good strong pony who’ll never give up. You just need to make sure that what you’re fighting for is worth it.”

I looked down and opened my mouth but was cut off when he continued. “Now, I do believe we should be getting our days underway; Dew Drop, can you take the herd to school?” Dad jerked his head at the table where my little siblings sat.

“Yes, sir.”

“Good. Nyx you can come with me to the store for an address and some bits.” Dad turned around. “Eeh! Get ready for school you lot.” There was a wave of “Aww’s” from the younger members of the family as they all went to brush their teeth and grab their saddebags. I wondered why they were complaining; it was the last week of school, they weren’t doing anything hard. Of course, going to school when their older siblings were already out might have rubbed them the wrong way, but that was the school district's fault.

Having finished doling out orders, Dad went upstairs to get ready for his day. I turned to my sister before she could leave.

“Sorry I can’t make lunch today, Glimmer,” I told her.

“It’s fine. I just wanted a chance for the three of us to hang out a bit before you leave for Aunt Rain’s. Like old times.” She looked a bit crestfallen that I couldn’t make the date and would be spending my summer in Cloudsdale.

“Look, Glim, how about the two of us drag Dew down to Book Worm’s shop this afternoon? We can browse fine literature for a while before picking up the Mohicans.” I jerked my head in the direction of our younger siblings. “Plus, the three of us are painting this town red on Friday.”

That got a smile out of her. I hugged her one more time before shooing her out of the house. I then cleared and cleaned the tables, washed the dishes, and drank another mug of coffee. With the kitchen taken care of I went back up to my room, brushed my teeth, got my saddlebags, then flew out my window, and down to the street where Dad was waiting. He rolled his eyes at my failure to use the front door, before the two of us started out on the short trip to the store as our neighborhood was just waking up.

“Good morning, Mr. Check,” a proud unicorn stallion trotting down the sidewalk wearing a blue cap and vest bearing a fancy badge said. “Nyx,” was added flatly.

“Morning,” my dad said with a simple smile and nod of his head.

I smiled nice and big: “Good morning, Officer Clip. How are you?”

“Humph,” and maybe a mumbled “punk” was all I got out of the police officer as he passed us, continuing on his rounds. Dad chuckled under his breath. We reached the corner of Date and Hornage Streets were the Check’s Grocery was located. Dad unlocked the door and we proceeded directly to the back of the store where his office was.

Dad opened a safe and pulled out a bag of one hundred bits. He levitated that and a sheet of paper over to me. “Here, this should be enough to cover the price of the medicine and get you lunch.” He smiled as he tucked everything into my saddlebags then hugged me saying “Stay safe and don’t get too distracted.”

“I will,” I said as I kissed him goodbye.

I trotted back through the store and into the middle of the street before spreading my wings and launching into the air. I laughed like a foal as I pulled off a quick ascending corkscrew and continued upward, happy to be in the air. After my little bit of flipping about I leveled out and looked over the city of Fillydelphia.

Nothing but open fields with rolling hills surrounded the metropolis, crossed by a few roads and the mighty Delamare river that cut through the land, flowing east to the blue of the Celestial Sea in the far east. The city sprawled around me with the skyscrapers of Downtown blocking a direct route to Dragon Town. I hated trying to fly through skyscrapers; the big slabs of concrete wreaked havoc on the air currents and would toss a pegasus around like a feather if they weren’t careful. Plus, Downtown’s skies were crowded, loud, and there were all kinds of jerks going about their business there.

No, it was too wonderful a day to waste flying through Downtown so I set out to loop around. I would take a longer, scenic route and enjoy myself, but I would not get distracted. I would go straight to Dragon Town and come straight back to hang out with Glimmer and Dew.

“Hey Nyx! You want to come play street hockey?”

Damn it! I didn't even make it five minutes.

“Misty! Dawn! How have you girls been?” I looked down at the pair of earth ponies in the street. Misty’s hoof was still cupped around her mouth from her shout as she skated down the street on a set of rollerblades. Dawn rolled alongside her, dodging pedestrians. I glided down to join them.

“Wondering where you went. I know that you spend your summers in Cloudsdale, but I didn’t think you would just disappear the second the season ended,” Misty said. She was pleasant shades of pink with dark blue eyes. Dawn was a dusky grey/blue with a bright orange mane. They both had larger builds for mares but that was helpful in roller derby.

I will admit that I had trouble making friends when I was young, but that had been remedied when I had joined my local roller derby league. There, it was very advantageous to be big and scary looking (being downright graceful on skates didn’t hurt, either) so I had been welcomed with open hooves by my teammates. The Fillidelphia Filly Foulers (what a name for a team that was) had quickly become my best friends and that musty gym we played in a second home.

“Well, I’ve been training for sky ball season so I’ve been in the air a lot,” I answered. “Plus, my dad is trying to keep me out of trouble so I haven’t been out much at all.”

“Oh Yeah,” Dawn said, “we’ve heard about how ‘out of trouble’ you’ve been. Those Dinker Brothers are still stumbling around in a daze.”

“I think that’s less to do with how hard Nyx hit them and more the fact that they’re worth her time,” Misty was waggling her eyebrows at me.

“Boo – Hiss. I do not approve of this perversion of my life.” I stuck my tongue out at Misty as she cracked up laughing.

“Aww, what’s the matter, Nyxie? Scared they're going to fight each other for you?”

“They’d better not fight over me–“

“No,” Dawn interjected, “you would enjoy the threesomes much more.”

Misty stumbled and crashed to the ground cackling. Dawn and I came to a stop, looking down at our friend as she giggled out: “Y-you kiss you mother with that mouth, Dawn?”

“On the lips with tongue probably,” I quipped. Dawn flushed and I grinned but if we kept this up we might kill Misty of laughter.

“So,” Dawn turned back to me, leaving our friend to finish her laughing fit on the ground. “You want to come play some street hockey with us? The girls will all be there and Helga talked some college guys into joining us.”

“We were figuring on a battle of the sexes,” Misty said as she got up from the ground, “but if we’re going to win we need some strategy and a quick set of hooves. So, Nyxie, we gonna see some action from the ol’ ‘Black Boulderina’ herself?”

Damn it all to hell. Street hockey sounded great but, “Sorry, girls. I’m running an errand for my dad right now. I have to get to Dragon Town.”

“Aww, horseapples,” Misty grumbled. “I was looking forward to wiping the floor with those guys. Would have been the perfect way to soften them up.” Her waggling eyebrows all but screamed ‘If yah know what I mean’ at me. I just rolled my eyes and shook my head. “Sorry for keeping you, Nyx but I swear to Princess Celestia, you better hang out with us before you leave town.”

“I will,” I said as she slugged me in the shoulder. “See you girls tomorrow, I swear.”

I took to wing as Misty offered one last friendly threat: “You better!”

“Bye, Nyx,” yelled Dawn as I flew away from them.

After that interruption, I was able to proceed without further issue. Did I mention it was a fantastic day to be flying? The sun was out, a nice cool breeze blew in from the west, and the air was perfectly smooth. The world passed by beneath me like it was on a different plane of existence. Ponies scurried about their daily business as a shadow cast across them for the moment I passed overhead. Within half an hour, I had arrived at the outskirts of Dragon Town.

The street was adorned with square red archways that had turquoise tiles along the top. The rest of the street looked about the same as most in the city other than the presence of the neighborhood’s scaly residence. I opened my saddlebag and lifted out the sheet of paper with my directions.

Two hours later I was pretty sure I had seen every part of Dragon Town except my destination and that my directions might have just been faulty. “Ugh, I’ve seen seven scale buffing salons, a dozen vendors selling meat and gemstone wraps, and even a comic book store but I can’t find a stupid pharmacy!” I yelled out at no pon- , er, no one in particular, throwing my hooves in the air and collapsing onto my haunches.

“Are you alright, dear?”

I turned and looked into the store I had given up in front of. It was a clothing boutique, one of the only ones I had seen in Dragon Town, and sitting behind the main desk was a purple dragon. She was thin and elegant from the tip of her snout to her tail’s whip-like end. She was looking at me with concern in her rose colored eyes.

“Uh, hi,” I said with a smile. “I was wondering if you could help me.” I stepped into the shop with a hopeful expression.

“Well, I certainly hope so. I’m Jasmine, and this is Exotic Fashions.”

“I’m Nyx and I’m not really looking for any clothes. I was wondering if you could direct me-“

“Shame, you would look positively stunning with the right clothes. Something in red I think; it would really accent your body’s graceful stance and add to your already impressive presence. Your mane style really lends to a rugged look but I think you could benefit from a change.”

“I’m sorry but I don’t have any money for clothes or getting my hair done,” I injected. “I’m just looking for Kanga’s Apothecary. I was told it was here in Dragon Town somewhere, but I haven’t been able to find it.”

“Oh! You’re looking for Kanga? Why no wonder you’ve been having trouble. That zebra is such a recluse it’s a wonder that she manages to stay in business, but she’s by far worth seeking out. Her scale balm does wonders for my complexion.” The dragoness ran a claw across her immaculately shining scales.

Well I was getting to meet all kinds of other creatures today; I was getting pointed to a zebra by a dragon. If I got lucky, I could buy lunch from a minotaur and get in a fight with a griffon. “Yeah…. Um, where exactly is her shop?”

“OK, so you go down the street…”

Several minutes later I was out of Exotic Fashions and standing far away from the main streets in a creepy alley that seemed to be part storm drain; the deteriorating asphalt road having been buried under mud and rubbish. This part of Dragon Town was at a lower elevation than the rest of town and the shadows of the surrounding buildings cast the space into almost total darkness despite it being mid-morning. I didn’t know if I was happy the ally was abandoned or not; I was alone but at the same time I don’t know if I would have liked a bunch of drugged out dragons hanging out with me either.

“Kanga’s Apothecary” started off life as your average little shop; the paint was white at one point I think and there were big display windows on each side of a red door. Now however, the whole front of the store was covered in ivy; the windows left mostly unobstructed so that a potential patron could look in and see all of the odd items in dark displays. Bones of animals, funky wooden masks with bright colors, odd potted plants with bizarre flowers, jars full of occult ingredients, and beautifully crafted tribal weapons all sat illuminated dimly by vines with glowing blue flowers that grew around the edges of the display.

This place had officially overtaken the abandoned Baldwhinny Locomotive Works as the coolest spooky place in Fillydelphia. I stepped up to the ivy coated door and turned the knob; it opened with the ominous creaking that all doors in spooky settings need. I stepped into the store with the far too cheerful chime of a bell filling the space. The door slammed behind me with much more force then I put into closing it.

The aesthetic of the outside carried over to the interior of the shop with a vengeance. The inside of the store looked more like a greenhouse then anything else, the glowing vine crawling all over the ceiling, support columns, and walls; it seemed to be the primary source of light inside. There were even more plants I had never seen before kept in every state from seed to in a can. The walls all around were adorned with more tribal masks and weapons while jars full of Celestia knew what hung from the rafters by fibrous ropes. The air was warm and humid except for a clammy cold fog that wafted along the floor.

“Hello?” I called out.

“Who dares enters my abode? State your business and only if you have gold.” The voice was very deep and gravely but danced between being masculine or feminine.

A shadow drifted around the back of the store. “Well, I’m here–”

“Just storming in like you rule? You mare, are most uncool.”

I was maybe a little scared now. “I-I’m sorry. I’m just looking– “

“You think life is but a game for you to play, quite the shame when limited are your days.”

“I-Wha-Who… You think you can get away with threatening me?!?” I snarled moving further into the store, fear forgotten with the challenge.

“Mwahahahahahahahahaha” The shadow’s deep but feminine laughter rolled throughout the store disturbing the white fog on the floor. I dropped into a fighting stance and started moving into the shop, ready to take on whatever prankster demon that though it could mess with me.

The fog started swirling around me as I got halfway to the back wall. With me standing in the very middle of the store and surrounded in a smoke screen the voice called out: “You dare to face that which you have no understanding of? You are an idiot bitch for not fleeing like a dove.”

“Bring it, gasbag,” I said as I spread my wings and bent my knees; it burst out laughing again. My eyes did nothing but blaze with anger as I strained my ears to tell me what stirred around me. The laughter seemed to be coming from several different places but I was catching the faintest traces of a different sound: hoofsteps.

The fog swirled in front of me and I thought I could see an equine shape. However, my ears had been following the soft hoof falls. The second the silhouette of fog showed up I heard the floor creak a tiny bit behind me and my feathers felt the air move as something pounced for me.
I swung my left wing out and pivoted on my right hoof. My wing caught the striped equine mid-flight; I swiped them around me and into the floor. I jumped on the zebra pinning them down as they... burst out laughing.

“Hahahaha. In all my years, I don’t think I’ve ever met a pony who I couldn’t sneak up on,” the big-boned zebra mare I had pinned said in her gravelly voice.

“Who are you and what are you doing?”

“I’m judging your wor- wor-hck“ she turned her head to the side and gave a great hacking cough, “I’m just messing with you, sugar.” Her voice lost its gravely tone and became warm and joyous; my expression went from demanding to confused. “Now, could you please let me up?”

I obliged and helped the zebra to her hooves. “Thank you, sugar. Now, I’m Kanga, purveyor of the exotic, rare, mystical, and occult; at your service.” She swept her hoof across her shop and then lowered into a bow. “Who might you be, honey?”

“I’m Nyx,” I answered, still confused, as she swept by me toward the back of her shop. I followed the now very pleasant zebra further back. She had a very curvy figure that she covered with a simple green dress. A bright multi-colored blanket that she had wrapped around her shoulders and head finished off the zebra’s ensemble.

“Oh isn’t that a pretty name. I have to say you seem like a special one; touched by the stars and the first pony I haven’t been able to scare in all my days.” She trotted up to a large caldron with a fire burning beneath it and a glowing green soup bubbling away inside, the white fog was flowing down the edges. “Come look, child.”

I walked slowly up to the edge of the massive pot and looked across the green fluid. It swirled in mesmerizing patterns, like it was trying to show me something. My attention was caught by what looked like a small dark green pony prancing along the surface of the much lighter colored liquid.

I lifted a hoof to point at the little apparition. “What is th-“ The second my hoof was over the vat, Kanga seized it. Before I could even flinch she dipped my appendage into the potion.

“Ouch!” I yelped, the stuff was freezing cold despite the fire roaring beneath the pot. The second I removed my hoof, it was dry and clear of any green but remained cold. A chilling sensation started traveling up my leg and into my chest, wrapping around my heart and lungs; spreading across my body, making my feathers quiver, and my hair stand on end. Then, it traveled up into my skull. My vision blurred as my eyes froze and my brain was numbed.

“Oh my, special indeed.” Kanga’s voice broke through the ice in my body. I instantly felt completely normal.

I turned to the zebra. “What did you-“

“Shh, child, look.” Kanga pointed back into the cauldron then wrapped a leg around my shoulders. The greens had been interrupted by bright blue, black, gold, and red. The colors all swirled about as dark fog started bellowing up and out of the cauldron. The vapor compressed into two shapes that I knew well.

Both of the little clouds were of black equines. One was little more than a silhouette; a pony standing proudly as her hooded cloak flowed in an unseen breeze. The second was a tall, black alicorn in light blue armor, her mane stretched out behind her like the night sky.

I gawked at the images of Nyx of the Night and Nightmare Moon as they drifted before me. “Ahh, I truly am in the presence of a special pony,” Kanga said beside me. I turned to see her looking into the swirling miasma of color the potion had become.

“Struggle is your natural state, overcoming any odds were ever you find opposition. You have seen adversity and even failure but it has only tempered you. You are strong of body, mind, and spirit. Innovative and intuitive, you seek the most efficient method to bring about a resolution.”

The zebra said as she gazed off. “I see a mighty warrior.” I shifted uncomfortably at the word. “Whole nations would tremble at the very mention of her name or rejoice for the gift of protection and life she provided.” I looked back up at two mares of steam, a shiver running down my spine.

Both of them had been dominant figures in my life. One was the wicked Mare in the Moon that had tried to kill Princess Celestia and bring eternal night on Equestria. The fact that I looked like a miniature Nightmare Moon had always been a source of teasing, fear, and rejection from others. A storybook about “Nyx of the Night” had been Dad’s solution to my fears of being like the dreaded specter. The black cloaked pony roamed the streets of her village in the night, protecting the inhabitants from monster attacks and other adversity. She was humble, brave, and noble; everything I wanted to be in life.

The shapes in the mist vanished as Kanga started talking again: “Morality and integrity will stand as the separation between your paths.” All of the gold color in the vat swirled to the center and then rose into the air as a single blob. The blob formed into a heart as it rose into the air.

“You will be tried in your endeavors,” the red liquid in the caldron shot forth in jets and green lighting lanced out at the gold heart as the white mist formed creatures; equines, griffons, dragons, and minotaurs all beating against the gold. The flaxen shape became dark and deformed, eventually becoming unrecognisable, “if you break and loose your heart you will fall into darkness.” The deformed heart sank into the chest of a reformed Nightmare Moon who reared up, her fanged mouth open in a soundless cackle as blue lightning flashed behind her.

“But know, Nyx, it matters not how far or how many times you may fall, you can always find the strength return to your heart and be a champion instead of a monster.” A gold glow started radiating out from NMM’s chest. The dark mare clutched at it as she burned away like morning fog in the sun’s rays. In her place stood my story book hero, head held high in triumph as the gold heart beat in her chest and her cape flapped dramatically.

With Kanga’s last words the mist dissolved and the cauldron's contents settled. The zebra walked away chuckling. I stared into the green fluid in a mix of terror and awe. “What was that?”

“Oh, that- some good advice, dear,” Kanga said as she looked back.

“But did you see my future? Destiny?” I asked then turned my attention back to the pot shaking ever so slightly, “What is that stuff and what did it do?”

“That’s just for show,” Kanga said cryptically with a dismissive wave of her hoof. “Now, what can I help you with? I certainly hope that such a nice young mare isn’t in here just on some dare or worse.” Her tone grew hard, like a mother warning a child. “I am not the kind of zebra to be looking for a high from, sugar.”

“No, no, no,” I shook my head. “I’m here to pick up a prescription for Mrs. Radish.” I pulled out my note and showed it to the zebra.

“Oh! I was wondering when she would be coming in. Didn’t think she would have to send a courier. She doin’ alright? I told that mare that no matter how good she felt she should take it easy or the medicine wouldn’t work right. Did she listen to the kooky zebra? No, she didn’t. Mm-hmm I swear some of you ponies…”

Kanga waltzed over to a set of cubbies set into the back wall of the store as she continued babbling to herself. I just sat there trembling slightly.

Did I just seen my future? I really didn’t see how I could be a warrior; Equestria hadn’t really been to war in centuries. I knew that it was a fool’s dream that I shouldn’t be humoring but there was the Royal Guard, Navy, Marines, and Equestria still had a few standing militias; the EUP and what not. I've got to do something with my life, right?

In an effort to clear my mind I looked around the store again, my attention settling on a wall covered in weapons, masks, and that glowing flower. I studied the beautiful designs carved into the wood of the masks, the fine work in a mighty spear, and the pretty glowing flower that ran all along the racks. A particularly astounding blossom was growing near where I was standing. I lowered my head and pressed my nose into the flower. It smelled fresh and alive, like lilacs and rain. The scent was calming as lavender in a hot bath.

“That’s a phantasmal flower, they ward off monsters and malicious spirits,” Kanga said behind me. “Never mind they’re just magnificent looking, aren’t they, sugar.”

I smiled back at the zebra. “They are.”

She trotted up next to me. “Here dear,” the zebra handed me a burlap sack containing several ceramic jars and drawstring bags. All kinds of exotic smells drifted into my nostrils as I took the bag and gave her my bit purse. The zebra took the bag and bounced it, “A sack of a hundred bits?” She asked and I nodded. “So, that’s fifthteen in change.” If she thought so I wasn’t going to argue. She reached into her shawl and dug out a much smaller purse extracting the quantity she owed me. “You don’t mind if I keep the sack of a hundred intact, do you, sugar?”

“Not at all. Thank you, Kanga,” I said. I put the bag away and turned back, ready to say goodbye to the zebra but her attention was on the racks in front of us.

The mare looked across the wall, “There it is.” She reached up to a spear with feathers and piece of carved wood attached to the shaft. Taking the spear down, Kanga untied the charm from it.

The cord that had held the charm to the spear was tied into a loop and Kanga lowered it over my head. “O-oh,” I sputtered. “I’m sorry but I just came here with enough for Mrs. Radish’s things and lunch. I could never afford this.”

The amulet was carved into the shape of the sun, much like Celestia’s cutie mark but more angular with the points of the star painted golden. The inter part had green and red making intricate, pointed patterns that were vaguely circular. At the center, a clear, light blue gem sat with an odd glyph carved into it. Three bird’s feathers hung from the bottom.

“This is Agurzil’s Heart. The green and red chasing each other represent death and growth in life’s never ending circle. The gem is aqua-aura quartz, so that the waters of all life may heal and nourish you in both body and spirit. The yellow points represent the sun to enlighten and strengthen. The feathers of a falcon, owl, and dove each bestow fierceness, wisdom, and peace of mind.” Kanga looked into my panicked and confused eyes with a smile. “It is a gift, Nyx. It does nothing here. This fetish is meant to endow a warrior not a wall.”

“I’m no warrior,” I said weakly. My knees shook ever so slightly.

“Dear, storms brew on the horizon and we both know you’ll answer the call when it comes; if you wait that long. So take it and go,” Kanga took my hoof in her own. “It was a pleasure to meet you, Nyx. Good luck as you walk your path.”

I stared back in shock for a second before her warm smile infected me, “Thank you, Kanga. It was wonderful to meet you too.”

Kanga escorted me to the door of her shop. “Now, it’s growing late and I have some brewing to do before I retire; so, until next time, sugar.”

“Good bye.” I waved a wing as I stepped back out into the street.

My little siblings had all been awed by my new charm, each wanting a turn to try and curse each other with zebra magic. Ray, my younger sister, had been beside herself that I was in possession of such a rare artifact while Dew had been indignant that I was polluting their brains with such superstition. Dad had remained silent but he never did send me back to Dragon Town for Mrs. Radish’s prescription. It didn't stop me from returning on my own and forging a friendship with the eccentric zebra or her family: something that would get us both in trouble as the years went by.

That night, I had confided in Glimmer about the ritual that Kanga had performed and the things that it showed me. I was fearful that they were true; that I would be beaten down by fate itself, fall into darkness and strife, become a monster. Even if I didn’t become a monster what would my life hold for me? Where was I headed? I didn't have a special talent or some burning passion to guide me through life like so many other ponies.

“Wow,” my sister was looking down on me from her bed, a forgotten book propped against her pillow. I was sprawled on the floor staring at the ceiling, watching the fan run its lazy revolutions, not having made it any further into the room. “This is really eating at you, Nyx. You aren’t easily fazed by anything.”

“I just had some zebra shaman tell me that my future is going to be defined by violence, that I’m going to have to endure great adversity and might become a monster," I mewled. "And the worse part is I think she’s right. Fighting is all I’m really good at.”

“That’s not true, Nyx. You’re an athlete, a model student when you're not causing trouble, fun, and really smart. Besides, you only fight bullies and worse. You’ve been protecting me since we were just fillies, it’s how you got your cutie mark.”

“Yah but there’s a difference between beating on some bullies and actually fighting and killing. I get in a fight with a bully and he might start acting a bit better.” A couple tears ran down my face and my voice caught in my throat. “I-I don’t know if I could kill anypony. I couldn’t deprive anyone of life; killing is wrong. There’s nothing a corpse can learn.” A sob escaped me and I looked over to my sibling.

Glimmer’s jaw dropped open when she saw that I was crying. My older sister had cried herself to sleep many times while in my embrace but me shedding a tear was a very rare thing. It never mattered what was said or how badly I had gotten hurt, I was always strong and stoic. I bled from my eyes before actually shedding tears.

“Nyx,” Glimmer said softly as she got up and moved to my side. She laid down and hugged me; I buried my face in her shoulder and wept. It was an inversion of our usual dynamic and Glimmer sat not knowing what to do for several seconds.

“Nyx, you’re not going to become a bad pony. That zebra said that you would forge your own path through whatever adversity you have to face. Everything she said was true: you’re strong, brave, and persistent. Sure, you'll have to make your own choices in life and they will decide what kind of pony you’ll be. We all have to do that.”

I tilted my head to the side so I could talk. “Its just that I don’t know how I’m going to be strong or righteous. I don’t know what to do about anything. You’re going to college and Dew’s becoming a doctor and I’m still in high school; just sitting around like some bum.” A particularly violent sob ran through my body and Glimmer tightened her grip on me. “Even the bullies I fight know what they’re doing more than I do. I just react to things; how am I supposed to make a decision like, like-” I took a deep breath “-that if I can’t even decide what I’m going to do with my own life?”

Glimmer rubbed my back but was slow in her answer. “You can never know if you’ve made the right decision until it’s too late, Nyx. You’re going to make poor choices and they’re going to haunt you for the rest of your life but everypony does that. All we can do is learn from mistakes; both our own and other’s.”

“B-b-b-bu-bu, I…..” I couldn’t finish a sentence as I wept into my sister’s coat.

“Shh, you don’t need to become some soldier at all. I’ll admit I think Dad would appreciate some discipline being beaten into you but you don’t have to listen to what she said.”

“But, I… I think she’s right… I like protecting ponies and I’m good at fighting…...”

“Well, as long as you’re protecting ponies I would think that you’re a good pony. Plus, you don’t have to deal with everything on your own.” I looked up to my sister and she smiled down on me, a few tears in her own eyes. “If you ever feel lost, know that there are ponies around you that love you and would want to help you. If you ever need help, no matter what it’s with, I swear to Celestia, I'll be there for you.”

“T-thank you,” I whispered. I buried my face in her chest again as my tears became those of joy and I hugged my sister tight. She returned my embrace with as much pressure as she could muster, tears of her own soaking the top of my head. We both laid there until I had calmed down enough to ask her: “Glimmer? Do you think you could help me talk to Dad about enlisting? Eventually at least.”

She pulled me away so we could be face to face. Glimmer looked scared for a second before a smile spread across her face. She pulled me back into the hug, “I would love to, Nyx.”

Author's Note

Holy new stuff, Batman!!!

RETCON ALERT: The old summary is now part of the Prologue which is now a Forward (Yah, got that?).

I hope you're all happy (in general). I've got a new chapter, cover art(by the wonderful Hoodwinked Tales), and rewrote my summary. This chapter has been sitting in my docs for a month now but just when Click got to looking at it I started a rewrite on it. I hate having things sit around, I always get tempted to fuck with them. I personally liked writing something a little more slice of life (this is the first time I've done that) and am sorry if it was a little pedestrian. However, I wanted to establish Nyx and the flashbacks/stories that will track her evolution into Shadow.

Up and Out (RIP Gene Wilder :heart: :fluttercry: :raritycry: :applecry: )

Chapter 4: Wintermail

My eyes flicked open.

It was pitch dark and very quiet in the bathtub. The fleshy parts of my body were stiff and achy from not moving much in several days, but that wasn’t what had woken me. It was quiet in the small space, not silent.

My ears stood erect as I tilted my head and pressed it against the bottom of the tub. I heard a faint rumbling coming from the ground but it was distorted by the floors below me. I never had asked Star where we had bedded down, but from the sounds of it we were in a sturdy low-rise building. There wasn’t any creaking from the structure swaying or howling from wind against the walls, so the storm had died down.

Another set of rumbles reached my ear. Their timbre told me that they were from a loud, far off sound. I recognized the sound of explosions in the distance. I was no stranger to trying to sleep despite the sounds of battle, but I was curious to know who was shooting at who out there.

A mound of blankets near my head rose and fell in sequence with a filly’s breathing. Star was sound asleep in her little bundle. I thought of rousing her for a second before deciding against it. She could probably use some rest after caring for me and probably wouldn’t be able to keep up.

I’ll let her sleep and just make sure I don’t get into any trouble.

I slowly and quietly got up, my blankets slipping off. I had to clench my jaws to keep them from chattering; the air was freezing against my bare but wonderfully intact hide. I stood up and got out of the tub with goose bumps covering me.

My barding was sitting in a heap next to the tub with all of my gear. I eagerly pulled on the garments and rubbed my wings along my back for warmth. With my carbine slung around my neck I looked back at Star again. I shook any doubts out of my head and moved toward the door.

I crept out the door to the bathroom and moved into the adjacent room. It looked like a stereotypical Equestrian living room after a typhoon had blown through. A half packed suitcase sat on a coffee table in the center of the room with clothes and possessions thrown everywhere. The Crystal Empire would have been a low priority for the zebras, so it didn’t surprise me that ponies might have been able to pack their bags and flee before the bombs fell. Where to was beyond me; there were only three stables in the north, and those who didn’t have a spot in them had nothing but tunnels or the frozen wastes.

I crept to the door of the apartment and exited into the hallway outside. I was quickly able to find a stairwell that led to the roof. Nothing in the building seemed to stir, so I wasn’t impaired in my progress until I arrived at the door to the roof, which was rusted shut. It didn’t prove a problem to me after a proper application of cyberpony super strength sent the door flying off its hinges, though.

I stepped out onto the roof of the building into the night, the moon shining brightly amongst a sea of stars. Never in my life had the night sky looked so perfect. I just stopped and stared, truly appreciating the sky for the first time in two hundred years.

Maybe those poets and writers I had to read in grade school were right when they obsessed about the night sky.

My thought was broken by the distant sound of gunfire. I shook away the thoughts and looked out across the city around me. Wintergreen was mostly intact south of Shining Armor Memorial, but everything north of the building was gone. In the distance, an evil red and green glow and small geysers of steam poured out of several massive craters. The crystal palace and buildings of Amore were gone, as were the surrounding neighborhoods.

I tore my attention from the cityscape to look in the direction of the only commotion in the whole region. Finding my target in the distance, I momentarily lamented my broken flight talisman then pulled my hood over my head, backed up to the opposite edge of the roof, turned around, and –after a breath– charged at the other side. I gave a great jump and, even though I couldn’t fly anymore, still soared across the street to a low-lying building on the other side. I rolled through my landing and ran to the edge of its roof, jumping onto the adjacent building’s fire escape and climbing the eight stories to the top. I used it to jump across another street and then ran along the roofs of a line of identical apartments as I headed to the firefight.

I parkoured my way across the roofs, minimizing the possibility of being detected or leaving a trail that could be followed from the ground. I crossed over a corner building and ran along the edge of a roof to, seeing my destination up the streat. Beams of red and blue streaked across an intersection ahead as the chatter of automatic weapons and rumble of explosives echoed up the urban valley. Directly ahead of me was a high rise building that overlooked the intersection.
I moved back to the middle of the roofs and picked up speed, running right for the glass sides of the high rise. With another great bound I launched myself across an alley and through the glass of the building.

I realized in midair that I wasn’t in an action comic and glass doesn’t shatter easily. I had the foresight to cover my face with my forehooves as I slammed into the pane. I burst through it, but not after beating the breath out of myself and having my face cut up despite my attempt at protection.

I landed on the worn out carpet in a heap, covered in blood and broken glass. I laid on my back basking in how much pain I could inflict on myself despite how little of me could still feel.
“Motherfucker!” I hissed to myself. “What a true master of stealth and motion you are, you old hag, you gonna try jumping through concrete next? Maybe that’ll knock some sense into you or at least break my fucking back so I can’t do bullshit like that anymore.”

I cut off my self berating as I turned over and stood up. My back ached; it was more than the crash though, a reemerging pain from a lifetime of hard landings, hoof fighting, and other physical abuse. “Ugh, my brain hates me; I can’t remember stuff without breaking down and now it’s casting ghost pains on parts of my body that shouldn’t be able to feel them anymore.”

And now I’m talking to myself.

I shook my head again to clear my thoughts as I worked my way through the office cubicles that filled up the floor around me. I followed a central path through the lines of workstations and arrived on the other side of the building. My view down into the street was a good one; I was three stories up with a nice wall of glass looking right down on the intersection with the fighting. I hung back from the windows for fear of being spotted.

The scene playing out below me was a serious fight between Steel Thieves and synths. Two suits of power armor lay in the middle of the street along with at least a dozen mangled robots. The surviving rangers were holed up inside of a store across the street from me while the synths were dug in around the intersection.

The fight seemed to have reached stalemate with the rangers cornered but synths not being able to overrun them. The synths were trying to get reinforcements out of the subway but they were getting mowed down by a gattling grenade launcher.

I stood in the shadows, watching the scene and contemplating. Should I snipe everyone involved? Leave before they spotted me? Would popcorn have lasted the past two hundred years? After finding some popcorn, would there still be a fight for me to watch?

My thoughts were cut short by the scream of several heavy anti-tank missiles streaking up the street and into the Steel Raider’s position. The building I was in shook from the explosions and the glass panes cracked, most shattering from the concussion. I slowly approached the now open windows to look up the street at the origin of the barrage.

“Oh, this is shaping up wonderfully.” Down the street there were two massive Ultra-Sentinel assault robots rolling toward the smoldering ruin the Thieves’ keep had become. Synths started coming out of the woodwork once they realized that their opponents were no longer returning fire. In seconds there were at least thirty of them in the street.

“Get in there and bring me any survivors.” An amplified mare’s voice called. “Alive!” The voice echoed up the urban valley from out of nowhere. I creeped forward and peered down the street.

There, in between the two Ultra-Sentinels was a pony in power armor. I didn’t recognise its model but it looked advanced and not too shabby with a coat of stark white paint. Rather frighteningly, her armor’s battle saddle was equipped with not one, not two, but four heavy machine guns. Even I wouldn’t survive a hit or two of those .50 caliber rounds and this mare was going to be sending several thousand rounds down range every minute.

The synths tossed a few spark grenades into the building, there was a pop –a sensation like pins and needles ran up my wings and spine– and then the robots moved into the building while the two Ultra-Sentinels stayed at the White Ranger’s side. She took up a position in the middle of the street, staring stoically at the ruin. The robotic ponies emerged several seconds later with two immobilized Rangers and one of the unicorn cultists.

“Ahh, look who we have here; just the ponies I’m looking for.” The white ranger sauntered up to her prisoners. She looked at the unicorn first. “Midnight, it’s good to see you still kicking.”

Ha, ha, its funny because one of his back legs was pointing the wrong way and he’ll probably never kick again. Fucking irony. That was Rainbow Dash levels of terrible joke and macabre as fuck to boot.

“What in Tartarus is all this?” The blue unicorn stallion demanded, my enhanced hearing picking up the waver in his voice. “Who are you?”

“Aww, you don’t recognize me? I’m disappointed,” the white pony held an armored hoof up to her chest in disbelief. She turned to one of the armored rangers. “How ‘bout you, Nova, dear? The accent, color choice; it’s going to really obvious in hindsight, love.”

I had to admit, she had a pretty thick Trottingham accent and seemed to know these jerks. Ohh, the white one was probably waiting to make a dramatic reveal to the other three! I really should have gotten popcorn, first a fight now now I had a wasteland soap opera.

The synths pulled the helmet off one of the rangers to reveal the blood streaked face of a bright orange earth pony. Her blue eyes settled on her captor with a death glare as she spoke: “That’s Star Paladin Nova Fury to you, traitor, and I don’t care if you’re Princess fucking Celestia’s right fucking butt cheek; we have nothing to talk about.”

“Actually, Nova, we do,” the white ranger sat on her hunches and took her helmet off. I didn’t gasp but wasn’t surprised the other two ponies did upon the dramatic reveal. The earth pony mare inside was an interesting sight matterless of the context, though. She was an albino; her coat, mane, and even eyes were just as white as her armor. The pony could probably vanish into the snowscape of the north just by standing still, with only the pupils of her eyes to give her away.

Midnight and Nova both gasped aloud, the latter speaking: “Sugar Cookie?”

“I’ve been going by Wintermail actually,” said the white pony as she put her helmet back on, “sounds much more intimidating and really has a nice ring to it I think.”

Midnight spoke up: “We thought you-“

“’-were dead?’ Do you even know how cliché that sounds, Midnight? And I’m offended you would think a bunch of griffon mercs could get the better of me. What, you just didn’t want to admit that a ‘friend’ could lose faith in the mighty and righteous Steel Rangers.”

“Why?” demanded Nova. “Why did you desert and what the hell are you doing up here?”

“Well, I really don’t feel like recounting my life’s choices to a bunch of glorified raiders,” Nova flinched at that, “but I’m here as a representative of my anonymous employers. They’re quite unhappy with the way you Rangers handled Stable 13.”

“What are you talking about, Cookie?” Nova growled. “We received a tip off about a functioning Stable up here and trekked to take it. What fucking third party could you be representing?”

“Do you not know how ‘anonymous’ works, Nova? And did you actually think that you would just stumble on somepony who knew were Stable 13 is? Let alone somepony willing to tell you where to find it to. It's Overmares are some of the most clever and paranoid ponies I’ve ever heard of.” Wintermail scoffed, “You lot only found out about it because the powers-that-be decided. Now, the matter at hoof: how many Rangers do I have to hunt down?”

Nova shifted and fear spread across her face. “What do you mean?”

“It’s just as it says on the tin, love. My employers are unhappy that we had to reveal the location of Stable 13 to you and who knows how many other ponies in the first place. Now that you’ve failed to eliminate the Stable ponies properly and let them release those cyber-goons, you’ve outlived your use. They can’t have you snooping around this city or telling others about what’s up here.” The white mare took a breath and did her best to lord over the orange one. “So, how many of your troopers are still running around up here? I know there are more of you then this little scouting patrol.”

“No, this is all that’s left of my forces.” Nova looked at the ground, dejected. “Those cyberponies in the Stable ripped my troopers apart.” I was almost tempted to feel bad for the mare but this was what many call all a comeuppance, a fitting one in my eyes.

Wintermail looked away from Nova and Midnight to the third thief that had been dragged out. She had been sitting silently, probably hoping to not get caught in the crossfire between her superiors and their old friend.

“Could we take off your helmet, dear?” Wintermail asked, her tone almost tender. She walked over and lifted the mare into a sitting position. Removing the helmet revealed a tear-streaked green face and purple mane. “What’s your name, love?” cooed Wintermail.

“K-knight Grape Vine, m-ma’am,” the mare sputtered out; shaking in terror.

“That’s a lovely name, dearest. It really goes with your colors,” Wintermail said, looking at the mare’s helmet before looking at her, “but I am wondering though, are you a drunk or a gossiper?”

“N-neither, I don’t usually drink and I-I don’t gossip.”

“Oh come now, we all gossip. What’s not to love about passing around some rumors and leaked secrets? Hmm? Love, conflict, favoritism, corruption? It’s all just so fun.” I picked up on a change in her tone, it had taken on a snide, sarcastic, almost angry quality to it. “Like, how Nova here got beaten by her mum and that’s why she’s so abusive to her soldiers. I’m guessing that hasn’t changed about her, she lead you poor souls up here to die after all. Just so she can get some approval from her dead mommy.”

“Fuck off, you slut!” Nova snarled from her armor. “You don’t give anything to this psycho, Knight.”

The green mare looked over at Nova. There was still fear on her face but there was more. A bit of hatred, a sniff of understanding, some uncertainty, and a good helping of confirmation about the accusation.

Winter looked over at Nova, rolling her eyes.“Nothing but threats and anger, Luna above you’re pathetic.” She turned back to Grape Vine. “That reminds me of the rumor that went around about me, though. Apparently, I was the biggest slut in our entire chapter, that I would fuck anything with four legs. Now, that may have been utter bullshit, but I do admit, I’ve gotten really lonely working solo. I could really use a friend, hell, just use someone too help me keep warm at night.”

The weird offer hung in the air for a moment before Grape opened her mouth. “Don’t say fucking anything!” snarled Nova. “You’re going to sell out your own to this backstabbing whore? So you can be her little bitch?”

Wintermail turned to Nova, gave her a little smile, and proceeded to bitch slap her. The steel hoof of her power armor produced a meaty slap undercut with a crack as it broke the orange mare’s jaw and sent her head snapping around in an arc of blood and tooth particles. “Quiet, dear,” she responded simply before turning back to Grape.

“I-I We were supposed to head south toward the train station if we became separated and we were unable to take the Stable.” The green mare was once again shaking with what parts of her body should movie outside of her armor.

“Love, I was looking for some rumors, not your official orders.” Wintermail chuckled and stood up right. “I’ve already heard the marching orders from every other one of you that I’ve talked to. Besides, if I’m honest, I already had a bedmate picked out for here.” The mare reached down and picked her helmet up from where it laid in the snow, sitting down and brushing it off with a hoof.

Despair spread across Grape’s face as she looked at the ground. “I’m sorry,” she whimpered.

The albino stopped putting her helmet on. “Don’t be,” she finished slipping her headgear on and attaching it to her suit, “none of this is your fault, love,” she finished through the suit’s speakers as her heavy machine guns clanked, charging. She unceremoniously shot the green mare once in the chest, the fifty cal tearing through Grape Vine’s chest plate and into her body. The Knight collapsed with only a muted gasp.

“You’re a fucking monster,” spat the scribe from beside her.

Wintermail stood and looked down on the green pony before turning her attention to the stallion. She didn’t say a thing, only turned her shoulders to bring her battlesaddle to bear. Midnight warranted a burst from the fearsome foursome, pretty much vaporizing him on the spot.

“I guess I’ll just take care of this the way I should have from the beginning, Nova. I hope you’re not too attached to your mind because I’ll be needing it.” Wintermail only spared a glance at the last Ranger as she turned away. “Get Star Paladin Nova Fury back to base.” The synths instantly sprung into action and picked up the orange armored pony.

She walked back toward her Ultra-Sentinels and left her synths to their work. I took this as my cue to duck and back away from the window. The synths were probably going to start searching through the surrounding area for any stragglers or observers which would mean trouble for me. And I had promised myself not to get in trouble.

I creeped back through the building and to my shattered window. Dropping down to the snow covered asphalt below and took off down the alley. I knew I would be leaving tacks that Wintermail and her synths might find, but once I had gotten a bit of a head start I could get to the rooftops or Celestia forbid, disappear into the city’s tunnels.

What I had just watched sifted through my mind. Wintermail spelled big trouble for us and it only made the issues of synths all the more dangerous. I guessed the silver lining was that there probably weren’t going to be any rangers for us to run into instead. Though the big lesson that I had learned from the incident was:

I really should have had popcorn.

An hour’s sneaking about found me safely in the neighborhood where I started and hopelessly lost. I had evaded the synths and made it across town without having to resort to tunnels, but I couldn’t remember what apartment I had left Starprancer in. The buildings didn’t even look that similar, but I couldn’t remember anything about where I needed to go and hadn’t saved the location in my PIP.

I found myself awkwardly wondering around the neighborhood on hoof, desperately searching for anything to indicate where I was and where I needed to go. While waiting for synths to show up and shoot me of course. I eventually climbed up a fire escape and onto the roofs to see if I could find my tracks. Fortunately, the weather hadn’t stirred up too much, and the disturbances in the snow from my departure were clear. I descended into the building just to once again find myself unable to remember where I was going.

“Damn it,” I hissed to myself. “What’s going on with me? I was just here a couple hours ago, how can I be lost?”

Wow, botched memory and thinking aloud; I was in fucking fantastic shape. At this point, blaming it all on hibernation sickness might be ignoring other problems…

No, it’s just hibernation sickness. My brain hasn’t been used in two hundred years, I wasn’t raised from stasis properly, and jumped right into the fray. This was just some prolonged amnesia, that’s all. I’m not losing it, again.

Matterless, amnesia sucked; I couldn’t even find my way back to the apartment so I could get yelled at by my ward. I hope Starprancer won’t be too mad with me. I might have hoped to find her before she woke up, but at this rate I would have to search the entire building or just wait for her to find me.

I searched three floors just looking into the living rooms and didn’t find anything, didn’t remember anything. I thoroughly investigated another couple rooms without luck and I was starting to get irritated. Frustrated, I ransacked one room wondering if Star had decided to hide inside of a drawer or something. The little filly was probably getting back at me for leaving her.

As she should; I was out of line doing that.

After another three apartments, I smashed a coffee table to splinters under my hoof. I needed a few minutes after that to calm down before I went back to searching. I was still on edge though, the silence echoed in my ears, the lack of anyone else made me feel lightheaded and ghost-like. I grit my teeth as I walked out of one room and into a larger hall with walls of mailboxes on each side, and few potted plants and couches were scattered about; the lobby.

What the fuck? How did I get down here? I could have sworn I was up a floor, I know I wasn’t on the first when I woke up.

I felt a knot lodge itself in my throat as I stood looking around the lobby, a shiver running down my spine. I gnashed my teeth harder and snarled. I mashed a musty couch, whipped my tail through a wall of mailboxes, before smashing through the building’s glass foyer, looking around for Star’s tracks in the snow outside. Finding none, I stomped back into the building and stopped in the middle.

I took several deep, shaky breaths to regain my composure. You’re fine, just find Star. You’re fine, just find Star. You’re fine, just find Star. You’re fine, just find Star.

I set about searching the building in the most calm and collected manner I could manage. I got through half of the second floor floor before my frustration reared its head again. Why was I having to go through all of this trouble in the first place? How the fuck am I supposed to fight off mutants and synths when this happens to me?How am I supposed to protect Starprancer like this?

I continued searching, my frustration building, until I found myself back inside the room I had ransacked. I stood in the doorway, looking at the items I had scattered not even twenty minutes before. I felt the urge to explode in rage again but that fizzled out before it could gain any traction.

Instead, I felt my chin waver and my vision blur. I was overtaken with a sensation similar to when, as a filly, my father had taken me to Canterlot and then we had gotten separated from each other. A feeling of frustrated, insecure hopelessness. I didn’t have any idea what to do, where to go next, or if I was going to be ok. It the pure and unbridled emotion of an alone child who didn’t know what to do.

I backed out of the room and ran to the stairwell, looking up and down, unsure of where to go. I decided to start climbing but only got a half a flight before I collapsed to the floor and cried like a foal. “What’s happening to me?” I mewled to the concrete. “I’m just trying to find my way back to my friend… She’s all I’ve got!” I started sobbing and called like I would for my father when I was a foal: “Starprancer! Please, I’m sorry! I’m so sorry I left. I promise I’ll never leave you again-n-n-n.”

My sobbing shifted to hyperventilating.

“Damn it!” I smacked my head against the wooden banister, cracking it. Snap out of it! I was sitting there crying for the filly I was supposed to be protecting to come save me from nothing. This wasn’t how I was supposed to act! I had slipped away from a madmare with an army of robots without a sweat, slain a squad of Steel Rangers while delirious, and escaped a horde of monstrous zombies. I had kept the zebra Caesar and all of his underlings up at night, struck fear into a whole nation. I was one of Equestria’s most honored heroes. In my time, I was only outdone by Spitfire, Rainbow, Shining Armor, and Big Macintosh. I was a legend in the flesh and steel. There were probably bedtime stories about me, now. I was… was…

I was tired and scared.

The War was over: I had lost. Now, I was just a relic, like Star’s revolvers or the posters that adorned the walls. Something modern ponies could learn from sure but just an artifact to be forgotten in the end. Maybe they would strike up an interesting discussion over me: compare stats and facts about me versus the Maregadishu Butcher, Lizteir, Shakti, Karonga, Silver, Psalm, Deadshot, White Feather, or a dozen other meaningless names that might have belonged to snipers and soldiers. I had had less respect than Shining Armor and Spitfire, I had always been Rainbow’s number two, I hadn’t saved Princess Celestia’s life, and I was still alive.

Why? What had happened? Why am I still suffering? Couldn’t I have perished on the battlefield with my comrades and foes? Glory, honor, and peace mine at last? At least died in the Balefire with my family?

“Tired and scared.” I said the words out loud as I stared at the ground and wept. I was hurting and everything that weighed on me was too much to ignore or internalize; doing that would break me. I would have to work my way through the pain, and to do that I needed to admit it first.

My admission settled me enough to take a shuddering breaths in an attempt to calm myself. I was just starting to get myself under control when I heard a voice.

“Shadow?” Starprancer was standing at the top of the next flight of stairs, looking down on me. She looked unsure of what to do and lifted a hoof when I looked up at her, like my gaze made her want to run away. The filly didn’t leave me though. She just looked down on me in silence for several seconds. “What happened?” she asked, voice burdened with fear and concern.

I swallowed and took a deep breath. “I heard a gunfight in the distance and went to investigate-“

“Princesses! Are you hurt?” Star rushed forward in concern and I flinched back into a corner.

She stopped as I shrunk away from her. “I-I’m fine, Star. They never even knew I was there.”

Star’s big eyes filled with confusion. “Then what happened to you?”

“I-I-I,” I shook and let out a sob. “I couldn’t find you,” I croaked out. “I forgot where I left you and got mad and scared.”

Star trotted slowly up to me and touched my foreleg. I couldn’t feel it and another sob racked my body. The filly looked up into my eyes, “I’m right here for you. I would have come out sooner, but I thought synths were ripping the building apart looking for us or something. I’m sorry I hid from you, Shadow.”

“No,” I croaked, “you don’t need to apologize, Star. I’m the one who left you and got lost. I’m the one acting like a foal. I’m s-so sorry.” I bowed my head down. She reached up and wrapped her hooves around my neck and let me cry into her shoulder.

Barely a minute saw me cry myself dry. Broken or not, I wasn’t one for tears. Star, realizing I had started recovering, asked me “What’s your tag?”

“Hmm?” I muttered.

“Your Pipbuck tag. You said you have a Pipbuck built into you and every Pipbuck has a tag. If we swap tags we’ll be able to keep track of each other,” Star said. “Here.” The filly drew her Pipbuck up to her nose and did something. I was instantly told that I had acquired a new tag.

“There, now we can keep track of each other.”

I held the filly tight. “Thank you, Starprancer.”

“It was nothing,” Star said. “So, who was fighting?”

“A couple of Steel Raiders-“ Star’s grip on my neck tightened at the name “-and a bunch of synths. There was another pony too. An albino earth pony wearing white Ranger armor, called herself ‘Wintermail.’ She was leading the synths.”

“I’ve heard of her,” Star said icily. I lifted her away from my neck to look her in the face.

“What do you mean ‘you’ve heard of her?’ How? I thought you hadn’t been to the surface yet?”

Star sat down and opened her saddlebags. She pulled out three thick notebooks and a small box that I recognised as one usually used to store memory orbs. “These are my mother, grandmother, and great-grandmother’s. All of them wrote about the stuff they did on the surface and great-granny Stargazer actually helped write this book.” Star levitated out another volume and showed it to me: ‘The Eternal Winter Wonder Wasteland Survival Guide’ by Ditzy Doo with Stargazer. It sounds like a good read.

“Anyway, with you being out the last few days, I was reading these.” Star smiled up at me. “Mom talks about a white armored pony that harassed our salvage missions to Stable 34 and trading with Tenpony Tower and Diamond City.”

I looked at the elegant mouthwriting of Nebula Skater. “Those places your mom was trading with, where are they?”

“Tenpony Tower was the Ministry of Magic Hub in Manehattan, down south. And Diamond City is east.”

I sat back and soaked in the new information. Diamond City was an ancient ruin located pretty much directly east in more frozen mountains. It probably wouldn’t have been worth a balefire bomb to the Zebras, the nearby village had a permanent population of less than fifty ponies.

Yakyakistan was the only other place up here that would have a permanent population. It had been neutral during the war and geographically isolated from both nations by the North Luna Sea, massive ice packs, mountains, and frozen tundras. Both Equestria and Zebrica had been tempted to outflank each other by going around the top of the world through Yak country, but neither had found the prospect worthwhile, leaving the Yaks to their own devices. Part of me was disgusted that the damn Yaks were probably the most advanced civilization on the planet because they hadn’t been caught in the big reset the rest of us had.

Still, I wasn’t above the idea of going to Manehattan, it had been a nice city.

“I really don’t think we should just go south either, Shadow.” Star’s statement cut through my thoughts.

“Why not?”

“First, there’s war going on in the south. The last time ponies came from the south, the Pegasus Enclave was fighting with the surface and the Wastelanders were also fighting amongst themselves. According to them it was mostly focused around Baltimare, Fillydelphia, and Shattered Hoof but they also warned about hellhounds being driven north of Manehattan.”

“Oh yay,” I said bitterly. “I get war, but what is a hellhound?”

Star swapped her mother’s diary for the Survival Guide, showing me a picture of a most unpleasant looking beast. It looked like a perversion of a diamond dog, which it probably was. The massive creature had a thick, rough hide, massive claws, a stout head, and a sour expression. A cobbled together energy weapon was strapped to its back to complete the image of something that wasn’t worth fucking with.

“They sound really dangerous,” Star said. “Their claws can cut through alicorn shields and Steel Ranger armor, most are skilled with energy weapons, and their usual method of hunting involves digging up under their prey and ripping them to shreds.”

“OK. I’m liking the whole ‘not messing with these’ approach.”

“Hellhounds also kinda bring me to my second point: the wildlife in the mountains and plains to the south is really dangerous.” Star flipped some pages in the Survival Guide. “There are feral ghouls and alicorns, Radibou, yeti, yao guai, Snow Twinklers, and White Death.”

I was already familiar with ghouls of the crystal variety. Radibou were just big two-headed deer that could be aggressive if provoked. Yeti looked exciting: big bipeds with shaggy white coats, three massive claws on each hand, and what looked like rams horns jutting from its head. A yao guai was just a bear with radiation added so they were massive and glowed; as if bears weren’t already terrifying enough. Snow Twinklers, contrary to their names, were massive, terrifying cat/bear/demon creatures that could hold a pony in their paws. White Death was irritating though, no drawing or even physical description, just: “When it calls to you, RUN!”

Thank you, that is so helpful, Stargazer. I rolled my eyes.

“What’s the story with these alicorns?” I asked

Star perked up and started digging in her bags again. “Mom doesn’t have much on them, just some stuff about getting into a few fights with them on missions to the deep south. Granny Sundancer and Great Gran Stargazer don’t mention them at all. There’s a pack of them that moved into the city two years ago, just asked Mom and her ponies to leave them alone. They keep to themselves and live in Hippocampus near one of the craters.”

Star pulled a black tome out of her bag and held it up to me. “Most of what I’ve found about alicorns is from this book.”

The book was more a binder with a manuscript stuffed in it. “The Tale of the Lightbringer,” I read aloud. “This is a novel, Star, a book of fiction.” I looked at the filly like she had lost her mind.

“It’s based off true events,” Star shot back. “Mom got it for me the last time she was at Tenpony, but I hadn’t gotten around to reading it.” The filly’s face clouded for a second before she went on. “In the part I just got to, the Stable Dweller’s just killed her first alicorn! By dropping a train car on it!”

“Well there isn’t much that will survive that.” Still, how did this ‘Stable Dweller’ get the alicorn under a train car? “Does your fairytale tell how dangerous they are?”

“They’re pretty nasty when you get them mad, they have really good magic and can communicate telepathically. They’ve changed though; the alicorns my mom wrote about acted almost like ghouls and the one’s around here don’t act like any of them. They’re… nice.” Her tone made it apparent that wasn’t exactly the word she was looking for.

“Well as long as we don’t get into any fights with them, they should be fine,” I said.

I leaned back in thought. I smiled when it crossed my mind that I wasn’t crying anymore, but that wasn’t my focus. Right now, I needed to figure out whether we would be worth going directly south or to Diamond City. “What do you want to do, Star?”

The filly looked up from her books. “You want to know what I want to do?”

“Well, you make up half of our group, your future is in the balance, and I was just crying for you to come find me. I’m sorry to just dump this on you but you get to pony up and be a part of the decision making.”

“Well,” the filly looked extremely smug about my statement, “I say we go east to Diamond City; it’s nowhere near as dangerous as going south. Plus, Tenpony doesn’t sound that friendly in my family’s journals, and getting caught up in those wars doesn’t sound good.”

“It’s a plan then: we’ll go east.” I smiled at Starprancer and she beamed at having been able to make a big decision, almost like she got to choose where she was going for dinner on her birthday. “We should get moving ASAP. Wintermail is looking for anypony that was in Stable 13, and it’s not for friendship lessons.”

“Why is she chasing ponies?”

“I don’t know.” I didn’t think it would be wise to tell my charge about how the Steel Rangers were manipulated into attacking her home by some third party. Star seemed to be taking her loss decently, but I knew from experience that you had to release that pain. I would prefer she break down crying in my hooves once we had gotten somewhere safe over her going on a fool’s vendetta against Wintermail, her army of robots, and their puppeteers.

I looked down to my companion : “I think we’ll try and get across the city. Hopefully we should be able to get out of here before Wintermail can lock this place down.” I felt a bit uneasy with how casual the two of us were treating our future. Spending most of my life working in a military where everything was done through orders and usually planed to a T made ‘just winging it’ about something this big feel surreal. Just ‘yep, it’s a new plan, we’ll get coffee and take our lives in a completely different direction’. It wasn’t an unwelcome sensation though. It was nice to be free: scary, but still nice. “Have everything you need?”

“Better, actually,” Star smiled up at me and opened her saddlebags, pulling out a clutch of clothing. “Some of these pre-war ponies left behind some really nice stuff. This one scarf I found is actual silk and I’ve got a gorgeous satin dress I can wear to my Wasteland prom.”

“That dress better not be too scandalous,” I teased. “I’m having enough trouble keeping track of your kleptomania and this developing sense of fashion, I don’t think I’ll be able to deal with fighting off a horde of trashy suitors too.”

Star just stuck her tongue out at me. “Sense of fashion? Please, I just know that this stuff is going to worth a mess of caps to a trader. I’m pretty sure those Tenpony ponies would sell their souls for some of this.”

I just laughed. I didn’t have anything to counter that, and Star just smiled at me. She really did have a wonderful smile that didn’t get shown enough. I felt the filly had been mature for her age even before the raid. She was too good at stoic and commanding looks to have just started doing them. Then again, it might be genetic. Starprancer was descended from great ponies and might have just showed it. However, that smile was so innocent and pure and happy it would make me burst out in tears of joy if it weren’t so infectious. It was almost Pinkie Pie-like in the way it made me feel: just forget issues and let’s be happy.

I left the apartment with Star in tow and a smile plastered across my face, confident that nothing would go too wrong. Not even the dimming light and stormy weather could dampen my spirit, at least until we got a few blocks and I started spotting synths in the distance.

Author's Note

Edit 1-7-18: Finally got around to splitting this monster in two, something I really should have done from the beginning. Hope its working out well for you. The particulars.

This one was pretty fun to write; cool mix of character development, plot thickening, and action. Sorry for taking so long with this, I wanted to get this out in mid-October but had a little breakdown over midterms. I decided to do another rewrite shortly after (which was for the best this time). Then, my editor and I had a break down of communication and its just taken forever to this to get done.

Thanks for reading :trollestia:

Up and Out

Chapter 6: Grape Vine

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Chapter 7: A Trial By Darkness

“So, what now?” Grape asked as we descended into the basement again.

“There’s a service elevator down here that leads to a utility service tunnel,” I said as I cracked the generator room’s door open. “We’re gonna grab our stuff and take it to the subway. We’ll be able to follow the rails around to the east side of the city, from there we just have to cross Lake Sapphire and then we’re into the mountains.”

“Why are we going east?”

“We’re following the path the Stable 13 Overmares found through the mountains to Diamond City,” I answered, starting to pack my gear away. “It’s a hell of a lot shorter and less treacherous than traveling directly south to… Fort Clydsdon? Winneapolis? There isn’t much for cities between here and the Unicorn Mountains. Northern Equestria was nothing but fields with farming towns scattered around.”

“No, there’s nothing out there,” Grape agreed. “We marched from Albaneigh to Fort Clydsdon, not much more than a crater left of that place, and then up the main pass to the south. Wish we had known about Diamond City and the east. The south was full of radwolves and other monsters, lost a quarter of our numbers before we even got into the city.”

I gave her a rather harsh look over my shoulder. “You act like that’s a bad thing.” I regretted the statement before I had even finished saying it; I really didn’t need her pissy.

The green mare stopped and gave a venomous glare. “They were my family.”

Family you were ready to sell out to a psycho. I sat up and sighed, “Everyone is someone’s family, doesn’t change a damn thing.” Grape was about to retort when I cut her off. “Let it go. Arguing about it won’t change anything.”

She fumed a bit but didn’t say anything as I checked on Star.The filly hadn’t moved but instead just laid there breathing quietly, completely unresponsive to the rest of the world. I leaned down and kissed her on the head before reaching for my stuff.

I dug a large blanket out of our gear, the largest single sheet we had and made of thick woolen fabric that should support Star’s weight. I had seen many zebra mothers carry around their foals using a sling, a simple length of fabric with a strategically placed knot that held a child on the back or close to the chest. Star was far larger than a zebra foal, but the principle would still work. The filly was quickly bundled up and slung over my shoulder.

With Star taken care of, I focused on packing all of our gear up and strapping it to myself. A filly and two ponies (maybe a pony and a half) worth of gear was a massive amount of weight for one mare but I had the strength for it.

I don't know how long my back’s going to hold up though. My damned spine was aching again and the weight didn't help with the pains. Maybe one day, I'll get lucky and stumble across a wandering Wasteland orthopedist or a new spinal column.

With me loaded down and Grape on her hooves and geared up, we were ready to go. I lead the way out the generator room over to the service elevator, pried the split doors open, and looked down the shaft. The elevator’s car was sitting at the bottom, its roof barely below us. I was able to force the door completely open and then we both stepped onto the car’s top before descending a small access ladder to its floor. Once down, it was a small jump up to utility tunnel’s floor.

I hesitated. “Grape,” I breathed quietly, straining my ears to make sure there was nothing to jump out at us, “give me a light.”

“Oh… okay,” she whispered back. The space was instantly bathed in the warm yellow glow of her Pipbuck’s lantern.

I hopped up onto the tunnel’s floor and quickly checked left and right. The tunnel extended off into oblivion in either direction, a simple square concrete passage lined with pipes and cables along the roof and walls. I jerked my head for Grape to follow me and she hefted herself up too. I mentally flipped my cybernetic eye’s night vision mode on, rendering everything hazy shades of green. Walking around with only my eye wasn’t the smartest, I didn’t have any peripheral vision and the field of view was terrible. But between it, the bit of light Grape’s Pipbuck threw off, and my ears; nothing would be jumping out at me without getting a hole put through its head first. Hopefully.

“I’ll take point, you stay on my ass; don’t get lost and don’t let anything sneak up on us.”

“Right,” Grape answered.

It was slow going. The pipes, conduits, and cables that adorned the small passage would catch on me every few paces and a little claustrophobia occasionally washed over me in the tight space. Fortunately, we only had to go about two city blocks before the tunnel opened into a room filled with tool shelves and conduit boxes. Straight ahead, yet more utility tunnel stretched into darkness.

Overhead there was a steel grated floor with more workspace and lockers. A stairwell off to the side of the space allowed us to ascend onto the upper floor. The steel grating groaned and creaked under our weight, but while it did sag a little, there didn't seem to be a risk of it caving in.

After crossing the floor we came to a large doorway blocked off with a chain link fence, its gate held shut by an ice-coated padlock. Several bodies laid on the far side of the fence, gruesomely preserved by the cold. Beyond that, there were tracks.

Fucking this again. I sighed. We’re going to be fine, just, no fucking with ghouls this time. I see trouble, we get out. No trying to sneak past stuff or fight my way through anything.

I slipped the point of a wing blade into the shackle of the padlock and twisted it around, pushing more of the blade in before yanking it down. The lock’s body cracked apart and it fell away from the shackle. I pulled the remains of the padlock off the gate and pushed the rusted barrier open.

I crept out onto the little platform over the metro tracks, carbine at the ready. I strained my ears but was only able to hear the grate floor creaking under Grape’s hooves. “Get out here and stand still,” I hissed. She quickly complied and I once again listened. I sighed when I heard nothing but the soft hollow roar of the tunnel.

Confident that I was safe, I jumped down to the tracks, the thump echoing up and down the space. I stopped and focused my hearing again for a response that thankfully never came.

“Are you sure about this?” Grape muttered.

“Not at all,” I whispered back.

“Great,” the mare mumbled. “Do you even know where you're going?”

“Of course; this is the green line, which does a loop around Amor. We can follow it all the way around to the northeast side of the city.” Or until something ruins the plan, and we have to run to the surface like pussies.

There was a station a short trot away from the alcove we emerged from. I had my rifle up as we moved into the lit area, expecting a horde of ghouls to jump out of the bathrooms the second we appeared. There was nothing however, just more pastel-colored crystals lighting the empty space in mellow hues.

I was going to walk through without giving a second thought, but Grape had other plans. “Aren’t we going to take a look around?”

I looked back at her. Already she was up on top of the platform sifting through a pile of refuse. “No,” I deadpanned, a little confused and a little irritated.

“Aww, come on,” Grape complained. “This place hasn’t ever been touched by raiders or anything, it’s a Luna-damned gold mine!”

“Shh!” I scolded. “Grape, we’re going from here all the way east until we’re nearly at the Celestial Sea, over a thousand klicks. It’ll take us a month and a half on hoof. Are you really going to heft a bunch of junk around with you for that?”

“But, I…” She just kinda looked at me, trapped between my logic and the strange scavenge impulse.

I wonder if their genetics carried the programming to dig through every pile of shit they see at this point. The thought made me want to laugh; whether it from mirth or at how tragic that was, I couldn’t tell. “Come on, Grape. If we’re going to take shit with us, we want a better value-to-weight ratio than anything in here is gonna give us.”

“Fine,” the green mare finally conceded, walking back over to me. “I guess I got a pretty good haul out of that fire station anyway.”

What a glutton for junk. I rolled my eyes and turned to start off again, but stopped as I noticed a faint glow coming from the ground before me. For an instant, I wondered if it was one of those goofy proximity mines that appeared on the civilian market, but that wasn’t the case. It was two fragments of glow crystal, they seemingly fallen from the ceiling; despite being separated from the rest of the crystals, they still emitted a soft light. There was a large powder blue chunk and a small puck-shaped pink one.

And here I was just harassing Grape about picking up junk. Though it wasn’t like I was picking up ashtrays and aluminum cans, it was kinda sad to just leave something so pretty laying in the track grime. Plus, glow crystal had been relatively rare and very desirable in my day, and I couldn’t imagine the Wasteland would have changed that too much. These pieces would probably be worth a fair bit in the right trade, so I stashed them away.

Or would they? It occured to me that I didn’t really have a clue about the Wasteland I was venturing into. What the people were like and what they valued, or even how they interacted. Hell, I would be clueless to handling something as basic as a greeting. Or are they so barbaric that they don’t even have regular greetings beyond shooting at each other?

“What's it like out there, down south?” I asked, looking back at Grape. “This so-called Wasteland.”

“Umm… terrible, I guess,” she mumbled.

“ ‘You guess?’ Isn't it your life? You should have more of a clue then that.” I creased my brow at her.

“I really don't think I could do better than that, if I'm honest,” she shrugged. “Shit's fucked, always has been, probably always will be. I don't know if a Stable pony like you would get that?”

“What part of me looks like some sorry-ass molepony?”

“You're wearing their armor and don’t know how surfacers live? And how is being a pre-war pony any different?”

I barked a laugh before jamming a hoof in my mouth to muffle my cackling. Hopefully nothing heard that.

“What?” Grape demanded.

“Kid, I fought in the bloodiest, most massive, destructive war in the past ten thousand years,” I stated. “I can assure you that there isn't anything you could throw at me I couldn't fathom.”

“So how much slavery and roving bands of raiders did you have running around?” Grape asked, a bit of a scowl on her face.

“A bit here and there,” I shrugged.

“Wait, seriously?” Grape stopped in her tracks, mouth agape.

“It was rare in Equestria. But the Badlands and Liota Forest to the south were rife with smuggling, mostly drugs and other contraband. We found slaves every once in a while. And there was no shortage of anarchist scum running around harassing whoever they pleased.”

“Wow... I-I had no idea that stuff like that happened before the bombs fell,” my companion mumbled. “All of the stories I’ve heard about Equestria before the war make it sound so perfect.”

“Perfect,” I snickered. “How and why did we sucked into a war in the first place then? Anyone who thought that Equestria was ever a perfect place was drinking way too much of Image’s kool-aid.”

“You make it sound like Equestria was some terrible place,” Grape intoned. She seemed to be growing angry with me as we talked, for some reason.

It was my turn to stop in my tracks as I turned around and looked the green mare in the eyes. “I was a pegasus born into a family of unicorns living in an Earth Pony city. My father ran a shop that was a front for the mob, and his biggest goal in life was making sure we didn’t follow down his path and get tangled up with those guys. My mother was an abusive, drunken whore who drifted in and out of my life on a whim.” Grape flinched back at the bitterness of my tone.

“I grew up having to travel two hours to the doctor because no one in the city we could afford treated pegasi. I usually didn’t get to play any games with the other ponies in school because they all thought my wings let me cheat at everything. I was slow to learn how to fly because I was never around other pegasi to learn from. I joined the Royal Marines when I turned eighteen because I didn’t know what my special talent was and I felt myself slipping into the same crowd my father had.”

Wow. Way to just puke all the angst up, you old hag.

I sighed. “No, to me Equestria could be a plenty terrible place,” I said, turning back around and starting off again. “To say nothing of what I learned from reading up on our history or interacting with other people.”

“If you hated Equestria so much, why did you serve in its military? Were the caps good?”

“I said Equestria wasn’t a perfect place, and that it could be terrible, but…” I trailed off, searching for words as I stopped again. “You can’t love something that’s perfect,” I finally stated. “Perfect is sterile and cold; it’s not something that you can get intimate with. It’s the flaws and errors and the way they make the good better that build love for something.

“I had problems with Equestria, but I also had going to the park on Sunday morning with Dad and my siblings. Hanging out with my friends after school, playing roller hockey or messing around at one of the abandoned factories. Spending my summers with my aunt and cousins in Cloudsdale, learning how to be a pegasus. Camping out with my platoon under a full night sky, passing around cigarettes, booze, and stories. Being a filly looking out on Canterlot and the Heartland at the peak of its majesty.”

I rubbed a tear away and looked at Grape, “It wasn’t perfect by any stretch of the word, but I loved it with every fiber of my being.”

I turned and started walking again. She followed after me and we settled into step along the rails, with several minutes passing in an unresolved silence before Grape finally spoke, her voice calm and a touch nostalgic.

“When I was a filly, my sisters and brother would play in the grassy field outside of our compound while my uncle watched us. Mom and Dad and Auntie Grass would come back from scavenging the old airfield and the second we saw them crest the hill on the far side of the field we would all race to meet them. Then we would all go inside, start dinner if we had it, Dad would tell me about the day’s haul.” She sighed, “It was... nice. I had a good childhood for a tribal.”

“What do you mean by tribal?” I asked, the bemused smile I had from Grape’s anecdote fading.

“It’s what the Rangers refer to the primitive ponies that inhabit most of the Wasteland.”

“Bit derogatory,” I commented. “I guess we called some of the people down in the south that. But they were actually tribals, groups of earth ponies and other creatures that lived in little bands.”

“That sounds like most wastelanders,” Grape said. ”Aside from the Rangers, Enclave, and maybe Tenpony; most ponies just live with their families or in little villages. I was like six before I met a pony I wasn’t related to.”

“How’s a ‘tribal’ like you get into the Tin Can Brigade?” I asked, making little quotes with my wings.

“I…” Grape’s voice caught a little before she was able to go on. “When I was about the filly’s age”--she nodded to Star, safely slung over my back--“a band of raiders attacked my home, they killed my parents and uncle, beat and...”--she shivered--“abused my aunt and older sisters, then they sold us off. I had learned a lot about tech from my father, so I was pretty valuable as a slave. I got passed from job to job until I wound up in Fillydelphia, working for Red Eye.

“We were out salvaging equipment from an old factory when the Steel Rangers attacked us. They killed the slavers and took all of the tech they could get their hooves on. I guess I was of some value to one of the scribes because they took me too, put me to work. I had to grind my way from seized contraband, to an assistant, to Recruit, and finally Initiate. Then the civil war started in the Rangers and I got some rapid promotions.”

“Mmm,” I hummed in understanding, seeing the mare in a new light. You might have actually been worth saving.

Any attempt to respond was cut off however, as a familiarly beautiful but haunting sound fluttered across my hearing. It was nothing more than a soft caress to my ears, a sound like a sword blade being drawn across the lip of a crystal glass.

It made me want to pull my skin off and scream.

“Fuck,” I hissed.

“What the hell is that?” Grape said, wisely lowering her voice.

“Crystal ghouls. Stick close.”

I brought up my carbine. I could see a curve in the track ahead with my augmented eye. As we crept further toward the corner, the light from Grape’s Pipbuck cast over the creature making the noise. I brought put my carbine’s reticle over it’s head and unleashed a suppressed burst. The ghoul’s head cracked and splintered, an eye popped and the right side of it’s jaw shattered.

It stumbled from the hits but didn’t go down as it whipped its head around and tried to scream, mercury-like icor running out its mouth drowning out its voice. The monster lashed out with its hooves at the space around it, trying to retaliate. When it turned its now gaping maw toward me, I pumped another burst directly down its throat. It staggered for a moment, what looked like pureed guts running out of its mouth, before collapsing on the ground.

I didn’t even have a moment to celebrate the kill before the old concrete tunnels rumbled with the calls of ghouls. I couldn’t get a grasp at how many, their sounds echo and blurred into one primal, hateful rhapsody. Once again, some basic part of me froze in terror like I was a rookie up against her first manticore again.

Grape grabbed onto my side in terror. I instantly darted to the side of the tunnel and pressed us up against the wall. “Get that light out!” I snapped at her, my voice quiet but intense. She quickly fumbled with her Pipbuck before we were plunged into dark.

The tension burned onto my skin as my blood pounded in my ears. Several seconds passed before another three ghouls ran around the corner. Neither Grape nor I let out so much as a breath as they came within spitting distance of us. They circled around their fallen own before taking off past us and down the tunnel, screaming all the way.

Grape and I remained frozen against the wall, her breath shallow and rapid, body shaking from the cold and stress. I inhaled deeply and exhaled slowly, holding still and straining my ears to pick up the monsters’ hoof-falls over their wailing. After a short but nerve-fraying wait, the screaming faded back to hissing.

Grape let out a quiet squeaking scream before she burst out panting. “F-fuck this place. Fuck this place. Fuck this place. Fuck this place.”

“Shhh.”

“Oooohhh, Goddesses above,” she mewled, “take me now, Tartarus's deepest deaths can’t be worse than this hell.”

“Calm down.”

“That sound…” She shuddered violently. “Coming here was a mistake, it was a terrible mistake. I should have never followed the Rangers up here. Never followed you down here, this place, these things-”

“Shut up,” I hissed dangerously. “You are not going to turn into a melodramatic bitch on me at the first sign of danger. These things are scary and dangerous if they get their hooves on you but they’re pretty much blind and about as intelligent as a box of rocks.”

“But they’re everywhere,” she moaned despairingly. “We should turn back, this isn’t worth it.” The green mare shifted to look behind us and I felt a shiver pass through her body. “What is that?”

I turned too. Behind us, far up the tunnel, there was a faint greenish-blue glow that seemed to mess with my cybernetic eye. Where the fuck was that thing hiding? We had been surrounded and I hadn’t even noticed. I specifically didn’t want to get caught up in anything down here, damn it!

”We can’t turn around. Those glowing ones attract other ghouls like moths to a flame.” Even now I could see the shapes of other ghouls drifting around in front of the glowing one.

“We’re fucked, we’re gonna die down here...”

“No, we’re not.”

“What? We’re just going to wander through here in the dark and hope they don’t attack us?” she growled. “I think I would rather freeze to death or get gunned down by synths over being mauled to death in this pitch-black hellhole.”

“Shut up,” I snapped again. “You’re not going to die down here. As long as we keep the noise down we’re going to be fine, that seems to be what triggers them. I’ve got night vision in my augment so I can guide us through the dark. You just need to stick close and be quiet.”

Grape gazed at the darkness, jerking between behind us, in front of us, and me. “Keep breathing normally, don’t say anything, and don’t freak out about the tail,” I told her, placing my prehensile length around her neck gently. “I’ll get you through this.” I-I’ve been through worse… This’ll be hard, not impossible. Not for me.

Grape shuddered and gulped.

Thanks for the confidence, bitch.

With Grape in tow, I proceeded through the darkness. It was hardly a few meters before we passed another ghoul. The specter was just standing there in the middle of the tunnel, hissing as it stared into the darkness.

Celestia above, I hate that fucking hissing. It's bad enough they’re fucking abominations that are a pain to kill, they needed an ambiance that makes my skin crawl.

I walked lightly as we skirted around the ghoul, still hugging the wall. Passing it only proved to be the first, admittedly easy, triumph in a long and arduous battle.

That encounter defined the next several hundred meters. Most of the ghouls were lurking around the middle of the tunnel after getting stirred up, so we hugged the wall. While my tactic proved effective and it seemed like we might make it through, the idea that I was repeating my mistakes again bubbled to the top of my conscious.

No repeat of last time, no repeat of last time, no repeat of last time. Slip through, don’t irritate them. I’ve beat dragons and hydras; these stupid ghouls are not making a snack out of me. We’re getting through this.

As a sniper, I had experienced more than a few encounters that boiled down to a game of sneaking and hoping “please, no one look at me.” In retrospect, it was an honestly embarrassing number of times for a supposed master of stealth and evasion. This, however, meandering through the dark among a group of creatures that would tear me limb from limb if they sensed me? It would have been hilarious if there was a single ounce of mirth left in my frayed nerves and crawling skin.

We seemed to have wandered into the midst of a very large horde; at least a few hundred ghouls were gathered along the couple hundred meters of track. I had to wonder why they were all congregated in this particular length, or indeed why there were so many zombies in the metro tunnels in general...

There was only so much space in the Stables and nothing but the frozen wastes otherwise. Most of the Empire’s population probably wound up down here. I stopped and looked at a cluster of three ghouls, this time seeing a pair of parents and their child instead of monsters. Poor bastards…

I shoved the idea out of my head and pressed onward, ever deeper into the sea of ghouls.

Things were going stunningly smooth, I had almost started to think we would get away scot-free until I heard a scuff of hooves behind me and thud followed by the soft “oof” of a falling green mare. Instantly my imaginary family of ghouls hissed loudly and started stumbling toward us.

I snapped around and grabbed Grape by the scruff of her barding, yanking her up and forward, feeling her front hooves wrap around my chest as she squeaked. Her face buried itself in my neck and I could feel her face was wet. I darted around the side of the trio stumbling toward us and once again pressed Grape up against the wall and down to the floor. Cuddling close and out of the way of any of the ghouls’ wondering, I put my mouth right next to the other mare’s ear and spoke, barely louder than a breath. “Come on, you’re doing great. Don’t give up on me now.”

She tried to speak but could only gasp and hyperventilate, I placed a hoof over her mouth to muffle her as I looked into my PIP’s files. I brought up my plans and schematics for the city and started looking for a way out of this damned tunnel. Even if I could get through this, Grape was on her last legs. I couldn’t really blame her; being lead around through pitch black while your ears were molested by the ghouls’ calls had to be rough.

Way out, way out, way out… A station? No. Any access tunnels or even a maintenance room to hide in? No. Anything other than more monster-infested fucking tunnel? No, we are under a fucking underdeveloped area the metro ran beneath without any stops. Fucking great.

Way out, way out,a way out! Probably not more than another hundred meters ahead, there was an overpass of sorts. The metro tracks crossed paths with an underground freight train track, the latter going over the former. If I was reading the schematic right, there was a ramp that lead from these tracks up to the freight line, which was heading upward and emerged onto the surface not too far away.

Great, just a little further and we should be out of this horde, then it’s a short burst to the surface.

“I’ve got us a way out,” I whispered to Grape, “I just need you to stand and follow me a little further, and we’ll be out of here.”

The mare let out a choked sob, but nodded and started to stand up. I wrapped a wing around her and hugged her to my side, figuring it would be more supportive for the mare than dragging her around by my tail.

Side by side, the two of us started forward again, edging around the little clusters of ghouls. A ramp leading up took form on the far side of the tunnel in the green and black of my vision, right where the plans said it was. I stopped and looked up the ramp, frowning deeply; there were a half dozen ghouls standing on the ramp and not enough space to sneak past them. Shooting them passed my mind for a moment, but my carbine had proved pretty ineffective against the monsters. Blunt force seemed to be the best against the creatures, which would mean me getting in close to them.

“Grape,” I breathed in her ear, “I’m going to need you to take Star. I can’t fight with her on my back.”

“S-sure,” she said, a scared waver in her voice.

I sat down, moved Star’s bundle off of my back, up, and over my head. I was slipping the sling over Grape’s head when I heard a groan and froze up. Who the fuck was that? Grape looked confused and scared, her eyes darting around the pitch-black trying to find anything. It sure as hell wasn’t a ghoul, the groan seemed to piss them off. A few of them had started hissing and shuffling in our direction.

I looked at the bundle just as there was another groan and a rustle of fabric. “Mom…” came a faint voice. The ghouls instantly went from hissing to screaming, that apocalyptic cacophony once again echoing through the whole tunnel.

FUCK! Bad timing, Star!

I grabbed Grape by the collar and tried to talk over the ghouls into her ear. “Turn on your light and follow me. Whatever you do, don’t stop.” I shoved Grape forward, she stumbled for a step as she fumbled with her Pipbuck before looking up expectantly for me. I raced ahead, going up the ramp and relying on my fighting instinct to guide me.

I made a beeline for the first of eight ghouls on the ramp. I lowered my head and brought my wings up into a pyramid around the back of my neck, much like a snowplow’s prow, preparing myself for the impact.

And what an impact it was. My lowered head fortunately avoided most of the direct collision but I felt my whole skeleton shudder and heard the ghoul’s shoulder shatter as my wings drove into it. I felt its icy blood spill across my back as it went arcing up into the air rather dramatically. The monster flew over the edge of the ramp and landed in a heap below, unmoving.

One down. I looked forward again. Seven to go.

I hadn’t lost too much momentum with my first strike but my balance was off and direction wrong for the next ghoul off to my left. Simply running past it and hoping Grape could dodge it occured to me, but I dropped that idea as soon as I thought of it. Instead, I threw my head to the left and let it drag my body toward the monster. I turned my left shoulder into it and moved my wing up to slice into it.

Once again, I was treated to the sound of shattering crystal as I slammed into the ghoul and smashed it up against the wall. I tried to redirect my energy a bit so I wouldn’t hit the wall too hard, but my head still smacked into the rough concrete and my breath was knocked out of me as I felt my collarbone snap under the strain.

The ghoul got the worse end of the exchange, though. I must have crushed every bone in its chest because it fell to the ground in more of a puddle with legs than a heap, shiny icor running out if its mouth. It certainly wasn’t getting back up.

Two, six.

I turned to the next one that was pretty much directly in front of me, making to charge toward me. I had lost my momentum and was moving forward at a wavering trot, so another ramming attack wasn’t going to happen. However, the barfighter in me saw the perfect solution. As we closed on each other, I simply lifted my right hoof up, shifted my weight back a bit, and then brought it forward and brought my hoof down in a classic jackhammer.

I could feel the shock through my stump as the hit connected. The ghoul’s intimidating charge instantly ended as it fell to the ground like a sack of potatoes, a divot in its skull. I felt myself smirk a little at the almost comical display before looking at the remaining ghouls.

Three down, five to go. Come at me, fuckers.

One of them instantly obliged me, letting out one of those ear-numbing screams as it charged me, gaping maw first. I swiped my right hoof across its face, knocking it to my right. Shifting my weight back, I then lifted my other hoof off the ground and brought it crashing down on the thing’s head in a brutal left hook. It staggered from that and I pressed forward, bodyslaming the creature with my left shoulder and wing. That put the ghoul on the edge of the ramp, one of its rear hooves not even finding concrete to rest on. I gave it a simple shove to the chest and it went tumbling off the edge.

Four for four.

I started turning to face the rest, but one was already running up to me. It jumped onto my back and brought a pair of hooves down on my back haunch with a meatly slap that staggered me a little bit. I moved to my right to put some space between us and pushed against the ghoul with a my left wing. Once I had a little gap, I swung my tail around, using it to push the ghoul away from me and into the perfect position for a buck, and buck I did. It might have been enough to make an Apple gawk and was certainly too much for the ghoul. My hooves struck it square in the chest and sent the abomination flying, hitting the ground like a bag of crushed gravel.

Only three left.

But those three had also been able to close in on me. I launched my left rear hoof at one, shoving him back a little as I tried to turn around and address another coming after my head. I wasn’t fast enough though, and the bastard was able to land a piledriver on me, both front hooves coming down on the crown of my head. I reeled under the strike, my vision blurring a little bit. I took a few steps back to avoid another downward swipe from the ghoul and then pressed forward again, once more body-slamming my foe away.

My offensive was spoiled by a flank, however. Just as I was about to launch a series of jabs on the ghoul, the third one struck me in the side, audibly snapping a rib. I let out a wheezing gasp and staggered sideways before scrambling back. I backed off and bumped right into Grape Vine.

Grape bounced off of me, falling onto her rump and panting. I would have yelled at her if I could fill my lungs properly and if I actually knew what to scold her about. She had followed my directions and was now waiting for me to pull the next part of the plan out of my ass.

Right, another asspull.

I surged back forward, wrapped my forehooves around the neck of the second ghoul and twisted violently. The creature apparently wasn’t expecting me to go on the offensive again because it only stood there as I wrenched it over. I rolled my weight through and around, dragging the ghoul with me. The maneuver would usually result in the opponent getting their head slammed into the ground at my side, but in this situation there was nothing next to me so instead the ghoul was thrown over myself and off the side of the ramp. I looked over at the other two monsters from my on my back. They were standing side by side, torn between attacking Grape or me.

I used my tail to flick my lower half around and lined up my rear hooves. The two ghouls were standing about in-line with me, one next to the other. It was a nearly perfect shot to be honest.

“Grape, keep running!” I wheezed as I let my rear hooves fly.

The kick had nowhere near as much force as my buck had but it was still enough to send the nearest ghoul into the other one. It was certainly enough to give Grape a gap to escape though. She threw her head forward into a sprint past me and toward the top of the ramp. I rolled onto my belly and jumped up to follow.

But not before one of the ghouls got a last, lucky shot in on me, a downward swipe into my rump that nearly crippled me. I felt the hoof land right between my hip bone and the top of my femur; I could have sworn I felt my hip joint pull apart a little bit, even if the actuator there was incapable of such a thing. Matterless of what actually happened, my whole back end locked up as pain raced up my spine and blacked out my vision.

I stumbled and nearly fell, my rear end refusing to do what I told it. When my robotics tried to act on their own, I was blinded by the haze of pain again. I felt the ghoul that had hit me land on my back, and it took everything in me to buck it off without throwing up from the pain. Then I just ran the best I could, limping awkwardly as I tried to keep my pained leg off the ground and as immobile as possible.

I still couldn’t manage more than a gimpy trot. My head started to pound with the pulses of pain and my vision blurred as I tried to follow the golden glow of Grape’s Pipbuck up the ramp and onto twin railroad tracks. The hissing seemed to diminish as I ran; whether that was because the ghouls weren’t following me up the ramp or because my hearing was fading from sensory overload, I couldn’t tell.

I looked up the tracks and saw Grape looking back at me. “Run!” I snarled at her, even something as simple as yelling making me stagger. Or maybe I’m just that off-balance. “I-I’m right behind you.”

She turned her body back around and looked like she was going to take off. But her eyes never left me and she quickly doubled back on herself, returning to me. Celestia damn you. I scowled at her, but Grape was either oblivious or uncaring of my attempt to visually berate her. She ran up to my left side and put herself under my wing, trying her best to push me upright and help lift my injured leg off of the ground.

“You’re being a damn fool,” I said to her. The mere act of talking made me feel like vomiting.

“I’m just following the fool,” she shot back.

I smirked, “But who is the bigger fool then?” I giggled.

The fuck am I giggling for? I didn’t need to start getting stupid from my brain trying to suppress pain.

“What the fuck did that ghoul do to you?” Grape asked, shooting me a concerned look.

I opened my mouth to say something but wound up retching, swaying side to side against Grape.

“Luna, damn it all,” she swore. “Please, Ms. Angry-Black-Cyber-Mare, I can’t have you dropping on me, I don’t think I can carry you.”

No, no you couldn’t. Just the weight of Star was straining her, and she was already panting just from running up the ramp and a bit of track.

I was far worse, though. Every muscle in my body was tightening up, my stomach felt like it was doing cartwheels, and breathing was getting hard. Worse yet, pain was starting to fade from my mind. Instead a fuzzy haze was over taking my senses, making me feel dizzy and hollow.

“S… s-stop.” I had to gasp the single word out.

Grape had no hesitation coming to a halt instantly. I dropped to my knees, gasping and heaving. Running with my bum leg had been a bad idea. The expanding of my ribs from breathing was excruciating, and it was something that was very problematic since I had run out of breath.

My vision fully blanked out as I wheezed and violently dry heaved. Apparently my brain deduced the lack of oxygen and pain as poisoning, which left my body once again trying to empty a synthetic stomach that wasn’t going to give up anything. I got locked in a sort of feedback loop: the brain trying to make the body do something, the body responding with pain, the cybernetics keeping it from producing results, the brain getting confused and trying to make the body do something to fix its confusion...

I took a shuddering breath and then clamped my jaw down on my fetlock. The motion once again helped me to ground myself and calm my berserk body down, but it wasn’t enough. I could feel the cycle of sickness straining against my attempts to quell it. I was at a distinct disadvantage against my body, the pain and lack of oxygen impairing my mind as it drove the cycle on. I could just as easily pass out at this rate; my vision was already blacked out.

Just then, I felt a prick at my neck and the cold, numbing sensation of something running into my bloodstream. Near instantly, my muscles loosened, my nerves calmed, and in an instant I wrestled my fit to the ground. As I stood back up though, I could tell not everything had been fixed in an instant. An odd fuzzy numbing sensation settled upon me, and I really didn’t like it.

Standing up gave me a weird floating sensation, like I had fluttered into a hover above the ground without using my wings. I looked down on a green mare as she cast aside an emptied syringe. I felt nothing really, like I was in a kind of floating haze; separated from the weird hybrid of mangled mare and robot. I’m nothing but mist on the wind, I mused.

SLAP!

“Stop staring off at nothing like that, damn it!” Grape’s voice was equal parts scared and demanding as she knocked me back to the moment.

I looked at her for a moment before I blinked. Ghouls… It didn’t sound like they were following us too closely but there was still the sound of their angry hissing in my ears. Grape… was right in front of me, helping me. Star… she was on Grape’s back right now, and might be waking up.

I can’t wait to say “hi”. I miss Starprancer, it feels like it’s been forever since I last heard her.

I blinked again. Objective One: get away from synths. Probably by going through the ghouls, use of force probably necessary. Objective Two: find somewhere to get Star thinking right again. Might have to bump that one down the list depending on how the situation develops. Objective Three: Find a secure place to hide out from the synths while the storm blows over. Should be east of Amethyst Avenue, preferably with heat and access to good scavenging. Objective Four: find alcohol (consumable, preferably bourbon) and have a good sob.

We had escaped the synths, now we needed to get away from the ghouls. Star seemed to be coming around on her own. I had found the perfect place to hide out in but now we needed another one. I could really go for a drink and a sob...

It’s been a really fucking rough couple of days.

I felt hooves on my shoulders and looked up. Grape had tears running down her face as she all but screamed at me, her voice echoing around hollowly in my head. She probably wanted to get going; we needed to do that right now.

I blinked a third time.

The wail of the ghouls tore through my ears and I jerked my head back, seeing a couple of the creatures idly wondering up the ramp. I instantly turned, catching Grape under my wing and holding her to my side as we started running off again, headed toward the surface at top speed.

“Are you okay?” Grape asked me as she bounced against my side.

I just shot her a sideways glance. Not the time.

That proved to be enough, because she clammed up and returned her focus to keeping pace with me.

The tunnel was pitch-dark and I had turned off my nightvision, leaving Grape’s light as our only guide. The path seemed beautifully empty though, the amber glow only falling across steel track and aged concrete. The sounds of the ghouls was still ominously present, but was diminishing as we put more space between them and us.

Eventually, I decided we had gotten enough distance between us and the ghouls for me to take Star back from Grape. The mare was panting and was starting to stagger under the added weight. Once I had the filly’s sling settled back around my shoulders, I set off with a much less encumbered Grape at a slower but still hurried pace.

We continued along the track and eventually started to encounter rubble. Scattered chunks of concrete and dirt from a cave-in were scattered across a path that seemed constrict at an alarming rate. However, there was also something that filled me with hope: the howl of wind. The screaming of the ghouls seemed to have fallen off behind us in the distance, replaced instead with the sound of air racing past some opening up ahead. In comparison to the terrifyingly rapturous screaming that had been echoing in our heads, the wind was glorious, a single constant note of hope for us to align our shaken consciousnesses on.

I looked around at the rubble, feeling a cool gust of air across my bare scalp. “Grape, turn your lamp off.”

“Um, okay,” she responded, the amber of her Pipbuck vanishing and darkness rushing in around us. However, it was not the absolute darkness that we had experienced in the metro tunnels. Ahead of us, we could make out pools of soft white light among the chunks of shattered concrete and debris.

I choked back a laugh of relief and felt Grape’s whole body shudder with a sigh beside me. We both surged forward, and when we came to the first pool of light we both looked up through a crack in the ceiling. A massive smile broke across my face as I saw a crescent moon framed behind several wispy clouds far above us.

I quickly moved on from the first pool of light and further into the thickening field of rubble. Somewhere in here there had to be a hole or passage we could take to the surface. There has to be.

Soon, we lost the tracks and concrete floor under the rubble, reaching the point where the tunnel had nearly completely caved in. The relative warmth of the tunnels was gone, replaced with the biting cold of the surface as the wind ripped past us through the cracks and gaps.

That airflow became my guide, and I simply kept following the gusts of wind until it eventually lead to fruition. A passage in the rubble that I had taken finally emerged out into the open air. I could only stand mesmerized, barely aware as Grape scrambling out and stood next to me. The pair of us simply stared at the moon, stars, and clouds as the wind bit at our faces.

The moon hadn’t looked this glorious since, well, last night when I had seen it for the first time in two centuries. It looked glorious beyond description and the feeling of relief and happiness that the sight filled me with was once again indescribable.

With our greatest lows come our highest highs, I guess.

My small revelry in the moonlight was once again cut short by the crack of gunfire ripping through the wind’s howl. I instantly hit the ground, Grape close behind me. Looking ahead, I saw that we were on the edge of a large railway yard. Row upon row of derelict train cars sat on a massive expanse of rails in front of us.

It had been a single shot. A very large caliber rifle, probably an anti-material rifle of some sort. Range would be hard to tell in an urban environment where the sound would be bouncing off of buildings.

I did a quick check behind us to make sure the gunfire wasn’t coming from the south. “Stick close, Grape,” I hissed as I rushed forward and took cover behind a boxcar. Grape quickly pressed herself in behind me.

I held still and listened. After a moment, I heard the chatter of an assault rifle in the distance before the big rifle sounded out again, silencing the assault rifle. I listened to the echo as it bounced around the train yard.

I edged over to the side of the car to take a look up the train yard to the north. A slow scan of the horizon revealed that there was a water tower to the northwest overlooking the train yard. To the direct east there was a two story building overlooking the space. Aside from them, none of the surrounding buildings rose above the tops of the cars. Part of me doubted a sniper would be so brazen as to set up on the water tower, since it was the most obvious place available, but that thought wasn’t even allowed to get all the way through my mind before I saw a flash of light from the tower as another clap echoed across the trainyard.

Definitely an anti-material rifle. Shooting toward the northeast? I wonder what the fuck’s over there? Regardless, the sniper was on the water tower’s top, around the far side where I couldn’t get a good look at him. Of course, that also meant that he couldn’t get a good look at me.

I backed away from the edge of the train car and turned around, looking toward the eastern side of the yard and the two-story building. It looked like some sort of administrative building, probably the control center for the yard. A path to it would be easily guarded from the sniper by the cars scattered across their lines and the building looked pretty sturdy and wind resistant. There was likely also a decent angle on the water tower shooter from there.

“Come on, Grape,” I said before starting off.

I walked around the ends of a few train cars before ducking under a few more. It was a relatively short trot to the edge of the switchyard, and the rail cars offered cover pretty much all the way to the door of the building. A simple application of my cyberpony master key had the door off its hinges and us safely inside.

“Watch the door,” I told Grape.

“The doorway, at least?” she shot back.

I smiled at the quip as I hefted Star off my back and onto the floor. The smile grew a little when I heard Star groan and shift around, protesting her new location on the smooth concrete. “I’ll check this place out real quick.”

Grape nodded affirmatively before I started off. The building did indeed seem to be some sort of administrative office for the railyard, made up mostly of offices and a lounge, with a door at the back leading to a parking lot surrounded by warehouses. The second floor of the building had a decidedly different tone from the sterile offices below. The first few rooms I came across were for sleeping, probably so night staffers and engineers getting in on late trains had somewhere to rest. Most of the floor, however, was dedicated to a control room for the yard that was dominated by a large switchboard. This was what controlled the countless railroad points that could transfer cars between the dozens of lines before leading them out of the yard.

I called Grape up and the mare quickly arrived with Star slung over her shoulder.

“So what’s the plan?” she asked as she took in the control room on her way to one of the bunk rooms I had scoped out. She hefted Star off her shoulder and looked at me from across the small room.

“You are going to get some rest,” I commanded, taking the sleeping bundle from Grape. “You could use it.” I put Star on the bottom bunk and pulled the blanket off her, stroking the filly’s mane. “I’ll stay up and keep an eye on Star. Hopefully she’ll be awake in a few hours; I don’t want to move before she’s back on her hooves.”

“What about that synth with the anti-machine rifle?” Grape asked.

“You think it’s a synth?”

“Who else would it be?” the mare scoffed. “Starswirl the Bearded?”

“It might be one of the other Windigoes,” I said.

The mare turned a few shades whiter. “You mean another one of those cyberponies like you?” She gulped, “Why do you think one of them would have stuck around?”

“Why do they do anything else? They’re a bunch of crazy wackjobs,” I spat. “I think you’re right with the synth thing, though.”

“So what are we going to do? Just leave it and hope whatever it was shooting at keeps it occupied?”

“Well, I’ll leave it alone for now.” I sat down and shifted my rifle’s case off of my back. “But the sun’ll be up in a few hours, it’ll be on my back and in his eyes... Once we have him taken out we should be free to move through the yard and surrounding area without too many problems.”

“Right…”

I get you through that tunnel and you’re going to doubt my ability to take down some robot with a big gun? Thanks, Grape. I rolled my eyes and settled into my guard spot looking out a window into the yard as Grape climbed into the top bunk.

Author's Note

I wanted to get this out by the end of Febuary... Time tables are hard :ajsleepy:
Hardly my best but I liked what I was able to do with Shadow and Grape's dynamic, I'm slowly but surely becoming sure that not killing her off wasn't a bad idea. I want to say the next chapter won't take as long but I've gotten a bit burned out on this again. Plus, I've been rethinking a fair bit of my overall plot which is always soooooo much fun.

Anyway, have some art and a song.

Shadow con cyberbits:

Some creepy AF ambiance since this chapter isn't creepy at all

Up and Out

Chapter 8: The Alicorns of the North

Ch 8: The Alicorns of the North

After so many years since I had last held my rifle, I almost expected myself to have grown unused to it. Quite the contrary, cradling that sculpture of steel and wood was a comforting, surreal experience. To me, the handsome old rifle oozed power and precision, but it also showed age. There was no getting around my Scythe being from the older world, just like I was. An era before the War that my well have been completely forgotten. But together, we pair of relics lifted each other out of oblivion. Together we were death and fire incarnate. After two centuries of inactivity, these robots would suffer the direct fury of the Black Angel of the Eastern Sky.

Celestia above, I’m sitting here getting all giddy about shooting some damn robot. Like anybody would care about this, that it meant anything at all…

I cared, whatever that was worth. I sighed shifted my weight a bit, moving my butt off a lump in the pillow I was sitting on. My rifle was laid out on a writing desk in front of me, aimed out the rooms window at the top of the watertower across the yard.

“Luna, have you been awake this whole time?”

I looked over at Grape in the upper of two bunks across the room, causing the mare to flinch.

Am I really that scary looking? I wondered.“Yeah.”

“Wow…” The green mare intoned, still looking away from me. “I haven’t seen you even twitch and you were in that position when we settled down. I thought you were like powered down or something.”

“I don’t power down. It doesn’t work that way, Grape.”

“Sorry.”

I rolled my eyes. I expected us to lapse back into silence as the mare went back to sleep. Instead she asked me: “So, you’re a sniper.”

“Mmmm,” I hummed affirmatively. “Among other things.”

“Oh…” Grape mumbled. “I recognized the pegasus skeleton on your rifle, some Enclave Remnants I saw a few years ago had it on their armor.” She shook her head, “They were a bunch of whack-job sniper-types.” She audibly gulped before stammering out a quick apology: ”Not that you’re a whack-job or anything. You seem really level-headed and sane.”

“You know, one of the greatest skills one can learn in communication is when to stop talking."

“Yes, ma’am.” She nodded quickly before settling back into her bunk again. “What’s the story behind it? Why do you pegasus snipers wear it?”

“It’s the Grim Reaper, Death’s harvester of souls from griffon mythology,” I said. “I thought a skeletal specter that collects the damned was a pretty metal when I was younger, a lot cooler than just having “born to kill” scratched in my rifle stock. So, I had my armorer stencil it, paint it on, and I ran with it for years. Already had the whole mini Nightmare Moon thing going and was earning a reputation as a cold blooded bitch, but this really rounded out my whole demonic harbinger of death aesthetic. Later on, the ponies I trained took it on themselves and it kinda got beyond me from there.”

“Oh…” Grape gulped. “Were you that good?”

“I was the best,” I said evenly, “for a while.”

“Oh. So, that synth or whatever with the anti-machine rifle, how hard is it going to be to hit him?” she asked.

I looked out at the synth’s perch atop the water tower. “Right now I don’t have the angle, but that’s an easy shot once I get him in my sights. Wind’s a bit harsh, it blows steady from the north but gusts really hard from the southeast, but I shouldn’t have too much trouble with it.”

“But the range.” the other mare looked out the window. The water tower was beyond the far side of the massive railyard. “That’s really far, you sure that’s not going to be an issue?”

My response came phrased as a snicker. “It’s not even a thousand meters, I think I can handle it.”

“Even with that super old rifle?”

“I’m older than the rifle,” I apprised the mare, shooting her another glare.

“Sorry, ma’am.”

I softened my glare.

“Who do you think it's shooting at?” Grape started again. “Rangers?” There was a slightly hopeful tone to her voice.

“Or Stable ponies,” I guessed. “There's Alicorns running around up here too.”

“I don't think Alicorns use guns usually, they can shoot lightning”

I lifted my head up and turned it to look at her properly, opening my mouth to respond, but Star chose that moment to let out a gasp. Grape jumped away from the edge of her bunk, pinning herself against the wall. I left my rifle on the desk, went over to the filly’s bedside, and pulled back her blankets. She was still unconscious, but curled into a ball, clutching her head in pain.

I placed a hoof on her shoulder and she spasmed, rolling over with a shriek. I yanked back my hoof as she settled back down again.

“What’s wrong with her?”

“I…” I gulped. “I don’t know…”

“Am I going to be okay with her when she wakes up?” Grape asked, fear apparent in her voice.

Star thrashed a little in her sleep and muttered something, before grabbing her head and squeezing around the base of her horn.

“We’ll have to see,” I answered. “I think you’ll live. She not the killing type.”

“I don’t know about that, some of the most terrible ponies out there come out of Stables.” Grape’s voice rang hollow and foreboding.

Noted. I waited for Star to calm down a bit and managed to place a hoof on her back without her screaming again. She was hot to the touch and had started mumbling again.

The filly started thrashing against me. “Mom!” she screamed, gritting her teeth as tears started running down her face.

I had been thinking of stepping back and leaving her to thrash out her fit, but after that I couldn’t bring myself to take my hooves off of her. I pulled Star against my chest and buried my face in her mane. “Shhh,” I cooed.

Star thrashed around for a few more seconds before a shiver ran down her body and she went as limp as a corpse. A terrible sense of dread went through me with that thought and I froze up, my whole chest tightening like a vice.

“Mamma?”

The quiet request had my heart jumping between elation and agony. “N-no, Starprancer, it’s me. I’ve got you.”

“Shadow?”

Star pushed herself away from me so she and I could look eye to eye. “Shadow…” The filly said it again, just to assure herself, and her eyes glazed over with tears.

“Shh,” was all I could manage.

The unicorn pressed her face into the crook of my neck and let out a pained sob. However, Star once again proved that she wasn’t much for crying; some sobs, wailing a few names into my neck, and she was done. We sat for a few moments, her cradled in my hooves while she hung around my neck.

“Hi, Star,” I finally said. “I missed you.” I had to choke back some weird hybrid of a sob and a giggle. “You’re feeling alright?”

“My head still feels fuzzy, the tips of my hooves are numb, and my horn kinda burns. I guess I feel kinda sick,” she reported. “Are you okay? Where are we?”

“We’re in a railyard in the industrial district on the eastern side of the city,” I answered. “Hiding out in an old switch house.”

“Oh…” she sighed, soaking the information in and thinking.

I felt Star’s mouth open to say something again before she went as stiff as a board. A scared “eep” from the upper bunk followed a moment after. Celestia damn it, Grape! Couldn’t give me a moment to at least tell Star you’re up there and not going to try to hurt her?

My mouth opened, something to pacify Star on my tongue. But before I could even draw a breath, the crack of the synth’s anti-machine rifle sounded off again. Star instantly tried to launch herself over my shoulder at Grape.

Star charged her horn in an instant and fired a burst of vaguely directed magical energy at Grape, splintering the side of the bunk bed. Grape squealed again before launching herself off of the bunk and into a surprisingly graceful arc through the open doorway. Her surprising grace didn’t last all the way through the door though, she smacked into the frame with a hiss of pain and limped away.

Star fell down my back and too the floor, holding her horn in pain for a second before resuming her pursuit. The desk I had been resting my rifle on was wrapped in her magic and lifted into the air, following the furious filly as she raced out the door after the green mare. I quickly got to my own hooves and followed after the pair.

Grape had taken refuge under the switchboard, cowering as Star bashed the desk into splinters on the old control panel. The filly didn’t seem to have enough wits about herself to hurt Grape at least. However, she didn’t seem to be handling the exertion well. Her magic started to fade out as she panted and swayed from side to side.

“Celestia damn it, Star, stop before you hurt yourself!” I snapped.

Her magic flashed out and she dropped the remains of the desk on the switchboard. The filly stumbled forward and stuck her head under the board. “I’ll kill every last one of you!” she snarled, far from her usual calm, snarky self.

Grape was sent running out from under the far side of the board. Star was quick to extract herself from under the board and fire another burst of magical energy in Grape’s direction, shattering the wooden paneling on the wall. Her trot wavered and nose started bleeding.

“Damn you, Starprancer! Grape, over here, now!”

The green mare diverted her course right for me, diving between my legs and rolling back into the bunk room with that odd grace.

“Starprancer, stop right now! You’re going to cripple your magic or worse!”

“Get out of my way, traitor!” Star shouted at me. Her magic wrapping around me, lifting me into air, and flinging me across the room. I sailed through rotted plaster and wood as I smashed through the wall. A pipe broke and spilt foul water all over as I and a section of wall collapsed into a heap in the next room.

I laid there, back spasming from the impact and the water so laden with rust and other shit it wouldn’t freeze soaking into my coat. Star snarled again and I wiggled around on the pile of debris trying to roll over, digging Celestia knew what rusted nails and nasty insulation into the back of my neck and the fabric of my barding. I’m going to need about a dozen tetanus shots after this...

I was able to look back into the room just in time to see Star digging into her saddlebag and extracting Moonbeam. Grape came into my view, she was trying to force the room’s window open before taking off toward me and the hole in the wall. The green mare was balling: crying, screaming, sobbing. She bounded over me and went barreling into another desk, somersaulting over the top and hiding on the far side.

“Please,” Grape pleaded, “don’t kill me. I’m sorry. I was just following orders. It was the last option we had, the whole Wasteland has it out for us! I never-”

“SHUT UP!” Star snarled, her magic trying to load her revolver.. “Shut up! Shut up! Shut up! You think a bunch of bullshit like that means fricking anything, you Steal Ranger! Steal, like taking, because that’s all you’re good for!”

“Seriously, Star?” I injected from the floor. “That’s the best you’ve got?”

“Why are you on her side, Shadow?” Star snapped her bloodshot eyes to me, swaying on her hooves but keeping her gun pointed at the desk concealing Grape. “What the heck fuck why? And why are you covered in blood?”

Blood?

The haze of bloodlust drained from her face in an instant, replaced with fear and worry. “Goddesses! Are you okay? You’re gonna die! I’m so sorry!”

“I don’t think I’m gonna die,” I mused. All this crashing through walls and stress probably isn’t healthy, though. “It’s just water from a pipe in the wall, maybe a cut or two. I’m just really cold and grossed out.”

Star gave me an odd look. “Are you okay? You’re acting weird again. Did the Steel Raider hack you or something?”

“No,” I shrugged, “I feel fine.”

“You’re sure?”

“Well, I’ve had to readjust the scale,” I elaborated. “I’m pretty fucking terrible, but I guess this is my life now.”

Star’s mouth worked aimlessly for a few seconds, looking for words before she finally settled on: “All right… Why is there a Steel Ranger here?”

“She owes me, she asked for help, she’s good with tech, and she helped me move around while taking care of you,” I answered calmly. “I honestly expected her to stab me in the back but I think she’s nice to have around.”

“I don’t care what you think!” the filly snarled, anger surging back to the forefront. “She destroyed my home! I lost everyone because of her and I’m supposed to forgive her for it?!”

“Forgive her for what?” I asked. “She was just a grunt. Not even a grunt, she barely knows how to fight.”

“It doesn’t matter! She’s one of them!” she screamed as she looked over me at the desk Grape was hiding behind.

“Are you going to shoot me next?” I asked. “The Rangers attacked your home, but it was Windigos that destroyed it. We wiped out everything and I was the commanding officer.”

“You weren’t well! You couldn’t take charge of them, you couldn’t even stand on your own.” Star turned back to me.

“My weakness is my fault.”

“No, it wasn’t, damn it! Don’t go blaming yourself, please.” There were tears on her face.

I shifted around and sat up. “There’s no blaming myself to it, that’s a concrete fact. If I it weren’t for me, Stable 13 might have survived. It certainly wouldn’t have met the fate it did.

“I’m more to blame than she is.” I nodded my head at Grape.

“Why are you saying that?”

“Because that’s the logic you’re using,” I said.

I lifted a hoof and lowered Star’s revolver. She looked at me, anger still burned in her eyes but it was mixed with fear, confusion, and vulnerability. “Grape can you come out?”

The green mare poked her head around the corner of the desk. Star bristled at the sight of the her, but didn’t try anything but try to burn a hole through Grape with the hatred in her glare.

For what felt like an eternity we sat there. Grape hyperventilating against the side of the desk, me holding back Star, and the filly pouring as much hatred into her glare as possible. Eventually, Star seemed to fatigue, her glare breaking and eyes falling away from Grape. Her fury broken, I waited a few minutes longer, just to make sure Grape’s scared face was burned into Star’s memory, and held out her revolver.

“Grape, don’t move or I’ll kill you myself,” I said, calmly. “Now you can shoot her, Star.”

Grape froze in place, looking at me in horror. Star looked at the gun and levitated it into the air, leveling it on Grape. The filly lorded over to Grape for what felt like an age. Then, slowly the revolver was lowered and a sob escaped her. I opened my mouth to say something but the pistol was flung into my chest hard enough to knock the wind out of me as Star stormed back into the other room.

I looked over to Grape who was hyperventilating in the corner, eyes unfocused as she stared at the space between her and Star. “You’re not hurt or anything are you?” I asked, rubbing my bruised sternum.

“Why have you forsaken me, Luna? I’ve not been through enough? I have to try and avoid the wraith of a demon unicorn filly? The scorn of a perfect-in-everyway pegasus doll? Does the depths of your cruelty know no bounds?”

“Grape,” I repeated a bit louder.

She jerked her head up to me. “Was I talking aloud?”

“I don’t know, I’m so perfect I might have just been hearing your thoughts.”

The mare’s face turned chocolate brown again with a blush. “I’m sorry. I think. She did try to kill me. And you couldn’t be more of the cool-under-pressure, warrior-badass snowflake if you tried.” She buried her face in her hooves. “I think I might just kill myself, but then I would probably just get reincarnated even worse off. I might be as attractive as you two.” Grape shuttered. “Instead of getting to hideout working on tech all day, I would be stuck in the brothels. Or worse...”

“Grape,” I hissed.

“I think it would have been better if I had just killed her,” Starprancer commented from behind me. “Almost seems like a mercy, really.”

“NO!” Grape burst out, throwing herself to the floor. “Please don’t kill me, changeling-sorceress!” she sobbed, “I don’t wanna be a sex slave!”

“Shut up!” Star snapped, lighting her horn.

The act of firing up her magic had an instant adverse effect on her though. Her eyes grew hazy and she fell back on her rump, whatever else she had to say dying on her tongue.

This is getting out of hoof. “Enough, the pair of you! Star, no more magic, you’re going to hurt yourself even more than you have. Grape, shut your whole damn train of thought down right now. You’re not gonna be anyone’s sex slave.”

At my declaration, Grape teared up and buried her face in a hoof again, the other hoof beating the floor in anguish. “You’re right! Nopony would ever find me desirable. I’m a fugly, unlovable troll. They couldn’t give my body away!”

I grit my teeth. I wonder how hard I could hit her without causing any lasting damage...

“Hey, Grape, was it?” Star said, looking back through the hole in the wall and giving the earth pony a sneer that was far more cruel and sinister than I thought she could produce. “If you don’t shut it, I’ll turn you into the most beautiful mare that there’s ever been. Somepony so pretty, ponies don’t even notice us. As attractive as the next hundred prettiest combined. That would make Rarity and Sweetie Belle look like mongrels. Put the Princesses to shame, too.

“We’ll use you as bait for any raiders that we run into.”

Grape’s body went rigid and she slowly looked up at Star, her face sheet white. Once again, I found myself reminded of a spiteful god looking down on some repugnant mortal that they were getting sick of seeing.

“You couldn't,” Grape said. “You wouldn't.”

Star shrugged with a sinister smirk. “I'm a growing filly, I don't know what I'll be capable of. What I do know, though, is you can't spell Grape without ra-”

“Star,” I interjected, “shut up. The only magic you’re doing in the immediate future is the wonder of healing.”

“Whatever, Shadow,” the filly grumbled, lighting her horn and stopping her bloody nose. “It’s not like healing your nose and telekinesis was hard on me or anything.”

Only healing my nose and TK? “Star, do you not remember what you did?” I asked.

“No?” She quirked an eyebrow. “I mean, it couldn’t have been too much, I feel fine.”

“Star, I carried you halfway across the city, you’ve been unconscious for nearly two days. You had a flare that knocked down a building and you’re lucky to still have a functioning horn.”

Star blinked at me and tilted her head. “I knocked down a building…”

“Yeah,” I answered.

“And then passed out for two days,” she continued. “You carried me halfway across the city…”

“She helped-” I jerked my head at Grape “- but yes, I carried you this far on my back. You scared me half to death and I swear, I’ll beat you senseless if you don’t calm down!” I walked over and picked her up by the scruff, depositing her on my back before looking for my discarded rifle and picking up my gear. “Just fucking drink some water, eat something, sit there, and behave. I need to go shoot a synth.

“Grape, collect yourself and meet us down in the yard. Try not to get shot.”

The sun was just coming up, casting me in complete shadow while giving great illumination of the watertower. Between the lighting, the train cars, and the angle, there was no way the synth could see me, even if it had heard the commotion Star and Grape had been making.

I was at the midpoint of the yard, able to see the front of the watertower and finally able to put a bead on the synth between gaps in the train cars. I put Star down in the snow and pulled my Scythe off of my back. Opening the action, I fed six rounds into the rifle before removing the lense covers. Rifle ready, I looked over at Star. The filly was grumpily reattaching her saddlebags under her winter cloak while chewing on some sort of snack bar.

“You know, I can’t really say how happy I am that you’re okay.”

She looked up at me, a frown etched across her face. “What’s your deal? I know we don’t know each other that well, but I don’t get this at all. You’re the big bad Shadowbolt sniper supersoldier mare who’s probably killed a million zebras and not thought twice about it. But then you wave at alicorns and spare a Steel Raider for no reason. What is that? You didn’t learn your lesson with ghouls and synth that maybe you just shouldn’t mess with whatever is out here?”

I blinked at her before looking away. “You called me monster,” I answered quietly.

Star’s brow creased in thought for a second before revelation washed over her face. “What?” Star galloped in front of me and did her best to stare me down with tears beading at the corner of her eyes. “Did that go to your head? Are you sure you’re not blaming yourself for all of this? Home wasn’t your fault. None of this is your fault. And I d-didn’t mean to call you a monster.”

“Star,” I started, wrapping my hooves around my head and leaning back against the train car. I still haven’t gotten around to having my sob. I could really go for that right now. But, I can’t do that now, though. I’ve gotta fight off everything and save the day or something still. “I’m a mess, Star. I don’t know what I’m supposed to do or even think. I feel dead inside and at the brink of bursting out in tears all the time. I can’t sleep, don’t have a plan to get me past the next few hours, and my my mood swings like my mother’s interest in family life. I’m already losing my mind, and I’m scared of becoming like the others.”

I leaned back forward and looked down at the filly. “I’ve been called a monster, heart-less, cold-blooded, natural-born killer, demon, and everything else. Rightfully so, and I’m never going to be able to overcome that, and it’s not easy trying to live with that on your shoulders. You’re not like that, and I don’t want you to ever be like this, you’re a kind and nice pony. And I also gotta figure out how to be a role model for you so that you keep that, because I know it’s going to be hard going forward but I can’t stand the idea of-”

“Shhh…” Star stood up on her back legs and placed her hoof over my mouth. Once she was sure she had stopped my rambling she leaned forward and wrapped both hooves around my neck and squeezed tight. I let out a cross between a hiccup and sob, then wrapped my neck and hooves around her.

“You’re not like them, you’re incredible. Big and dumb and a mess that tells goofy jokes, but incredible,” she said, rubbing a tearful face into the crook of my neck. “I’m glad you’re my friend.”

I nodded and shuddered again. “Thank you… I needed that.”

“You don’t need to try so hard to be a role model, you’re already amazing. It’s nice to see someone who can fail and keep going too,” Star continued, looking over the way we had came. Grape was seen skulking through the snow, looking erratically around for any sign of danger. Star sighed, “I guess I can try with her at least.”

“She seems like a decent enough pony and I know it’s mean, but I don’t need you thinking killing is the best solution to problems.” I rubbed her back before letting her go just as another anti-material rifle shot sounded out.

“Just as you’re about to solve a problem by shooting it?” Star teased, sitting back down with a smirk on her face.

“Synths aren’t alive, I’m just breaking more robots.” I shot one last smirk before poking my head around the side of the traincar.

The water tower was about twenty meters high. The synth was perched on the side of the the domed water tower, looking into the heart of the yard. The wind was a steady ten knots from the west now, with gusts up to fifteen from the same direction.

Wind: ten/fifteen knots on my back, a none factor. Elevation: 947 meters above sea level, target plus fifteen meters. Temp: -15 degrees. Ammo: Y48, solid sharpshooter’s load for 8mm ELA, old, probably degraded. Range…

I had a laser rangefinder built into my cybernetic eye, so I just looked at the body of the watertower and thought range finding thoughts. Range: 754.6 meters.

I heard Grape finally stumble her way up to us. I gave her a stern look before turning back. I mentally brought up my ballistic calculations and then let the computer attached to my brain solve the equations in a moment as I shouldered my rifle. With my calculations set, I reached up and started clicking in adjustments on the modern scope on my old rifle.

I nestled into my cheek weld and cranked up the zoom. “Grape, head or chest?” I asked.

She flinched again from me looking at her. “W-what?”

“On a synth,” I elaborated. “Do you think I would cause more damage hitting it in the chest or the head?”

“Um…” The green mare put a hoof to her chin in thought for a moment.

“Didn’t you knock the head off of a synth and it still managed to buck you, Shadow?” Star asked. “You almost threw up your own guts.”

“That did happen didn’t it,” I recalled, my abdomen aching from the memory.

“That would make sense, the head is probably just filled with sensors and maybe a few processors for those inputs. The main control computer is probably in the chest along with their power source,” Grape speculated. “There’s also a copper bit that looks like intestines on them, I think it’s a heatsink of some sort. Hitting it would probably overheat it and take it down.”

“Mmm,” I hummed in acknowledgement.

Ruining a heatsink would undoubtedly cause issues for the synth but I doubted that it would be the killshot I was looking for. The upper chest it is.

“You're still going to try and hit it from here?” Grape asked from behind me.

I smirked a little before taking a deep breath and tuning out. “Nothing else. When taking the shot: it’s just you, your rifle, and the shot. Everything else in the world ceases to exist in that instant.”

It hit the synth square in the chest, just behind the shoulder. On an organic target it would have shredded the lungs and diaphragm, probably caught the coronary and aortic arteries. Hydrostatic shock would have caused even more damage, pretty much guaranteeing a kill. On the robot, the bullet impacted with a blue spark, apparently hit something important, and it collapsed.

Rather anticlimactic, really.

“Well fuck.” Grape was standing behind me, looking over my shoulder, mouth agape.

“Moderately demanding shot,” I commented, slinging my rifle over my shoulder and starting off along the rails again.

“Grape, I want you behind Star. Keep an eye to the rear and left. Star, look right. I've got point. Now that that sniper is down, whoever was having a shootout with the synths might try to counterattack.” To affirm my statement, there was a crackle of assault rifle fire from ahead. It was followed by a burst of laser fire and what sounded like a cannon of some sort.

We made our way over multiple branches heading off into the surrounding warehouses and store yards. Soon we had made it to the end of the yard where the tracks merged back together. The gun fire had gone quiet but the occasional burst confirmed that we were getting close to the fight. We followed a northbound set of tracks out of the yard and were suddenly on a street that ran parallel with the tracks.

We dodged around snow drifts and hugged the sides of warehouses as we moved through the industrial area. The gun fire echoed off of the cracked concrete, rusted sheet metal, and ice. There wasn’t any sign of the combatants though, they seemed to be on our left, off to the west, and there were no signs of trails or tracks. Hopefully they’re not heading this way....

We had followed the main line for about eight blocks and seemed to be getting past the gun fire. Of course, we weren’t home free. The snow banks had grown into small mountains as the frozen north worked to reclaim this part of the city, crushing the buildings they were leaning against and effectively corralling us into a valley of ice and concrete.

“I don’t like this,” grumbled Grape.

“We’re getting boxed in,” Star added.

“I noticed, but the snow seems to get impassable to the east and there’s gunfire to the west. We don’t really have another option here,” I answered. “We don’t want to turn east yet either. The cold and winds are going to be a lot more intense on the tundra. We won’t make it out there like this.”

We’ll need to find a department store or something to raid for camping supplies and extra cold weather gear. We wouldn’t find any such thing in this part of the city but north of here was the Diamond District, the wealthy, touristy part of the city along Lake Sapphire. The area was probably brimming with loot and would make a perfect last stop before crossing over the lake and leaving the valley.

My thoughts were interrupted by a ticking in the back of my head. It was slow but seemed to grow in tempo each step forward I took. There was also a ticking outside of my head, coming from Star and Grape’s wrists. I stopped and held a wing up, not that Star and Grape needed to be told to wait up.

“Where do you think that is?” Star asked, as we scanned over the scene before us. There was a train on the tracks off to the left and more snow covered warehouses on each side.

“Stay here,” I said before walking off toward the train.

The ticking increased as I got closer, my RAD counter was going constantly by the time I had reached the back of the train and swept a wing across the last car. It revealed a bright purple and yellow symbol, indicating magical waste. I quickly backed away from the train and it's ruptured containers.

“That looked super healthy,” Star deadpanned, before continuing a bit more seriously. She dug around in her saddle bag and passed me a packet of Radaway.

“Probably,” I said. “We're not making it past that. Let's circle back and head over a block.”

We walked back a block. Faced with a two-story snow drift to the east, I decided to brave getting closer to the gunfight and marched down a westbound street. My original plan had been to simply move over a block and start northward again, but the snow drifts had other plans, most of the other streets were narrower than the road we had been on and were completely choked with snow.

Being forced to keep going west put me on edge, I didn’t have a lot of faith in my group’s combat ability. We were great against ghouls, but taking on organized opponents with ranged weapons was a solid no. I didn’t think I had would have another instance of running for my life interspersed with hoof-to-hoof fighting and gunplay in me for a while.

The thought had only barely passed through my head when the sound of laser fire came from up the street. I ducked down behind a nearby wagon; it was close. I brought a wing blade to my lips in a quieting motion to Star and Grape before creeping around the side of the wagon. There were two groups of synths ahead of us, both clustered around the corners of warehouses at intersections. Their opponents were to the south and we had stumbled across their flank. There were six in the group closest to us and another three further out, all of them looking up the road and occasionally poking around the building to shoot down the street.

Keeping an eye on them, I crept forward into the next intersection, this road too was blocked to the north with more snow drifts. I looked to the south and quickly ducked back behind the wagon, there was another group of ten synths a two blocks down.

From the positioning of the synths, we had walked right up behind the firefight. The other group were probably only a block or two to the southwest, caught in a crossfire.

I waved my wing for Grape and Star to join me. The three of us laid against the side of the wagon as I pointed with a hoof. “There’s two groups along this road, and another down in that direction.” I jerked my head to the south.

For a moment, I contemplated debating our course of action with Star and Grape. But the truth of the matter was that we were outnumbered nineteen to three and were ourselves boxed in by the city and snow. However, we had the element of surprise and extremely favorable firing angles. This was a golden opportunity to eliminate a sizable portion of the enemy force and I wasn’t going to squander it on democratic debate.

“Grape, when I give the signal I want you to cross around the side of this wagon and hose down that group to the south. Star, take my carbine and hit that group just ahead of us. I’ve got the three further down the road.”

“I don’t think…” Grape looked like she was thinking about challenging me but her comment died with a single glare from me.

“Right,” Star said, as she took my carbine in her magic. She turned the rifle over in her magic, checking for a round in the chamber and ammo before bringing it level with her head, ready to fire.

“On three,” I said. “One, two, three.”

It went off like clockwork. Grape ducked around the front of the wagon first, followed by Star and me. The green mare’s twin battlesaddle spewed out a wall of blue laser fire as Star carefully emptied my carbine into the sides of her group. I lined my sniper rifle up on my trio, they were all standing perfectly and I hit all three with a single shot.

Two of them fell instantly, blue sparks arcing out of their chests. The third I only got in the rear abdomen, about where Grape said the radiator-looking thing was. It staggered around and turned toward us, drunkenly trying to aim it’s beam pistol at us. I quickly cycled my rifle’s bolt and fired again, hitting right in center of the chest, the synth falling to the ground instantly.

Next to me, Star had emptied my carbine and was pulling another magazine from my vest. I looked over at her group, seeing several piles of scrap, one synth dragging itself through the snow toward the street, and another hiding behind the corner of the building. It made to poke out as Star was reloading, giving me the opportunity to put it down.

With two groups scrapped, I looked over Grape’s shoulder to see she had taken down seven. The eighth was shot in the back by whoever was over a few blocks over when it tried to take cover around the same corner it had just been shooting around.

“Grape, where are the other two?”

She spat out the trigger bit and reached for another set of sparkcells. “They ran off up the other street.”

“South or east?”

“East,” she answered.

Right. I turned around and looked back up the street we had just come up. “Get across this street ASAP and to the other corner. Run now.”

I covered our backs as the other two took off west before turning and following. Even with Grape and Star’s head start I was able to quickly catch up with them.

That went pretty much perfectly. I thought as stomped over the synth crawling around on the ground. But those two that had gotten away could still prove a problem and there was whoever the synths were fighting not taking kindly to our presence.

I switched to a brisk trot with my two charges in tow, casting my eyes backward. Approaching the corner of yet another warehouse, I heard voices coming from ahead, accompanied by pounding hooves crunching through snow..

I stopped instantly, Grape running into me. Fuck. Whoever it was, they were close. Way too close for us to hide and let them pass by. I tensed myself up and launched myself at the first sign of a snout coming around the corner.

The first thing I noticed was my lounge aimed for the head was actually going to hit them in the legs. Their very, very long legs. I latched onto the pony, holding tight as I leapt up and around their shoulder. The behemoth was turned into a fulcrum, my mass circling their body and spinning them around so that they fell onto their back. In an instant, I was sitting on their chest and they were on their back in the snow. One of their front hooves twisted around into an armlock and the other pinned under me with a wingblade resting against their neck.

I took a second to soak in the creature. Again, I was struck by her size, I was an extremely large mare and this mare dwarfed me easily. I felt like I recognized her too. She had a very intense set of pink eyes shooting beams at me from a light blue face. A pink, short, punk-ishly styled mane was tousled out behind her as were a pair of massive wings partly pinned under her. Her horn glowed angrily as she glowered at me, bringing my attention to one final point: the kitchen knife hovering directly in front of my face and the set of sharpened knitting needles pointed at my eyes.

“Get off of me before I peel that pretty face of yours off,” she growled at me.

I twisted her leg, getting a hiss of pain out of her, and glowered. “Try anything and I’ll gut you.”

“Harm so much as a hair on her head,” cooed a sharp Prench accent to my left, “et you’ll see your chance against this, putain.” I dared a glance over and saw another alicorn standing there. She was a deep green and had what looked like a shortened 20mm chain gun aimed at my head.

Looking beyond, I saw that there were three of them in total. The blue I was on top of, the intensive-fire green next to me, and a slender filly-like purple with a large doughy set of eyes behind the green. I recognised Lefty and Purple from the plaza where Star had her flare up.

“Hey, she’s my cyberpony and anyone who messes with her is going to answer to me, my super powerful, ultra-unstable magic, and 44 squared calibers of attitude,” declared Starprancer from behind me, puffing her chest out and waving her revolvers around in what I guessed was her attempt at being intimidating.

“Ooo! It’s the black mare and her filly from the other day,” called the unfittingly cheery voice of the purple behind me.

“Oh Princesses above, alicorns!” Grape angsted from behind Star. “I hate alicorns. Bunch of deranged, bipolar lunatics with super powers.”

“Cunt, I’ll turn you fucking inside out,” snarled the one under me, shooting a deadly glance at the green mare.

Star swung one of her revolvers to point at Grape and the other at the blue mare under me. “Hey, I have dibs on turning this fart muncher inside out the moment she does anything stupid.”

“Oh, the embryo can talk,” shot back Lefty.

Star grit her teeth. “Enough!” I snapped. “Grape, Star, stop engaging them.” I turned to the alicorns. “Which one of you is in charge?”

“She is.” The green one pointing the chaingun at my head gestured to the blue mare under me.

I glanced down. “You cool?”

“I’m laying in the snow under some icy bitch,” she snarked. “I don’t think I can get any cooler.”

I twisted her leg again.

“Fuck! Yes, I’m fucking chill as hell. Now get the fuck off of me.”

I let go of her leg and rolled off her chest, stepping back and next to Star. The blue and green coldly regarded us and we returned the glares.

“Yay!” The cheery voice ripped through the tension. “I’m don’t like having to go around fighting with everypony. Especially not you, you’re even more scary than the other robo-pegasuses since you can see through invisibility spells,” she commented, bouncing on her hooves.

“Laurel, shut up and stop fraternizing with the enemy,” snapped the light blue one as she stood up and shook the snow off of her coat, glowering at me the whole time.

“They’re not our enemies, Bubblegum. They’ve met us twice now and not shot at us once.” The oversized filly plopped down on her haunches and made to count with each of her hooves. “That’s a whole two times less getting shot at over like everypony else in the wasteland. They’re 200% nicer to us.”

“I understand what you try to say, Laurel dear,” the green with the chaingun said, “but I don’t think that’s how it works.”

“How it works doesn’t matter, Lourd! They’re nice and I like them.” Laurel smiled and pointed at us. “Well, black cyber baldy and the filly. The green mare looks kinda shifty eyed though.”

“Steel Rangers always are shriveled-up pussies when you peel ‘em out of their armor,” sneered Bubblegum.

My ears swiveled as I heard more hooves approaching. Snapping around, I was treated to another dozen alicorns coming up the street.

“I don't know if this is the best time to be making friends, Bubbles.” A dark green mare with red eyes and a minigun hovering in her magic quipped as she looked at me. Despite how startling her red eyes were initially, there was an intrigued, mirthful look to them that put me at ease.

“Shut up, Aegis,” Bubblegum snapped. “I'm not making friends, I'm dealing with a situation.”

“What situation?” came another voice from deeper in the group.

A tall (even by the alicorn’s standards), muscular mare emerged out of the group leaning against a green teammate. The purple’s eyes fell on me and flickered with a hint of shock, annoyance, and what might have been recognition. She looked to Aegis, “Keep the group moving forward, the phonies to the south were pulling back but they might still try sneaking up on us. We shouldn’t be too far away from the wrecked train now.”

She then faced me. The purple alicorn had a look I easily recognised: calm, collected, and stern with an undertone of fatigue and pain. She looked tired and was nursing a savage burn wound on her left shoulder. “Who are you and what are you doing this far north?” she asked.

“We’re survivors from the Stable trying to flee to the east,” I said, looking her in the eyes.

“You're running from the White Menace?”

“From Wintermail, yes.” I did my best to remain imposing to the group of giants. I had to, Star’s horn brushed against my belly and Grape crowded against my rump.

“We don’t want any trouble,” Star said from under me.

“Well, you’re in the wrong place for no trouble, sweetheart,” mused the purple, bending forward to look at Star and almost falling on her face when she lost balance.

“Saint, you’re in no condition to be dealing with this,” Bubblegum asserted, stepping up to hold the purple upright.

“I’m not dead yet, punk.” The purple, Saint, stood back up. “We need to get that train secured ASAP. It’s only a matter of time before Wintermail pins us down again, I want Laurel to be resting in the bliss when it happens.”

“Bliss?” Star asked.

“It’s our slang for radioactive waste,” answered Aegis..

I creased my brow, “What in Celestia’s mane they you trying to accomplish with that?” I mumbled to myself

“Alicorns are real freaks,” intoned Grape from behind me. “Rads don’t hurt them, they heal them and make them stronger. It’s freaky as hell.”

“Seriously?”

“It’s a gift from momma,” interjected Laurel. “She made us perfect so we could thrive in the the wasteland as much as possible!”

“Laurel,” hissed Bubblegum, “don’t call the Goddess that.”

“What? That’s what she was.”

“No!” shouted Saint, something that really seemed to take the wind out of her sails as she swayed on her hooves and nearly fell.

Aegis, the other green serving as a lieutenant of sorts, shot Laurel and Bubblegum a dirty look. “We are not, under any circumstances, opening that can of worms out here, you two. Now all of you move! The phonies are closing in on us, we need to find that train.”

“Pursuing the train may prove foolish, Aegis.” It was the green with the autocannon that spoke up. “The sun’s up and the storm’s blown over. We’re going to be caught in the open and gunned down. We need to find shelter. We can rest Laurel during the day and teleport out of here in the evening.”

“We won’t last until evening,” Bubblegum stated. “We’re low on ammo and all of us have been on our hooves for seventeen hours now. If we get pinned down again, we’re dead meat.”

As the trio argued, I looked past and noticed the rest of the alicorns. There were probably about two dozen all together, half seemed to be walking wounded, a few were carried on stretchers. The remaining half seemed to be split between the front and the back of the group, trying to protect their comrades from inevitable attack. They’re worse off than we are...

“The train you’re looking for,” Star interceded. “It’s back that direction about a block and another two to the left.”

The alicorns all looked at her for a moment in stunned silence. I could have sworn I saw the whole group of them blink in complete unison a few times.

“I could show you where, i-if you would take us with you,” Star added, scuffing a hoof in the snow.

There was another moment of stunned silence, this time including Grape and me. The wind whistling around the warehouses became deafening. I gave the filly a quizzical look, she wrapped her hoof around my leg and I assumed she squeezed while giving me a determined nod.

Fine. I gave Star a little nod of my own and we both looked up to the alicorns.

Bubblegum was the first to react, shaking her head, bearing her teeth, and shouting: “Are you insane? We’re not going-”

“If you help us there and ward off the phonies until we can escape, you have a deal.” Saint stood as upright as she could manage leaning against Bubblegum. “At least back to our base.”

“T-taking them back to the hive? You can’t be serious, Saint,” Bubblegum stammered.

“What the hell’s the hold up.” Another blue, lightly colored like Bubblegum but with a blond mane and green eyes, trotted up, a stretcher hanging off her back and dragging in the snow. She took in the three of us and her face curled up in contempt. “What the fuck are these and why are we talking to them.”

Bubblegum nickered. “Saint just decided to take them back to the hive in exchange for helping us go around the damn corner.”

“Seriously? You bleeding again that your brain’s not working anymore?” the blue asked. “That’s a level of stupid we only usually see from Bubblegum.”

“Fuck you, Primrose. I’ll fucking shank you with this Ranger bitch’s femur after I turn her inside out.”

“Hey, I told you you’re going to have to go through me if you want to touch her,” Star shouted from beneath me.

Bubblegum craned her neck down, turned her head so her ear was pointed at Star. “What was that, shrimp?”

Star scowled and her horn flared with magic. When she spoke again, I felt it more than heard it.

“I SAID: YOU TOUCH A HAIR ON THE STEEL RAIDER’S HEAD AND YOU’LL BE THE ONE TURNING INSIDE OUT! GOT IT, BITCH FACE! DON’T MAKE ME RAISE MY VOICE AGAIN!”

I think they heard you in Roam, Starprancer. I wasn’t aware cybernetic eardrums could ring but they seemed to be. Bubblegum honestly looked like her brain had been shouted into mush, her eyes were crossed. When she nodded, she nearly fell over before looking at the other light blue.

“Primrose, I need a medic,” she shouted at the top of her lungs. Which after Star’s Royal Canterlot Voice was almost quiet.

“I might have overdone that a bit,” Star mused. My hearing seemingly the only that could still pick up her talking voice.

“Very overdone,” I commented. “And what did I tell you about magic.”

“Sorry”

“That was so cool!” Laurel, the five-year old in a giantess’s body she seemed to be, bounded around Star jovially. “Can you teach me that spell? I wanna be able to talk super duper loud too! I can make decrees and someone is always gonna hear me if I need help!”

“Enough all of you,” I snapped, my teeth bared.

I’m not sitting through another round of this. I took a breath and went on. “The synths and Wintermail heard that, I wouldn’t advise standing around.”

“Serious, bitch alert,” mumbled Bubblegum.

“She’s right,” said Saint. “Laurel, Primrose, take the filly to the front and have her lead the way. Bubblegum, Lourd, Aegis, North, South, Clover, and the black mare; come here.”

I gave Star a quick hug before Laurel scooped her up and placed the filly on her back, trotting off to lead the group. The seven of us, plus Grape, then congregated around the purple mare. She looked me in the eyes for a second, “What’s your name?”

“Shadow, I guess.”

She quirked an eyebrow and I heard a snicker come from Bubblegum. “You’re sure of that?”

“No, but it’s what I’m going with.”

“Fine,” she shifted back and looked at the group in all. “The White Menace is still shifting most of her force over from the Southeast so that’s the direction the phonies will be coming from. The southern phonies pulled back in that direction after their flank collapse. The Menace is probably regrouping for another attack on us. I want you all to set up a defensive line at that rock quarry she attacked us from initially. It’ll give you a good view of that wide road the synths came up.”

“Right,” Bubblegum nodded.

“Between Lourd and Aegis, you should have plenty of firepower. And with a name like Shadow and a sniper rifle slung over her back, she should be a pretty good shot.” Saint quipped.

“Or a lot of hot air,” snarked Bubblegum.

“Too hot to trot is the term you’re looking for,” I shot back.

Saint smirked at that, and Aegis let out a snicker while Bubbles looked indignant. Saint continued: “I don’t want any risks taken, Bubblegum, you stay there and hold off the phonies but the moment it starts going south, high tail it out of there. Hopefully we’ll have some sort of fortification set up around the train.

“Get moving,” Saint finished.

Author's Note

If you see any editing problems, go ahead and point it out in the comments please.

I've been wanting to write alicorns for ages. They were probably one of my favorite parts of the original story and I've not really seen them portrayed much. I'm looking forward to writing them, even if for a few chapters. Star's awake! I realized it's been like a year and a half since I actually wrote with Starprancer ~~and that's depressing~~. I just really struggle to work on this at all. I have these burst where I only really want to do this but other times I actually start to hate it. I'm glad I'm still keeping at it though. It should start to get more interesting in the next few chapters with the Disciples and the Escape from the Crystal Empire.

Glad you've made it this far.

Up and Out :trollestia:

Chapter 9: The Stench of Intertwined Fates

Ch9: The Black Champion and the White Menace

It was only just starting to occur to me that I was maybe letting the relationship with the alicorns move to fast. We had agreed rather quickly to join forces, more to our advantage than the alicorns’, but I hadn’t been interested in looking a gift horse in the mouth. I didn’t have any reason to contradict Starprancer’s offer and to use Laurel logic: neither of us had tried to shoot each other on sight so that meant we were friends. The enemy of my enemy and whatnot.

Celestia above, I’m a dumbass. Life wasn’t that easy.

I had my suspicions of what these ponies were from the first time I heard of them. The appearance of the Steel Ranger armor had given the stagnating arms race a second wind. Powered flight armor, combat drugs, magical energy weapons, the leaps and bounds tech took forward meant that soon the fleshy bit holding the gun was the weak link. Robots were one answer but their processors never measured up to an organic brain. Super soldiers were going to be the way of the future and there had been three main competitors in that arena: the Cyberbolt program, the Zebra’s Commission of Alchemical and Psychical Advancement, and the Ministry of Magic.

Once again, Grape’s whispered warning passed through my mind. “You don’t get it, we have to get out of here. These are the Prophet’s Disciples, alicorns are psychotic monsters in the best cases but these are the worst of the worst. They’re a bunch of wack-job hyper-supremacists lead by a mare who thinks she’s the Goddess’s next form and is trying to rebirth Unity and wipe out the rest of equinity. They’ll kill us, quickly if we’re lucky, the filly probably won’t be so lucky.”

Grape was hardly what I would call a reliable source, but she knew more about alicorns than I did and probably more than Star. Plus, the alicorns were kinda creepy up close and personal. Even if there were subtle physical differences in size, slight features, and particular hue of their coats to tell them apart, they looked like clones of each other. The same face with the same eye shape, mouth, ears, and nose on the same body in one of three colors.

Then there was the matter of cutie marks. Bubblegum, Primrose, and Lourd all had normal marks, nothing too amazing. But then Laurel and Aegis were blank flanks! Worse yet, Saint, now that I thought back to her, only had a cutie mark on her right flank. North and South, the “twins” in the group, shared their set of marks, North having a mark on her right flank while South had one on her left. I had never put a lot of stock in cutie marks, but now that I had noticed, I couldn’t get over the dreadful anxiety those inconsistencies put in me.

And finally, there was our current situation. Star was back at the train with the main group, Grape and I had been sent along with these six intended to head off Wintermail and had now been seperated ourselves.

A real fucking dumbass. I felt the mare in my head sigh loudly and shake her head in disdain.

It’s not all a mess at least.

The quarry the alicorns had been talking about was sandwiched between the railyard and a large road that seemed to cut diagonally across the industrial area, going from central Amor to the Sapphire District in the North. I was perched atop a large mound of gravel overlooking the thoroughfare with Aegis, Lourd, and North. There was a storm covert going under the road behind us and Grape was camped out with Clover and South on the far side of the road, looking up over the edge of the ditch. Bubblegum, the only one in the group who seemed to have an invisibility spell and an understanding of what wings were used for, had flown off to scout out the enemies’ movements.

The current positioning was clever, my group was elevated and had good command over the entire area. The other would cover our right flank and establish a crossfire if the synths just pushed up the road. It was a strong defensive formation that gave both groups covered routes of retreat, it might just be enough to make an eight on who-knows-how-many fight work out in our favor.

I’m in a good position and the alicorns haven’t given me any reason to think poor of them, but…

I glanced over at Aegis laying next to me on her back, red eyes soaking in the lazy patterns of clouds overhead.

I could probably take her before she even knew what happened. Lourd was behind us, taking a power nap, and I was convinced North and South were having some sort of twin sync, telepathic discussion. They were looking directly at each other, tilting, shaking, and nodding their heads like they were chatting face to face.

Slash Aegis’s neck with a wing, buck Lourd in the head at the base of her horn. I'd be on top of North before she or the others knew what they were doing. From there I’d…

I’d get Grape and Star taken hostage. Probably get minced, blasted into tiny pieces, or turned to ash myself. Piss of the only friendly ponies I’ve managed to meet out there. I sighed out loud as the plan fell apart just as quickly as it had formed.

“What’s the matter?” Aegis asked, looking over at me. I would have thought a massive mare with red eyes would look scary, but she looked nice. Her eyes shimmered like candle flames; a pair of warm, soft, and mellow dancers beaconing me to relax.

“Nothing,” I answered.

“Do we make you uncomfortable?”

I sighed. “Yes.”

“Oh, I’m sorry.” She blinked and looked back up at the sky. “We’re a lot to take in. To be honest, though, I don’t quite know what to think of you either. Your eyes are weird how one’s normal and the other’s not. And your wings and tail. Then there's just the way you look as a pony too, it’s weird seeing a pegasus mare with a build like yours and you have that cold, scary look on your face.” I creased my brow at her as she smiled. “Guess, I know why regular ponies don’t get along with us, either. If they feel like this.”

“I’m sorry?”

“It’s fine, there’s a lot of things we can’t change about ourselves. At least you work past it. Ever since we left the Followers, we haven’t stumbled across anypony other than the Overmare willing to give us a chance.”

Wait, Star was Nebula Skater’s daughter and Nebula was the pony who gave the alicorns a chance at peace…

“So you got chased up here by other ponies?” I asked.

“Pretty much, we were having trouble finding somewhere to live where the NCR wouldn’t harass us. We heard the pegasi had found refuge in Diamond City, but they weren’t as willing to help us out. But, we managed to find our way west to here though. It’s been… Wow, nearly a year- feels like just yesterday we were flying in.” The green chuckled quietly. “Guess time flies when you’re starving and freezing to death.”

“We’ve ‘ardly been lacking for food,” intoned Lourd in her elegant accent. Eyes still closed as she continued to appear napping. “You’re just an exceptionally picky eater.”

“Excuse me for not being into hundred year old junk food.”

“Don't blame it on the food, you just don't like eating, silly goose.”

Aegis growled and put her hooves on her head. “Eating is weird and I don't like it!”

Lourd just shook her head and tut-tutted.

“What kind of pony doesn't like eating?” I asked.

Aegis groaned and pressed the back of her head into the ground. The small smile on Lourd’s face disappeared as her eyes finally opened, settling on me.

“We alicorns used to sustain ourselves off of magical radiation, almost like a plant uses the sun,” Lourd elaborated. “We still can to a degree, but it’s much harder. Radiation affects us mentally as well as physically. It’s like a drug, I guess. Soaking in radiation is probably the most pleasant thing most of us have ever experienced. Bubblegum has equated it to using Dash but better a million times over. It relaxes, regenerates, heals, strengthens, empowers; it’s rapturously blissful.”

“‘Bliss,’” I intoned.

“Yes. We only turn to it in desperation at this point. The best of us are fragile when it comes to the mind. Addiction, dependency, and withdrawal have killed just as many of us as any hunters or other monsters.”

The mare sighed and one of her eyes glazed over with a tear. A swallow and blink, and the pleasant smile was back on her face

“As a result, we eat to maintain our energy instead. The normalcy of it also seems to help some of us keep our sanity.” The green looked over teasingly at Aegis. “But others enjoy being little flowers who only want to live off the sun.”

“I’m the special-est flower,” she mumbled, not looking away from the clouds.

“Such a flamboyant disregard for how sad it makes me when you don’t eat what I prepare,” the Prench mare lamented.

Aegis grimaced slightly but remained silent as Lourd went on, turning back to me. “I was the private chef of the Prench Ambassador to Equestria long ago, before the end and the Goddess. I so miss those days of extravagant feasts and broadening my horizons. Equestrian cuisine was so simple and hardy, yet I couldn’t help being enraptured by the elegance of much of it. I guess after spending so much time studying the most complex recipes in the world, it was nice to return to simpler tastes. Of course, Canterlot was such a hub of culture and art that I was never waiting for other styles either.”

I chuckled. “About how I remember it, but I was never big on the high-class food scene though. Growing up with five other siblings at the table meant you ate quickly or you didn’t eat at all. Joining the Marines kinda just hammered that in.”

“You truly have a disposition of a proper soldier then,” Lourd commented. “I remember dating an Equestrian officer. I would make him all kinds of things and he would simply scarf them down, offer up some generic comment on how good it was, then move on to trying to mount me.

“He was such a boar, but mercy was he a handsome boar.” She rolled her eyes, but still seemed caught up in the nostalgia of the memory as she fanned herself with a hoof.

She’s fanning herself with a hoof when she could be using a wing…

“I wasn’t so quick to move on to mounting the nearest mare, sweetheart,” I chuckled, “ and the nearest stallion wasn’t usually up to the task of mounting me. Poor fool that thought that was a good idea.”

“You were not some sex crazed animal half the time? Well, I must retract my comment, most un-soldier-like of you.” Lourd turned up her nose but couldn’t help the smile spread across her face.

“I’ll have you know that I still hold the drinking records of the Shadowbolts, the entirety of the Sixth Army and Fifteenth Marines, the Thirty-Seventh Ranger Battalion,and the Second Army’s Officer Corps,” I jabbed back. “I didn’t need to be whoring around to maintain prestige.”

“So, you are a pre-war mare then?” Aegis asked from above, looking back with queer interest.

“Yeah.”

“I have to say, you look ravishing for two hundred years old but I think some of the work you’ve had done is showing through,” Lourd teased again, chuckling at her own joke.

I wasn’t as entertained at the jab at my cybernetics, but I swallowed and put on a little smirk.

Aegis wasn’t enthused about the joke either, continuing to look back at me with the same queer curiosity. “How did you make it this far? You weren’t secretly running the Stable were you?”

“No, I’ve been in cryostasis for a long time and just gotten woken up recently.”

“Really?” The mare seemed to get a glimmer in her eye. “You’re taking this all really well.”

“I don’t think I am, but I’m still on my hooves I guess,” I shrugged.

Aegis gave me an odd kind of smile. “That’s all most of us can do, isn’t it?”

I blinked at her before returning the smile. “I guess it is.”

The alicorns were weird creatures with a dubious past, weapons built to fight a war that was waged no more. But they also seemed to struggle to find clothing in their massive size, resorting to modifying everything themselves. They wore a pair of socks, boots, scarfs, and large tarps fashioned into cloaks with assorted bags and webbing holding gear and loot. They all had a series of three rings pierced in the front edge of their left ears, the only group symbol they seemed to bear. They bickered and argued among each other like a large dysfunctional family and there seemed to be a level of care extending to every single member of their group.

I like alicorns.

“If you were a soldier,” Lourd mused behind me, “and one to know their way around a sniper rifle, and especially one that old, I imagine you saw more than your fair share of the war. The stories I heard come back with veterans, I guess it shouldn’t be too surprising that you’re… rolling with the punches.”

“You fought in the Great War?” Aegis asked perking up again.

“More than that,” Lourd asserted, giving me a more scrutinizing glare. “Your face doesn’t bely your age, little ebony doll, but I feel that rifle does, as does your disposition. You were probably a seasoned veteran by the time of Littlehorn. A mare old enough to know and remember evils far greater than zebras and greed.”

The jovial air evaporated and I mirrored the mare’s appraising look. “I thought you were a chef not some sort of shrink.”

She chuckled, “The master chef I studied under at home always said the key to the perfect dish was understanding who you were making it for and what they would need when they sat down at the table.”

I snickered. “And what does your divine food intuition say I need if I sat at your table?”

“A hug,” she answered quickly, “then a hot bowl of vegetable soup. I have an old recipe my mother used to make all the time that would be perfect.”

I couldn’t help but chuckle. “Does sound perfect.”

“Oh, it’s just fucking dandy, isn’t it?”

All four of us jumped and jerked around to the top of the mound of gravel, bringing our assorted arms to bear. However, pointing my rifle at the origin of the voice appeared impossible, the muzzle and target refusing to meet up like two north poles on a pair of bar magnets. I shot a quick glance to the others and saw they had a similar problem, each of our muzzles shrouded in a pink hue.

“Aww, you stupid bitches wanna try and fight me?” Bubblegum, in all of her grungy, punk, powder-blue glory, rippled into existence fluttering over us. “Fucking adorable.”

“Bubbles,” Lourd grumbled, “now is hardly the time to be showing off.”

“Please, you dumb fucks could have accidently shot me.” The blue alicorn finally settled on the ground, her wings folding gracefully on to her back. “Bad enough you’re letting this bitch get inside your heads.”

“We’ve been keeping an eye on both of them,” North spoke up. Bubblegum shot her a glare and the twin elaborated. “The other mare has isolated herself and makes no attempts to communicate, spending all of her time looking at the ground or over here at the black mare. She makes her hatred and fear of us outwardly plain. She also seems to completely lack the motivation to attack any of us and maybe even defend herself.

“This one is far more sociable but undoubtedly more dangerous. She’s been quietly examining every one of us and keeping conversations directed toward us while not revealing too much about herself. She hasn’t felt the slightest inkling of hatred, though. Fearful, anxious, and untrusting initially, but talking with Lourd and Aegis quickly pacified her. She’s aloof and keeps most of her emotions off her face, but we can’t catch the slightest whiff of malice in her head.”

“Wait, you can read my thoughts?” I jumped to my hooves and turned to face the up-to-now-silent member of the group.

“No, we can feel others’ emotions.”

“Don’t tell her that!” snarled Bubblegum.

“You’re just mad that your plan to be as far away from the dangerous cyberpony as possible so she didn’t pin you like a bitch again backfired and you were out in the cold while we were getting along just fine with Shadow,” Aegis quipped, her voice cracking as she said my adopted name and a grin spreading across her face.

Why did I go along with Star calling me that?

Lourd chuckled. “I had a dog named Shadow when I was a child. Fierce creature but he was a big lovable gaffe with a golden heart. You remind me of him.”

“Thanks?”

“The fucking Goddess fuck me all the way through! I will fuck your shit, bitches!” Bubblegum barked. “I’m in fucking charge here and I’ll beat the pair of you and slice this bitch’s head off if you keep this shit up! Fucking got it?”

“Calm down, that was barely a sentence,” I chimed in. “Screeching at your inferiors is great way to make you look like an idiot. And keep it to one swear word per sentence, you’re wearing them out.”

She jerked to me and her horn flared. Instantly a kitchen knife freed itself from the bandolier of sharp objects wrapped around her chest and stopped stopped right before my remaining organic eye. I flinched back covering the eye with a hoof as fire burned in her eyes.“Be quiet.”

She shiethed her blade. “Phonies are about ten minutes out and the white bitch and her assault robots are with them.”

The tone of our discussion shifted completely as I looked under the mare at the snowscape beyond. “How many?”

“There’s two groups. The one at the front is about twenty-five. The second one is closer to sixty and lead by the Menace and her robots.”

“We’re not going to be able to deal with that many synths. Never mind the damn super Steel Ranger and her assault robots,” I commented.

“Indeed,” commented Lourd.

“Of course not.” Bubblegum rolled her eyes and looked at North. “Tell Clover to send word back to Prim and the others… ‘Engaging lots of phonies. We won’t last. Be ready to get the hell out of here.’ That’s a statement not a request.

“You four better be on top of those phonies as soon as they’re in eye sight,” she added casting a glance at me as she spread her wings.

“I don’t think that’s a good idea.”

The blue jerked back to me and gave me her best death glare.

“We already have a good ambush position set up,” I asserted. “Shooting at the synths from long range would just give away the element of surprise.”

“You’re just scared you new fuckbuddies’ll figure out you’re full of shit.” Bubbles snorted. “Sniper? But you can’t shoot down some synths.”

“Snipers don’t shoot random soldiers. We go after officers, medics, the big fish. The average grunt is pretty much helpless if there’s no one to order her around and she’s pissed-herself scared. The synths don’t have that, all I can do is pick them off one by one and if that’s the strategy we try to use, they’re gonna back away, rush us, suppress me, or just take cover and wait for reinforcements. We’ll probably get flanked before we have a chance to use our position and we’re definitely not gonna win that engagement.

“We should let the first group push up to there.” I pointed up the main road between our two vantage points. “Then we open up with everything we’ve got. Scrap the whole first group and book it before the second can get here.”

Another flare of indignant rage flashed across Bubblegum’s face and she was nose to nose with me in a moment. But she had it under control even faster than the previous burst. “Fine. We’ll let them in close and slaughter the first group.

“Actually, I kinda like the sound of that…” A rather sinister smirk spread across the alicorn’s face as she spread her wings and flew to the other side of the road. I saw her settle down just as Clover, another green I had to assume was a magic user from her lack of apparent weaponry, tossed what looked like a small origami bird into the air with her magic. The folded scrap of paper spread its wings as it left it’s master’s embrace and started fluttering off in the direction of the others.

That’s neat.

My observation of the bird was cut off by Lourd chuckling. “I couldn't tell if she was going to beat you to death or try to have her way with you.”

I jerked to the mare. “Who’s doing what now?”

“Bubblegum defaults to either breaking and/or fucking whatever frustrates her,” Aegis commented.

I blinked twice. “What the fuck is wrong with her?”

“Now there is a list,” Lourd snorted. Aegis just shrugged and snickered.

“She’s a nest of conflicted and confused emotions to say the least,” North commented.

I looked over at the blue mare across the street as she settled down on the incline. She looked over to me and we made eye contact for a moment before I jerked my eyes away to look at Grape. The green earth pony was laying on her belly and looking forward dead eyed.

Come on, Grape. We haven’t even started yet.

The sound of metal hooves in snow indicated that was about to change though. The synths were closing in. The four of us crept up the sides of the gravel pile, making sure to not expose ourselves early.

“Leave the front files to the others. Lourd, shoot into the center, give your shells’ slash damage it’s best chance. Aegis, controlled bursts into the back. North, watch the foot of the hill for any that rush us and keep them in the street. I’ve got the leftovers.”

A bemused smile spread across Lourd’s face as she nodded while Aegis nodded with an almost childish exuberance. North rolled her eyes.

We had only a few more seconds to wait before the synths were upon us. The group in the ditch issued the opening volley, Grape’s battle saddle and South’s light machine gun ripping into the first line of synths before they rain head long into a magical barrier Clover had cast. Bubblegum’s assorted high velocity junk soon joined the fray and the front of the synth’s formation all but liquified. It was nothing compared to what Lourd and Aegis did however. In a couple reports of the auto canon and a few bursts of the minigun, they had reduced the main body of synths to scrap.

There were three that escaped the alicorn’s onslaught. One of them rushed to the wall along the front of the other building to cover itself from the ditch while it shot at our gravel pile. I put a round in it’s chest and it slumped back against the wall. The other two had simply turned and fallen back firing over their shoulders as they went. I placed a shot in each of their backs and they joined the rest of the scrap in the snow.

The engagement hadn’t lasted half a minute and it had left us completely unscathed while the synths had been utterly decimated.

“The Goddess, that feels good,” Lourd cooed as she lifted her canon. “I’ve grown exhausted with only being able to get ambushed and not ambushing.”

“Oh yeah!” Aegis laughed.

I paid the celebratory alicorns little attention. My rifle scope leaving behind the scrapped group to look toward the group further out. Which turned out to be a good thing, indeed.

“Get off the hill!”

I dove at Lourd’s chest while catching Aegis’s neck in my tail. The three of us tumbled down the embankment of gravel picking up North on the way as our ball of equines bounced it’s way into the drift of snow at the bottom of the pile. Not a moment too soon as the top half of the gravel mound was blown away by an anti-tank missile impacting it, sending rock flying in every direction.

“Merde!”

“Goddess, that was close. Is everypony okay?”

“You sluts okay?”

“I think so.”

“Wait! I think I’m bleeding.”

“No, it’s her!”

The sounds of alicorns bickering were muffled by the snow. It was about all I could process beside the feeling of my head melting and freezing at the same time. Everything else seemed numbed by the cold.

“Get her up. Clover! Can you do anything about this?” It felt like Bubblegum was yelling directly into my head.

My stomach did a flip when light hit my eyes again, my brain starting to throb.

“Dear, can you hear me? Shadow, try to look me in the eyes.” I couldn’t see Lourd’s eyes no matter how hard I searched the bright bloom around me. “She’s in shock!”

“In shock? The bitch should be dead! Look at her god damn head! There’s a chuck of rock sticking out of it.”

“Do you think it’s all the way in her brain?”

“No, she’s up and looking around. She couldn’t do that if there was something jammed in her brain.”

“No, I’m pretty sure movement thoughts happen in the brain stem, so you can move around and stuff even if you lose the top part. You just can’t like think or anything.”

I-I can still think… I think.

“The filly is gonna kill us all if we let her get killed or turned into a vegetable.”

I aimed my eyes in the direction I thought Grape’s voice was coming from and blinked really hard. My head was wrapped in a warm fuzz of magic. Pain was not present in my head, instead everything was blurred by waves of nausea. When my vision finally focused I was instead face to face with Bubblegum.

“Forget the womb goblin, Saint’s gonna beat me senseless if she learns how close that was,” the mare groaned. “Fucking bitch is on my ass enough without shit like this happening.” She wrapped her magic around me and lifted me into the air. “But we sure as hell don’t have time to be standing around with our hooves up our asses.”

The blue placed me on her back, far more tenderly than I would think she could muster. She then turned and started leading the pack up the ditch. We followed it along due north east for a spell before getting to another storm culvert.

“Put those wings to use, turkeys,” Bubblegum snapped as she took to wing. The group flew over the top of the colvert and onto the road. My ride seemed to be as comfortable in the air as any pegasus, taking to the air again bringing a racing feeling in my chest as I clung to the blue’s warmth. The rest of the group weren’t as successful, most barely clearing culvert’s top before crashing to the ground. Lourd fortunately remembered to grab Grape in her magic and dragged the earth pony up to the road.

Bubblegum swerved back over her sisters, fluttering over their heads. She let out a weird growling sound as she looked down on the flightless alicorns, obviously irritated. “Come on! Get those hooves in gear. Fucking move it! Can’t fly, you can damn sure run.”

I would think the mutant super soldiers with wings would be fantastic fliers… I doubted alicorns could break their flight talismans or some other kind of physical issue. Maybe it’s something in their heads, or they might not have ever learned how to fly. I knew trying to figure out flying on your own was hard and usually ended in a lot of broken bones.

“H-hey.”

My introspection was cut off by Bubblegum’s voice filtering through my ear, calmer and seemingly devoid of swearing. It was almost all I could manage to turn my head to look at her as my vision was still adrift in a sea of doubles and blurs. The alicorn seemed to be looking back at me.

Yeah?

“Ywaaallb,” I mumbled.

Fuck me, I sound fantastic. The lack of any real pain combined with my apparently fucked speech control, messed up senses, and retarded motor function were fairly concerning, but I couldn’t think of anything to do to help with that.

Well, maybe I should take a break from the constant head trauma and running around…

…

Seems unlikely.

“HEY!” Bubblegum snapped. “Goddess above you’re fucked.”

Oh, has she been talking? Good appraisal, Bubblebutt. I chuckled.

“Hang on, Shadow, only a bit longer and I can have Prim fix you.” She dipped down in her flying a little, shifting me forward on her body and allowing her to wrap a hoof of her own over my forelegs. She squeezed my plastic hooves hard enough for the pressure to register with my cybernetics as we climbed back to altitude. I noticed at that point how fast we were flying, the rest of the band left behind as Bubblegum tried to get me back.

Even if we were staying extremely low and weaving between building, the distance back to the train and the alicorns’ impromptu fort passed by quickly and Bubblegum was flaring for a gentle landing among the massive mares.

“Primrose! Help!”

“What the hell happened? Where’s everypony else?”

“They’re on hoof. I had to get her back quick, there’s a chunk of rock in her fucking head.”

“How did the bitch manage that?”

“Fuck you. That white armored slut shot a missile at us and she caught some shrapnel.”

“The who did what now?” I heard a deeper, far more irritated voice ask.

“N-nothing at all, Saint. You should really be rest-”

“Bubble’s got her team shot to hell again.”

“FUCK OFF, PRIMROSE! I’m gonna shove your horn down your throat!”

“Shut up,” Saint snapped. “Where’re the rest?”

“Coming,” Bubblegum answered again. “They’re fine but she got hurt and needed help.” I felt myself float into the air as Bubblegum finally transferred me to the ground.”It’s in her head and I think it’s bad.”

Ehh, I’m fine. Five minutes and I’ll be good as new.

I felt another set of magic poke and prod at me. This was far more focused than Clover’s magic, the field infiltrating my bones and caressing my every nerve and blood vessel. “Numerous small lacerations, a large laceration with a surface foreign body, extensive bruising, cranial fracture, massive concussion,” Primrose listed out as she worked me over. “No breaching of the cranial cavity…”

She’s surprised by that?

“Distortion of the cranium around the impact. Indented about 1 centimeter in an oblong dent…”

My head buzzed as her magic shifted its focus.

“What the fuck?”

“What else is wrong with her?” Saint asked.

“I was amazed her skull could survive an impact like that so easily but it turns out…” The buzzing intensified. “There’s some sort of reinforcing carbon latticework layered in the bone.”

“What’s that mean?” Bubble’s intoned.

“This… thing’s cranium is made of bone that’s part carbon ceramic armor… Goddess above, you sure we need her alive, Saint? Dissecting this thing would be amazing. Even just seeing what else they managed to protect with this bone armor.”

“Ahh ratherr nahh-T,” I mumbled, throwing a hoof wave in what I thought was the medical mare’s direction.

I heard Bubblegum snicker.

“No, we’re not harming her, Primrose,” Saint said. “Help her out however we can-”

“Shadow!”

Star sounded far off, but I was glad to know she was probably running toward me now.

“Well…” I felt Primrose’s magic shift over my scalp again, focussing around where I imagined the shard of rock was imbedded before my slowly recovering senses were plunged into pain again.

“Fuuuuuu” I curled into a ball and clutched my head.

“Honestly, probably all I need to do for this freak.” I could distantly hear the “healer” finish her comment, tossing the massive shard of rock she’s yanked out of my head away.

“Goddess above, Primrose. Don’t just go yanking shit out of wounds like that.”

“If I wanted some raider swine’s medical opinion I would go ask Daria, Bubbles.”

“You’re lucky we’re still out here and desperate, cause I’d slice that smirk right off your face-”

“Shadow! What happened to you?” Starprancer’s voice finally shoved aside the stream of alicorns.

I couldn’t manage more than a groan in pain but I did lift my head out of the snow and turn to look in her direction. Instantly my neck had the familiar warmth of her hooves wrapped around it while her far more delicate but no less powerful field of magic enveloped the now gushing-blood wound on my head.

“What did the alicorns do to you?”

“I… I’m sorry.” Bubblegum choked out. “She got a bit beat up helping us out.”

I felt a cold but pleasant liquid being poured on my head and realized a healing potion was being drizzled into the gash in my head. Together the two magics melded the hole and staunch the bleeding.

Don’t go wasting one of those on me...

“Better?” asked Star.

I nodded and returned my head to my hooves and the snow, aching throbbing replacing the lances of pain from before.

“Hey, no sleeping yet, Shadow. Look me in the eyes and have a chat and I’ll let you take a nap.”

I grumbled, it was too painful to be awake.

“Just a little something. Tell me about how the alicorns were. Show me those eyes so I can make sure the concussion is passing. Then you can nap

I sighed. Fine, Star.

I’d won my nap in the end but it was for nothing really. My throbbing skull precluded any sleep so I just wound up missing Starprancer’s company once she returned to helping care for wounded alicorns and laying in the snow. Bubblegum was sitting not to far away from me, she’d reach out and tap me on the shoulder to make sure I hadn’t slipped into a comma, but for the most part she seemed dead on her hooves. The massive mare’s eyes would close and her head would bob up and down as she struggled to stave off sleep. The rest of the alicorns weren’t any better and often much worse off.

The general exhaustion combined with the looming knowledge that we weren’t out of the dark yet to form a looming sense of dread. We were, in essence, sitting around waiting for Laurel to recharge her batteries so to speak. Hoping that in the intervening time Wintermail wouldn't show up and snuff us out. A somber, almost defeated, air hung over our little camp, made all the worse by the loud whistling of the wind between the warehouses. The truly desolate nature of where we adding to the weight on our isolated little group as we all but waited for death to come strolling up the street.

And eventually she did.

I felt the change in the alicorns before I heard anything. Many seemed to perk up in unison and several, including Bubblegum, rushed away to whatever defences they had set up. I gave a great sigh and shifted over onto my hooves. Standing up straightish, I could take in the camp around me. The alicorns had scattered a few of the train cars around to offer themselves cover from up the street while a line of flat cars across the road formed the main ramparts at the edge.

I just had a chance to check that my rifles and plasma pistol were in place before minigun fire tore through the air over the compound. The burst of lead tore apart a wall of one of the buildings, setting off a small avalanche as the structure gave way to the snow. I turned and stumbled forward to the main battle line.

“What the hell are you doing?”

Bubblegum’s comment brought the attention of several of the alicorns to me. Aegis and Lourd smiled seeing me upright and I saw the slightest curl show up on the edge of North and South’s lips. Most of the other alicorns looked at me with mixtures of concern, fear, and irritation. Bubblegum herself seemed concerned more than anything.

“You should be down resting.”

“I can rest when I’m dead.”

“You feel like a badass when you say that?”

“Usually,” I smirked, wobbling on my hooves.

“You fucking slut, go rest. You can barely stand up right.”

“I’m not laying around while we’re taking fire!” Another burst of minigun fire followed by some assorted magical energy weapon shots fizzling against the train car barricade.

“Damn it, we meet too few chill ponies to let one kill herself. You had me and my girls’ backs, now we’ve got yours. Go rest, Laurel should be getting done.”

Part of me wanted to argue with the alicorn, but another part of me was becoming aware of a redoubled effort by my brain to beat it’s way out of my skull. More waves of nausea joined the pounding and I once again swayed on my hooves. As much as I hated it, I was in no shape to fight and so far there didn’t even seem to be a fight. The synths only seemed to be firing random shots into cars and overhead. I wasn’t really needed, I hadn’t really recovered, it was a really bad idea for me to be standing guard.

“Fine, you handle it. I’ll keep an eye on the back line.”

Bubblegum just smiled and turned away.

“A hound for pain and glory, soldier mare?” Lourd teased from the background.

I gave a quick smirk before retreating back into the boxcars to my spot back in the snow. Star gave me a worried and disapproving glance from beside Primrose and an injured alicorn. She didn’t make to say anything about me walking around at least..

A bolt of laser fire raced over head and I groaned. I had wanted to go back to taking a nap, but sleeping while under fire sucked: the constant noise, the anxiety that you might die in your sleep, that someone else could die while you were asleep. It was something that you could get used to, and I had been more than used to it, but that had been a long time ago. Soft beds and calm settings had since spoiled the hardened edge of my younger self.

I haven’t gone completely soft yet at least and I wasn’t going to get anysofter. I had only been on the surface less than two weeks and I had recovered to nearly full levels of badass. Beating Steel Rangers and ghouls to death with my bare hooves, outsmarting an army of robots and their cunning leader, making friends with whoever I came across, and not blowing my damned worthless brains out from despair.

…

I still needed to get to my sob…

I felt the tears starting to bead at my eyes and chest tighten when an electronically amplified voice cut through the air.

“GENERAL SUNNY SKIES! A word if you will.”

I was yanked from the edge of crying as the echoes of Wintermail’s voice died out.

Shit. How the hell did she know my name? Or that I was here? What the hell?

SHIT! Oh fuck. She knows everything! She couldn’t know everything, it was all beyond secret and it had been two hundred years. It was impossible any of the information we had left behind could have been found, understood, and acted upon. And even then, what value could it hold?

“What the hell is she shouting that name for?” Primrose grumbled. “Damn psycho doesn’t even know what century she’s in.”

I jerked over and looked at the blue, her brow drawn in the utmost disgust. Looking over at her I saw Saint lying in the snow, head up and alert and looking directly at me. Her brow was also creased but not in anger, something more like confusion. The look was weird and seemed to burn right through my hide. I shot her a confused look back but all that did was make the alicorn angry.

“General, dear, if you would, I mean no harm for now, this is just a parley. Though, I’m freezing my rump off and if I need to shoot my way through alicorns and the occasional unicorn filly, I'd rather start quick."

Saint's irritation shot through the roof and I got the distinct feeling only her injuries were keeping me from an ass whooping.

What? Why are you looking at me li-

…

How the fuck does SHE know? She was waiting for me to stand up and address the psycho. But how in the hell did she know me? Lourd said she was from my time, Saint’s probably the same.

But who then? She was military minded enough to lead this group, a former soldier? Probably. But why did I have to get caught between probably the only two ponies alive who had a clue who I was? I had enough issues without people harassing me about my past. I had been a terrible pony and I had pretty much died.

Do I want to be that mare anymore?

Caught up in mental shambles, I almost didn't notice Saint’s glare waver; unsure if she had the right mare and disappointed. The disappointment stung, I had lost so many things in life but my pride wasn’t one of them.

I started back toward the barricade.

“Where the hell are you going?” Primrose’s grating voice followed after me.

But so did Saint’s almost awestruck gawk.

“Shadow, what are you doing back here?” Bubblegum asked at the line. “She’s not doing anything right now, just calling out some random name.”

“It’s not just some random name,” Grape said.

“Do you really give a fuck what name she’s shouting, retard?”

“I do,” I said, walking up to a hole in the barricade.

There were synths peaking around both corners of the warehouses beside us and several more on a further off rooftop. Wintermail was standing proud in the center of the street, much like that night she had taken down Grape’s unit. I smirked. Only one assault robot here this time though.

“What are you doing? You’re not going out there are you?”

I hopped the barricade and was out in the open, leaving the alicorns, Grape, and Star behind. The expanse of snow seemed to stretch out for miles as the buildings around me towered to the heavens. I felt physically tired by the time I found myself standing talking distance from the White Menace.

I pulled myself up to my full height, hardened my expression, and set myself in as aloof and intimidating a mind as I could. I glared at the white silhouette of Wintermail’s armor. She almost looked like a ghost, featureless but most decidedly equine. The armor was even more impressive up close, a graceful suit that called back more to the plate and mail worn by knights of Celestia centuries ago than the bulky, hulking metal blocks crossed with hoses and all manner of mechanical components of its Steel Ranger ancestors. The heavy machine guns had been replaced with a pair of beam cannons, better suited for hunting unarmored alicorns.

The white mare sat back on her haunches and reached up to her helmet, removing it. There was a smile plastered across her face and eyes that looked red up close were bright with excitement. The helmet hung at her shoulder from some connection to her armor as she stood back up. She seemed to content to stare at me for a moment, eyes racing up and down my form.

Is she getting an eye full?

She smiled bigger, a childlike awe overtaking her face. “I’ve seen so many amazing things in my life, but you? You’re the next level, General. The Black Angel of Stalliongrad, Demon of the Saimare, conqueror of the Griffon subcontinent, Changeling Slayer, and godmother to the Steel Rangers. Wouldn’t be a surprise if there’s water in those old mare’s tales about you being the offspring of Nightmare Moon and Death. Guess, you’re not some ministry mare or a Princess, but bloodly hell, in some ways you’re more than a pair of petty gods and their rock bearers. You’re a legend… mythic even.”

And now she’s fangirling about me? “If I wanted to be fellated, I would have asked an alicorn to help a mare out.”

Winter laughed, much more than she should have. “Ohhh, you were worth all these years, Sunny.” She said my name with the same joking tone a playground bully might have.”

It pissed me off how effective it was at getting under my skin. Of course, I had the perfect counter.

“You flatter me, Sugar Cookie.”

“How do you know…” She gawked at me for a moment, then tried to say something before I cut her off.

“Did you really call me out here just to gab aimlessly?”

It took a moment before that arrogant facade settled back in. “Not at all, General. You’re actually the heart of why I’m up here.”

Uh-oh…

“You see, I’ve been tasked with collecting some extremely important software concerning Operation Windigo. Dog of it is, only four copies were ever made and each of them was split in half using binary encryption. Each of the halves were doled out to military brass and political leaders. The whole thing was cloaked in the utmost secrecy and most of the fragments were destroyed in Canterlot or Cloudsdale. I’ve had a real time finding who had them in the first place, let alone who had a part A and a part B. But of course, you know that don’t you?”

She raised her right hoof and a panel retracted to show off her pipbuck.

“Where did you get that?!” I snapped

It was one of the stupid fancy 2000kX series, essentially the same computer as the one I had in my chest in wrist mounted format. The case was black and dark blue with a few dark purple accents. At the bottom of the screen was a distinct cloud with a tricolor lightning bolt coming out of it.

“Lifted if off a minotaur warlord in the Badlands. Really sweet piece of bling. Still miffed that I wound up with two A copies. Tore half of Vanhoover apart to find Admiral Aqua Marine’s copy and thought I would be done after tracking down this, but apparently the fates deemed we must cross paths.” She smirked again, a smug thing with a cruel edge to it.

“You’re kinda fucked if that’s what you’re after. I don-”

“A bluff isn’t going to work on me, love,” she cut me off. “Both Dash and Aqua had mentions of you in their pipbucks, ‘Shadow’. Great code name by the way, amazingly creative.” The mare chuckled. “I could go over the whole mess of uncovering where Stable 13 was along with you winding up at Shining Armor Memorial where the Ministry of Awesome’s research and development director was working. But I doubt you need me to go over that. But trust me, General, I’m one hundred and eleven percent sure exactly who you are, what happened to you, and what your plan was.”

Fuck…

“Fine,” I sighed. “Assuming I do have it, how are you gonna get it from me?”

“‘How am I gonna get it?’ Sweetcheeks, right now I’m struggling to think of a way I’m not going to get that file. Even assuming I wasn’t around, what are you doing? You gonna go cuddle with the alicorns and hope none of them decide to rip your head off on a whim? Or were you just gonna freeze your sweet ass off on your own? You’re going to die up here, General, and for bloody nothing. And if you do make it out of the Frozen wastes, what then? Gunned down for the duds off your back; raped, beaten, enslaved. Hunted down by some group of Rangers or the NCR to preserve order.”

A grin had crept it’s way onto my face. Sure, some wasteland cur is gonna take me down.

Winter saw right through my arrogance. “Don’t you fucking laugh, bitch. It can happen to any of us. The higher you are, the more cunts there are gonna be dreaming about how you’re gonna look collared and giving them a blowjob with a broken jaw.”

My smile faded back to my neutral frown. “Doesn’t answer my question.”

“Oh you’re quite the whilly bitch aren’t you? Pompous coming from a bootlicking whore whose whole life meant bugger all.” The earlier fixation with me had vanished and now I was treated to what was probably more regular for the White Menace. “All those battles you won and all that bloodshed and for fucking nothing.”

I grit my teeth at her.

“How’s it feel to be a monument to wasted effort, General? Gave it a hundred and eleven percent and here we are, everything you’ve ever cared about dead and forgotten. Family probably died in the blasts.Your whole country and culture just obliterated. Whatever’s left has long since mutated or rotted into something shit. Bet that feels just brilliant.”

“Shut up.”

“And now you’re gonna go stake out on your own in the Great Equestrian Wasteland, huh? Even better, bet that filly’s gonna look really good pulled down over some raider’s diseased cock-”

“Shut up!”

My mask had shattered, my teeth were bared in indignant fury.

Wintermail chuckled. “Feels good that I admire someone who still has some fire in their soul after going through that much. You’ve been through as much as any ghoul I’ve met and even the sensible ones’ I are a bunch of hollow clucks. Pain like that is inconceivable to most of us. But that moxy’s not going to get you through this. You’re gonna die alone and lost out here.

“You’ve got two options right now, love. You come with me, I’ll help you get your hooves under you out here, make sure you don’t go falling face first into trouble, and show you the ropes. I wanna help you find a world after what you’ve lost, sweetheart. I really do. I’ll even let you bring the kid along, make a buddy comedy of things. In return you give me the program. The other option-” her brow hardened and the tone of her voice shifted “-I blow your head clean off your shoulders and rip that program from your carcass. I go about my business hunting down every Stable Dweller, Steel Ranger, and Alicorn up here. I go back, get paid, and found myself a little raider empire and live out my life pillaging the NCR.”

I snarled. “Shove it up your ass, bit-”

“They left you here.”

I wasn’t ready for that. She wasn’t loud when she said that, but it cut right through me. Gone was her nihilistic snide tone that made it seem like everything she did was a matter less joke, the grating voice of someone who deep down cared about nothing. This was a statement; simple, loud, clear, and with deadly intent.

I couldn’t say anything… It was all I had to not start crying right there.

“It’s awful to be betrayed like that, by your best friends no less. After you gave everything to Equestria and it beat you down and threw you out, they were all you had left. They filled you with hope, and they left you in that pod. That tomb. Forever.”

The harsh wind blew a tear out of my eye and it froze against my cheek.

“You really gonna go back out into the world after that and just throw your well being in the hooves of whoever you come across first? I’m a right monster, I know, love. But you’re in the same boat and I’ll be honest, I really don’t want to shoot you. You’re an amazing mare, it’ll be my honor to serve at your side.”

There was something genuine in her voice. I grit my teeth as more tears burned at my eyes. What is this mare? She comes to me oozing about how amazing I am and how she wants to sweep me off my hooves like some fairy tale. Like I’m not some payday to her or that she didn’t kill hundreds trying to get to me. Stable 13 really was dead because of me! Me and some Celestia damned program! How could this monster look me in the eyes and think I would follow her?

…

Should I follow her?

The confusion, anger, and fear drained out of me.

“You’ll leave the others alone?”

“I swear on my mother’s life, love, not a single scratch on any of them.”

I started walking forward. I hated that I was crying. That this psychopath started off with praise and admiration for me and was now pitying me. It was an enormous vortex of emotions that drove my tears. More feelings than I had any idea how to understand or deal with. It left me feeling numb and hollow again. I couldn’t get away from that sensation, of being some dead shell paraded around for some sick god’s entertainment.

If I’m entertainment though, I might as well embrace it.

I was standing in front of the mare, close enough she could probably enjoy my scent of defeat. I kept my eyes down and on her hooves until I was right in front of her. I sat back and lifted my hooves to rest on her shoulders finally making eye contact. Wintermail had the stupidest grin I had seen in a while plastered across her face, like a virgin realizing they were being moved on for the first time.

I smiled, a small, demure, teasing thing as I rubbed my hooves up and down her neck. I looked into her eyes. Up close the sclera were genuinely unpleasant, they looked hollow and dull from most angles, taking on a white or grayish hue. But looking directly into her eyes they flashed blood red. Poor mare was born looking sinister, a phantom of some kind that lured ponies in with their odd appearance before a flash of evil red eyes and the black of death.

“You’re not that different from me are you?”

She nodded tentatively, fear and arousal struggling for control. I moved my hooves around the back of her neck, pulling her in closer and bringing our heads side by side. There were several large scars across the back of her neck and a small lump just below her skull. Touching them only seemed to overload her hazy senses more as she gasped out and shuttered a bit.

“N-no…”

“Mmmm,” I hummed into her ear. I traced a hoof over one scar and up to her ear. “But you know… If that’s true…” I moved the other hoof down around her collar bone and up to her chin.

“You’re probably a liar too.”

Wintermail’s stupor vanished in an instant but it was too late, she’s fallen for my miracuously successful ploy. She tried to jerk away from me but my hooves were locked firmly in place, fragile neck being caught between between her armor and my grip. The Ultra-Sentinel that had been sitting quietly behind her the whole time instantly leveled it’s guns on me, but it wasn’t going to be able to do anything without hurting it’s master.

Caught by the balls. I smirked

“Fucking hell, you stupid cunt.” Wintermail tried to turn her head to look at me but I don’t allow it. “The hell’s your plan from here, cow?” The Ultra-Sentinel turned its arsenal back toward the alicorns in the distance and I got of face full of power armor clad hoof. “You’ve got nothing and you just throw my offer out like that, shit-for-brains? I’m gonna quarter your sorry ass.”

All her fuss vanished when I twisted her head around and loaded up her neck, straining the tendons and cartilage just enough to make sure I had her attention. “I would really advise against blowing my head off. If the main processor in my chest loses connection with my neurological processor and brain, it’ll break a vial filled with some smooze that will dissolve everything in my chest cavity, starting with the data banks that file you’re looking for is kept in. And then the spark core in my chest will go critical not too long after.

“So, love, let me rephrase those two options from before. You shoot me, fail miserably, and maybe blow up in a burst of unrestrained magical energy. Or-” I increased the pressure on her neck again “- I just kill you and be done with it.”

She shouted: “Kill me and the filly gets it right through the head before I even hit the ground. Most of the mutants won’t survive either, the synths are going to very vengeful about losing me and it’s not like they aren’t in on the mission. They’re on loan from my employers after all.”

The synths seem pretty dimwitted on their own. But they had a definite, probably overwhelming, numbers advantage.

“I’ll cut you a deal then, you send all of them away. Once the synths are gone, I’ll let you go and we can go our separate ways.”

“Nah, you let me go, then we’ll see about negotiating, lov-”

I cut her by pressing down on her skull. “You’re the one who’s got nothing. You need me alive and happy. I’m dead, you fail. I’m pissed, I’ll snap your neck or you’ll kill me and fail.” I twisted again. “Don’t take me for a fool, snowflake.”

“Fine, cunt.”

She definitely had a chip of some sort, Wintermail didn’t say anything or make any overt physical movements. The synths just disappeared up the way they had come from, her assault robot following.

“Well, I guess you’ve technically won this one, Sunny,” Winter cooed in my ear. “Of course, one battle is hardly a war.”

I twisted on her neck again “But you need to win battles to win a war.”

She suffered my abuse without much response this time and when I let off she was ready. “Something that worked out just perfectly for you, didn’t it?”

I was about to retort but my voice died in my throat, as something rough and wet traveled up the side of my face and along the edge of my ear. I jumped back from Wintermail just as she shoved her hooves between mine, pushing mine outward and shoving me back in one motion. Free of my head lock she looked me in the eyes, making a show of pulling her tongue back in and savoring my flavor.

“I’ve been wondering this rotten hellhole a long time, Sunny,” she said. “It may have taken ages, but I’ve finally found someone worth my time. It’ll be grand sport getting the better of you.”

She grabbed her helmet in a hoof and lifted it up over her head, smiling at me like a serpent the whole time. “Until we meet again, gorgeous.”

“Sugar Cookie.” She turned her helmeted head toward me and I could feel her irritated glare through that featureless face plate. “Next time I see you I’ll kill you.”

The wind kicked up the snow around us as it started howling through the buildings again.

“We’ll see.”

With that she turned and strolled off. Even in the midday sun, she looked like a ghost fading back into her miasma. Eventually fading away into the endless blur of white stretching out in every direction.

Sure that she was gone, I turned and started walking back. Again it felt like the distance stretched out, lead hooves ploding their way back to something resembling safety. Without a foe to stand face to face with, my skull split open throbbing again. The day’s aches and pains returned with a vengeance.

But that wasn’t why I was crying.

I botched my landing getting back over the flat car barricade, collapsing in a heap.

“Are you decent, dear.”

“Need some help?”

“Primrose! Somepony, she needs help.”

“What in the Goddess’s name was that?”

“You okay?”

“Is she gone?”

“Who are you?”

I dragged myself up and brushed past the alicorns. I meandered my way through the camp on increasingly wobbly hooves. Twice I ran straight into a rail car and I tripped over broken asphalt with every other step.

“Shadow, come back here.”

“What’s wrong with her?”

Leave me alone. The tears were running down my face constantly now. My chest was so knotted up holding back that I almost couldn’t breathe. I needed somewhere quiet and secluded quickly.

Finally, one of the potholes in the centuries old, ruined road took me down. I collapsed nearly face first into the snow. I didn’t have it in me to get back up. I started pushing myself along the ground, either trying to continue my aimless escape or bury myself in the snow.

“Shadow.”

I stopped my slithering as the snow on me was peeled back. I hadn’t known them for long, but there were few things I could think of in that moment could’ve made me feel like those emerald gems of eyes Starprancer had. And in that moment she was the closest thing to what I needed. She was looking down at me confused and concerned but the moment we made eye contact she seemed to get what I needed.

Her hooves wrapped around my neck, I buried my head in her side, and burst out bawling.

Author's Note

Up and Out

Chapter 5: An Elderly Cyberpony is Assisted Across the Street

Author's Note

I split chapter 4 into two chapters as part of Sunny Skies's rewrites to help with reading flow, since it really should have been something I did in the first place. Sorry for it not being new stuff but that'll be here soon.

Chapter 5: An Elderly Cyberpony is Assisted Across the Street

The synths seemed to be sweeping the city searching for anyone still left. That would pose an issue to us but I doubted they were anything I couldn’t handle. These robots may have been super advanced, but they didn’t hold a candle to zebras as hunters. I could get by them easily.
Doing so with Star, however, might prove difficult. We wound up in a busted-out store, a city block away from the synths and as I confronted my companion.

“Okay, Star, I want to know if you’re going to be able to stick with me if we try to run Wintermail’s net or if we should try and flank around.”

“How hard will it be to sneak through?” she asked.

“I don’t know. These things could be exactly like ponies; if that’s the case then we just need to stroll by with a smile, maybe sing a musical number with them.” Star smirked at my poor joke.

“Worst case: they were programmed to think like Praetorians and they already know we’re here.”

“What are Praetorians?”

“The Zebra Ceasar’s royal guard, bunch of crazy ninja types. They’re the ‘hoof-picked from birth for greatness, trained in mountains by monks, can walk on the tops of grass blades to stalk their prey, kill you in a million different ways with a feather and foul glare’ kind of warriors. Real nasty business, fought against more than a few of them in my day.”

“Cool!”

“Shh.” I looked up the street and weighed my options again. “I think I feel a plan coming on…” There were four synths in the street a little over fifty meters away, scanning the roads while others searched buildings. “Let’s get a closer look.”

I led Star out of the back of the store and into an alley. A large dumpster was sitting sideways, blocking most of the alley toward its intersection with the next street. I left Star behind the dumpster and crept to the end of the alley. There was a wagon sitting on the side of the road and I was able to look through one of its mirrors at the synths. They were a little more than a stone throw away, standing in the middle of an intersection of two major roads. It was a good position with long sightlines; the four robots could see any movement across the roads for at least a mile in each direction, effectively locking down the whole area.

I crept back into the shadows of the alley and motioned for Star to join me. “You see that building in the distance?” I asked her. “The high-rise with the purple tinted glass.”

I was pointing to the building that I had been hiding in when I had witnessed the fight between the squad of Rangers and Wintermail’s robots. It was risky to go back but the search seemed to have moved on. Additionally, the building was distinctive and easily seen from pretty much anywhere in the neighborhood.

“Yah, I see it,” Star answered.

“That’s going to be our rendezvous,” I said, “just in case we get separated. We’re going to stay in the shadows and make our way through these alleys. Don’t use your magnums unless you absolutely have to; everypony in the Empire will know if you shoot them off.”

“Ok,” Star said. “But how are we going to get past those four?”

I smiled a little and motioned for her to fall in behind me as I trotted back where we had come from. I passed the restaurant and turned down the road away from it, headed toward something I had spotted on our way in.

About a block away from where we had been hiding, I found the Helpinghoof medical clinic. The small heath center looked much like the surrounding buildings: simple square-with-round-edges architecture, pleasant sparkling pink paint with yellow trim that had faded, and wondrous images of wildlife and happy ponies printed on the front windows. The main door was a beautiful sheet of glass with pink and yellow crystals embedded in it, forming a cross with three butterflies. “Welcome” was printed in gold leaf above the Ministry’s logo and some other stuff like the address was printed below

All in all, it was a beautiful window and I gained no small amount of petty satisfaction watching a rock sail through it.

“Shh,” Star hissed, “the synths might hear. And you didn't even try the door.”

“The synths did not hear that,” I said, throwing back coat’s my hood. “Plus, I like when glass shatters, and the MoP sucked.”

Glass crunched under my hoof as I stepped through the door. Star followed closely behind me, pulling back her hood and scarf so she could look around the waiting room we had entered. “What’s your problem with the Ministry of Peace?”

“It was an irritating hive of corruption and hypocrisy.”

“Weren’t all of the Ministries like that?” Star asked, critically.

“Yes, but Peace was the worst.” I scowled at an example of a particularly irritating poster that hung from the wall: “‘We must do better.’ You have any idea how insulting that was? Never mind it came from a traitor. Then the Mops in the field that didn’t lecture you on love and tolerance and call us barbarians were drug dealers, smugglers, and pimps. And the whole damn Ministry’s operation was charlie foxtrot at its best.”

“They didn’t sound that bad,” Star said as she followed me through the clinic’s waiting room, past the reception desk, and down a hall with treatment rooms on each side and a large set of double doors at the end. “Especially when you compare the Ministry of Peace to the other ones. The ponies at Technology were a bunch of crooks and tried to kill their Ministry Mare, Magic had all kinds of horrible deaths with their experiments, Moral was… Moral, and Image just lied to ponies and burned books.”

“I never said I liked any of the other ministries, I just hate Peace most. If I’m honest I had had too much fun harassing Magic and Tech when I was working for Ordinance to hate either of them too much. Pinkie and Rarity were pretty cool mares too, when they weren’t being spazzes.” I had reached the end of the hall and was starting to push open the double doors .

However, I stopped and looked back at the filly with a questioning raise of the eyebrow. “You sure seem informed on the political topics of two centuries ago. Especially since most of that information never reached the public ear.”

“Our Stable’s always been centered around educating its inhabitants as well as possible so they could build a better world when the time came,” Star said. I chewed on the information as I broke through the double doors which had frozen together. I let Star pass by me as she continued: “The whole of the Canterlot University library is back home. Moondancer hoarded away as many old books as possible when the Ministry of Image started purging them. And then she also did a lot of writing when she got old. She wrote some of my favorite stories when I was a foal. Then she had some memoirs about her life and the war.”

“Was I in there?” I asked, stopping in the middle of the room and looking down at the filly.

Star giggled. “She wrote one of my favorite stories growing up, it was about a black mare called the Huntress who fought monsters that wanted to attack ponies as they slept. And I guess there was some mention of an irritating but endearing black military mare she was friends with who was always harassing her and causing chaos in Canterlot.”

I snickered.

“Yah, you don’t really seem like the ‘desk-bound, bureaucracy-blocking pencil warrior’ Moondancer talked about.”

“Not everypony gets to be damn war hero and those of us that do eventually get put behind a desk before we can hurt ourselves. I spent a lot of the war working behind the scenes as a commander, teacher, and equipment evaluator.”

“Did you have trouble not being out there helping in the fight?” Star asked.

I looked down on her, “I did far more good as an officer then I ever did as a grunt.”

“Sounds like a waste of a cyberpony,” Star pointed out.

“It was pretty late in the war when this” -I waved my synthetic wings around- “happened.” I leaned down and shifted my voice to a gossiping whisper, “I think I might have actually been... old at that point.”

Star chuckled a bit before falling silent, seemingly in thought. “You like reading then?” I asked. She nodded, “That’s good. Knowledge is a valuable commodity.” She smiled and I gave her a pat on the back.

I moved into the back rooms of the facility. Being that these clinics were only meant to deal with specific issues and this one seemed focused on general wellness, it was nowhere near as large or well equipped as a proper hospital. Getting past a few exam rooms placed one at the back of the facility with nothing but a pharmacy, staff lounge, and storeroom between them and the back door.

I trotted over to the pharmacy and started looking across the shelves of drugs. I was instantly distracted by the contents of the first rack though. “Star, you have some healing potions right?”

“Yeah,” she answered from right behind me.

“Take care of them, I don’t think that we’re going to find any usable ones up here.” I picked up a bottle that had once contained a rich purple fluid that was coveted for its ability to heal minor injuries instantly. Now, most of the bottle was full of cloudy, greyish lavender ice with a black sediment collected on the bottom and a layer of white lard-like film on top. The potion was definitely not healing anypony and I put it back before moving on.

There wasn’t much in the way of fancy drugs here. The clinic probably handed out healing potions and Med-X for most issues. Anything worse got sent to an actual hospital or a script to an actual pharmacy. There was still a wide variety of painkillers, cold syrups, vitamins, personal hygiene products, sexual health pamphlets, and all other manner of things ponies needed to keep themselves in a semblance of physical health. I, however, glanced over everything on a search for two things far more basic yet far more elusive.

“Come on!” I groaned as I almost ripped the doors off of a cabinet.

“What are you looking for?” Star asked as she looked over the stuff I left in my wake, some rolls of bandages and some bottles getting put in her saddlebags.

“Alcohol, mainly.”

“Really! We’re here for booze?” The filly demanded indignantly.

“Shh!” I hissed and looked at Star, instantly regretting the decision as her eyes burned into me. “It’s not for me, it’s for getting around the synths.” I pulled a brown plastic bottle out of the cabinet I was looking though and tossed it to her. “Don’t lose that,” I said with a stern tone.

The filly’s anger had been pacified by my assertion and she looked rather embarrassed at her outburst. I trotted past her, through the lounge, and to the storage room door. The door was locked but didn’t hold under my master key, the bolt breaking out of the wall under a strike from my forehoof.

I started walking through the door, a smug grin on my face as I looked at several glass bottles full of a clear liquid right in front of me. I almost missed the movement to my side that prompted a staticy voice calling out:
“Intruder alert.”

I was instantly treated to the sensation of something hard beating me across the back of the head. Dazed and confused, I stumbled back out of the room and into the table in the lounge, rubbing a rapidly swelling lump on my head.

“You are trezzpassing on Ministry of Pea-zz property, prepare to be dizzintegrated.” I looked up at a Ponitron robot as it hobbled toward me. The robot had a barrel like chest topped by a head that was housed in what looked like a clear plastic egg shell. It stumbled along on four rather stubby-looking legs and from the shoulders protruded a set of arms. Each arm ended in a set of claws that reminded me of a carnival game you got stuffed toys out of.

I pushed the lounge table back as the robot advanced on me, those arms raised high. The choice between grabbing my carbine and raising my hooves in self defense was ended as the robot brought those chunky arms down on me. I crossed both of my hooves above my head, catching the arms. The acrylic shells of my limbs emitted a loud crack under the impact but remained intact and I pushed the robot back. It stumbled back on its clumsy legs and looked like it was about to fall over. I rapidly jabbed at it with my right hoof.

My strike dented its steel chest, but robot didn’t fall and reprimanded me for my success, its arms coming down again. With my weight on my left leg, I could only try and swipe the Ponitron’s arms away with my right hoof. I blocked the right arm but the left smacked me in the face. Much like my legs, my nose made a loud crack when struck. I let a string of profanities slip out of my mouth as I grabbed at my bleeding muzzle.

I hobbled away on three legs as the robot made to strike again. I started to unfurl my wings but was cut off as something tightened around my throat and yanked me up. The air was soon filled with the sounds of suppressed gun fire as the Ponitron’s clear head was shot full of holes. I flailed my hooves around and flopped my body around, trying to get at whatever was strangling me. Meanwhile, the shell over the robot’s head shattered and the sensors inside started sparking.

I saw something glowing in my periphery and tried to see it as the Ponitron entered its death throes. My carbine was floating above me wrapped in an emerald aura that promptly faded, leaving me to fall to the floor.

“Ooph.” I landed on my back with my hooves splayed around me, then rolled onto my side to keep blood from running into my eyes. I looked over at my companion. “What was that?” I asked Star, my voice distorted by my hoof over my nose.

“Well, you said to only use my magnums as a last option, so I improvised. It’s not like you were using your gun for anything.” The filly trotted past me and over to the scrapped robot, giving the metal carcass a tentative poke.

“You didn’t need to strangle me,” I complained as I stood up and started moving toward the storage room. I limped past the filly on three legs while I held my nose.

“You didn’t have to get smacked around either,” Star shot back as she followed me into the small room.

The filly started looking over the shelves while I walked up to the glass bottles I had originally seen. I reached up with a wing and pinned one of the bottles between the appendage’s blades, bringing it closer. A smile spread across my face as I read the label: ‘100% Pure Grain Alcohol’.

“Star,” I called, “come over here and get your healing potions out.”

The filly trotted over and sat next to me. Her horn lit up as she produced nine doses of deep purple healing potion. I set the bottle down in front of her. “Open the purples up and mix a tiny bit of alcohol into them. It’ll keep them from freezing,” I said in a nasally tone.

Star looked up at me and rolled her eyes. “Shadow, put your hoof down.”

I creased my brow at her but complied, blood dripping down my face and onto the floor. Her horn ignited again and my vision was filled with the green glow of Star’s magic as it enveloped my nose. Pain was instantly replaced with a warm tingling sensation, like my face was being rubbed in a fluffy towel that was fresh out of the dryer. Star closed her eyes as the flow of my bloody nose slowed to a trickle. Next, there was a loud click as my nose jerked back into its proper place.

“Ouch!” I yelled and grabbed my face again. The pain from the relocation faded quickly though, replaced with the warm tingling before there was numbing by the cold. I pulled my hooves away and crossed my eyes to look at my nose.

“There,” Star said with a self-congratulatory tone, “it’s even straight.”

“Thanks,” I said, wiggling my muzzle and finding it as good as new. “Where did you learn that?”

“Miss Blossom,” Star said going back to the healing potions and alcohol, “my magic teacher.”

I found a rag sitting on one of the shelves and started using it to wipe the blood off of my face and sleeve. “Well good job, that spell was pretty much perfect.”

Star took a moment to finish precisely guesstimating how much alcohol to put into each of the potions before looking up at me. “Thank you.”

I smiled. “If you’re done with those potions you can put them away. Do you still have that brown bottle I told you to watch?” Star nodded and levitated it over to me. I pulled a cardboard box of powder laundry detergent off of a shelf and went to work. First, I poured the alcohol out until there was only a little over a half of a bottle left. Then, I added a bit of the detergent and filled the alcohol’s bottle up with the contents of the brown bottle, leaving about a third of the bottle full of air . Finally, I knotted up my bloody rag and jammed it in the mouth of the bottle.

“Shadow, what is that?” Star asked, gesturing to the brown container.

“Hydrogen peroxide,” I said, taking my wingblades and scoring lines in the glass of the bottle.

“What’s it for?”

“Its an oxidiser, it should help the alcohol burn better in the cold.” I placed the completed device in front of Star. “And this is the most classic of Embassy Party Favors: the Molotov cocktail.”

“Embassy Party Favors?” Star asked, looking forlornly at my improvised fire bomb.

“That’s what we started calling improvised weapons after the Stripes burned down our embassy in Roam,” I said with a somber grin.

I left the cocktail on the floor and grabbed the other four bottles of alcohol off of the shelves and packed them, along with the hydrogen peroxide and detergent, into my saddlebags. “Do you know a fire spell?”

“No,” Star said examining the bomb in her magical grip. “I found a lighter in one of the staff’s lockers, though.”

“When were you looking through the lockers?”

“When you were strolling into a flank beating.”

I gave Star a stern look that she returned until I cracked a grin and a smile slipped onto her face.

“Let’s go then,” I told Star as I started walking out, shaking my head and snickering.

We left the Ministry of Peace clinic and made our way back up the alley to our observation spot. The only thing that had changed since we had left was to position of the sun in the sky. The four synths were still positioned at the intersection. Star had carried the cocktail in her magic on the trip over but I took it from her as she pulled out her lighter. I turned the bottle over so the mixture inside soaked into the rag.

“All right, Star.” I looked her in the eyes, “I’m going to chuck this and we’re going to run. You go as fast as you can, I’ll cover us. If we get separated, where do you go?”

“The high-rise with the purple glass.”

“Good,” I said with a smile. “Light me.”

Star nodded, flicked the lighter open, and held the flame to the alcohol soaked rag. The flames took hold on the fabric instantly and I brought my carbine to my mouth before giving Star one last nod.

I sprung around the corner and threw the Molotov. The bomb arced through the air and landed right on the face of the synth looking down our road. The bottle shattered and the cloud of fluid spread across the other synths. The detergent I had added, caused the mixture to stick to their bodies and produced a thick black smoke.

Star was instantly racing across the street while I slowly trotted out into the road, covering her. I put several rounds into the synths before looking over and seeing that Star had almost made it across. I fired several more shots and took off after her, racing across the street. Star had stopped at the edge of the next alley and was looking back at me. I shook my head and waved a wing at her, “Keep going, there might be more coming.”

Star turned around and started running down the alley while I followed behind her, casting a glance back to the entrance of the urban canyon. We didn’t seem to have any immediate pursuers but we were leaving an extremely noticeable trail in the fetlock-deep snow. Star’s progress was also slow as she struggled to stay on top of snow that regularly came up to her belly.

In my mind’s eye, I looked over the map of the local area. We were in an urban area surrounded mostly by apartments and small businesses. The high rise was a in the edge of the financial district a few miles to the east. In between us and our objective was a labyrinth of back alleys and a few main roads that we would have to cross without being spotted. If we traveled south east we would be able to get to a community center.

The community center stretched from Amethyst, west for about two and a half blocks. There was a large bus stop on the west side that bordered a park that eventually lead to a recreation building and some government offices. If Star and I traveled southeast to the bus depot and crossed the road there, we would be able to sneak through the park to the rec center. That would put us on the edge of Amethyst with only one instance of major exposure. From there we could wait until the cover of nightfall or bad weather to run across the massive thoroughfare and escape into the financial district, hopefully avoiding the synths in the process. Then we just needed to cross the city, work our way through the outer suburbs, and flee across the eastern plains under the cover of darkness to the mountains.

We’re probably getting caught and killed but it’s not like I’ve got anything better to do.

I easily caught up with Star, grabbed her in my jaws, and slung her onto my back. Speed was the main objective as I raced through the alleys, taking turns as my mental maps deemed fit. I was quickly away from the site of our firebombing and moving through the alleys, navigating toward my objective. There was no sign of pursuers and there thankfully didn’t seem to be any pegasus-based synths flying around.

I trotted down the alleys, occasionally doubling back on myself, jumping a fence, or ducking into a building to break up my trail. A half hour found me across the street from the bus depot. The weather was rapidly deteriorating as strong gusts started howling down the streets, clouds covered most of the sky, and thunder rumbled in the distance. Star and I would need to take shelter from the building blizzard soon and we needed to be on the east side of Amethyst when we did. If not, we would probably get pinned down by the synths.

However, luck was with us and in little time I was crouched in the snow at the edge of an alleyway looking at the community center as it spread across a four lane street from me. Even better for us was that the bus station at this end had been turned into some sort of evacuation staging area. The road was crossed by an assortment of concrete and steel barriers meant to direct ponies through a series of processing stations. Scattered around were wagons, some featuring Ministry of Peace crosses or the military’s white, six pointed star; others were obviously commandeered passenger and school wagons. A massive tank still stood sentry over the whole scene from the center of a nearby intersection. Icicles hung from its canon’s barrel and the white paint on it blended seamlessly with the snow that had covered it over the years. Nothing moved in the nearby area other than snow and debris caught up in the wind. However, another foursome of synths watched over the street from about half a mile up the road.
Star had gotten indignant about me carrying her around and now stood on the ground next to me, looking over the scene with a cautious curiosity. I sat for several minutes to make sure nothing else was observing us or patrolling the area before I stalked out, keeping low and hiding myself behind the concrete barriers and wagons.

The only thing breaking my stealthy approach was the noise my hooves made. The snow throughout the Empire was old and crunched loudly beneath a hoof, but here it was like the ground was covered in broken egg shells and twigs. The noise only getting worse the further into the street I traveled.

“What is that?” Star whispered, looking at my hooves.

“I don’t know,” I answered quietly as I slithered around the corner of a wagon and into the shadow of a barrier. I had my theories but none of them needed to be spoken to the filly.

I creeped along the barrier, the cracking sounding with my every step. Behind me, Star silently followed until I heard a snap and she let out a pained hiss. I turned back to see her face contorted in pain as she held up her right front hoof. A large white shard was sticking out of the sole, blood slowly leaking out. Star grimaced and lit her horn, removing the splinter. She stuck her bleeding hoof in her mouth and levitated the fragment in front of her to examine it.

Annoyed confusion was replaced with horror as the filly slowly figured out what had stabbed her. I had been keeping that thought out of my head, not even wanting to entertain it for a second, but now there was little use in denying it. This evacuation had been a failure.

Star turned her gaze to me, looking for somepony to tell her that her idea was wrong, that it wasn’t a piece of bone that had stuck her in the hoof. I grimaced and reached to pick her up. Before I could get her, Star’s gaze turned to look over all of the open snow. She looked almost sick as the idea started to sink in and she started backing up toward the concrete barrier at the edge of the area.

Star backed up and onto something under the snow. That something was the chest of a long dead pony and what followed was horrifying even from my perspective. The corpse’s ribcage gave out and Star fell through it. It looked like the ground opened up with a groan and a few cracks, the unicorn tumbling into a gaping maw full of jagged teeth formed by broken ribs that dug into her. Star, to her credit, only let out a single bloodcurdling scream before thrashing/jumping out of mini sinkhole, stumbling away as she broke down sobbing. I grabbed her by the scruff and made a break for the bus depot’s terminal building.

The side of the terminal facing us was supposed to be a wall of glass panes, however, all of the glass was gone leaving a steel framework supporting nothing. One of the steel bars exploded in a flash of blue as I dove into the lobby. A robotic screeching could be heard on the wind as the four synths up the road took notice of Star’s little outburst.

There was a much plainer horror inside of the terminal. The place had been converted to a processing area with barriers flanking a line that serpentined to a row of desks. Around the perimeter were a few sandbag walls with soldiers and riot police. Only a layer of frost had been able to cover the charred bodies of ponies trying to flee. Despite how hard I tried not to, I absorbed how the dead had been mummified by the cold. Charred skin and blisters were pretty much perfectly preserved on flesh that had shrunk around the bodies’ skeletons, amplifying the anguished expressions on their faces. Bodily fluids had run out of ponies eyes, mouths, ears, noses, and cracks in their skin as they burned and the flows had been frozen in time.

To make matters even worse, there were several ghouls scattered around the space. The specters had probably been napping, praying to Celestia, contemplating existence, studying the lobby’s decor, or just snickering to themselves about how funny mortal ponies with their goals and limited lifespans were. Whatever they had been up to before I came racing in with Star in my jaws, they made the quick, unanimous decision that I looked delicious and a half dozen ghouls let out screams before charging me.

I stopped and considered my situation for a second. There were synths outside and ghouls in here. I had a filly in my jaws who was probably going into shock and was bleeding from some gashes on her legs. My carbine hung pretty uselessly from my neck. I was wading through mounds of civilians that hadn’t escaped death in an inferno. I was being hunted by some maniac mercenary and her horde of robots in a frozen shell of an isolated city. Corpses now came back to life and attack the living, as if death didn’t already suck enough. Everything I had ever worked and cared for was gone. All my friends were dead. Fuck it, I should just go back outside. Getting gunned down by synths would be better than getting mauled by ghouls…

No! No, no, no, no, nononono. I’m not going to start that. I’m going to keep a level head. I don’t need all of that rattling around in my brain.

OK, Objective One: get away from synths. Probably by going through the ghouls, use of force probably necessary. Objective Two: find somewhere to get Star thinking right again. Might have to bump that one down the list depending on how the situation develops. Objective Three: Find a secure place to hide out from the synths while the storm blows over. Should be east of Amethyst Avenue, preferably with heat and access to good scavenging. Objective Four: find alcohol (consumable, preferably bourbon) and have a good sob.

With my list committed to memory,I returned to pressing matters.

I lunged forward and pounced on a ghoul that was standing between me and a door at the back of the terminal. The crystal ghoul let out a pained hiss and a crack like glass as I landed on the abomination. I was off of it and on my way to the door without pause.

There was only one more ghoul in my path to the back door. It was what I thought an animated corpse should really look like. Skin like dried out leather stretched over a skeleton that was somehow moving, a pair of milky eyes rounding everything out.

I brought my right front hoof up and delivered an uppercut to the ghoul. It’s head popped off with an almost comical sound and icy cold, black blood shot out of its jugular into my face. I screamed into the scruff of Star’s barding as the blood got into my eyes. I attempted to wipe my face before bringing my hooves down on the ghoul, doing my best to mash the monster into a paste on the floor.

My distracted and distressed state was quickly broken along with a couple of my ribs. A crystal ghoul had run up and brought its own hooves down on my side. I staggered and swept a wing blade across the creature. It created a couple sparks but only really knocked the ghoul back a step. However, that was all of the space I needed as I kicked out with both of my rear hooves at it. The zombie’s head shattered into shards from the impact and I winced in pain as my right side burned. I started running as fast as I could, limping awkwardly as I tried to not move my right front leg and agitate my ribs.

Through the door at the back of the lobby, through some dimly lit office space with a few more ghouls, and into a back storage room. I dropped Star and collapsed on the ground, only just managing to close the door with a rear hoof as I started hacking. I slid across the floor and up against the opposite wall pressing in on my chest, hopefully putting the broken rib back into its proper spot so my talisman could fix the damage. Eventually, my coughing slowed and the adrenaline stopped flowing, leaving me clutching my side in pain as exhaustion pressed in on me.

I groaned and looked around the room, instantly realizing what I was sitting next to. He was a young buck, young as I had been when I joined the military. He wore white, grey, and dark green snow camo fatigues bearing the six pointed white star of Equestria on the collars. He had a sergeant's stripes and the patch on his left sleeve identified him as a member of Company D, Fourth Battalion of the 5th Mountain Regiment. Originally the 5th Hoofington Regiment before Luna’s Reforms, they were one of the best winter and mountain warfare units in the army. I had fought alongside and even led troopers from this pony’s unit during the Battles of Stalliongrad, Shyloo Peaks, Trotaviv, and during the Cartpathian Campaign.

I reached over and put a hoof on the shoulder of the long dead soldier. He was sitting in much the same way I was. Leaning up against the wall. His coat had fallen out in places and blood had trickled from his mouth, pain not just from the radiation sickness was etched across his face. His right front leg was crossed across his chest so his Pipbuck would be close to his mouth. A holotape was sitting in the slot on the computer, a final testament from some poor soul who watched the world burn.

With a tear in my eye I reached over and removed to holotape from the slot. I then reached into his shirt and pulled out the chain with his dog tags. There were two tags there, one to add to the record and another to stay with the body. Since I was still a commissioned officer of the Royal Equestrian Armed Forces, it was my duty to record the fallen.

I also elected to liberate him of a pair of frag grenades he had clipped to his webbing, packing them in my bags. I stuffed the tape and tag into my barding before laying my hoof across his eyes and kissing his helmeted forehead.

“Star? You with me?” I asked somberly. Turning my attention to the filly sitting in the middle of the floor. She was seemed completely zoned out, staring at the door as the sound of the ghouls pounding against it echoed. I crossed the distance to her side and wrapped a foreleg around her. “Hey, I need you to here with me.”

Star jumped at my touch and turned to look at me. Slowly, I watched emotion return to her eyes and she wrapped her hooves around me before letting out a few choked sobs. The filly shivered against me and I stroked her mane for a few seconds before I hefted her onto my back. We unfortunately didn’t have time to hang around here and wait for her to recover. I took her hooves tightening around my neck as a good sign though.

At the back of the terminal was a door that opened into a small employee parking lot that was separated from the park beyond by a cinderblock wall that I easily jumped. I laid low and listened to the sound of something storm through the crunchy snow and into the parking lot behind me.

“Sensors indicate intruder in proximity,” declared a synthetic voice. While a synth was looking around the parking lot on the other side of the wall, I made a mad dash into the park.

The park was a series of gently rolling hills covered in scattered trees. Everything was coated in a thick layer of snow and ice cascaded from the trees in beautiful flows. I ran along the backsides of the hills in order to reduce my silhouette and hide my trail from the road. I had made it almost halfway through the park before the synth in the parking lot caught on and started firing at me. I ducked around a hill, got my carbine in my jaws, popped up, and blasted the synth’s head apart with a burst.

I was instantly back to running. Speeding alongside hills, through snow drifts, among the frozen trees. The likelihood of finding somewhere to hide was still in flux. On one hoof, the synths had an idea where Star and I were. On the other, they still didn’t know that much about us and so far there were only a few robots in the area.

Of course, life also seemed to hate me.

More laserfire came at me from my right. A squad of about nine synths appeared on road beside the park, having emerged from the ether apparently. Behind me were the other three synths from the group that had investigated the bus terminal. I could do nothing against them other than pop off the occasional shot and pour on the speed.

The synths, to their creators’ credit, could keep up with me and my cyberpony enhancements. I stole a few glances back at my pursuers. One of them was missing their gray rubber coat, revealing a metal endoskeleton actuated with servo motors in the joints. There were large components hanging in its chest, some sort of sensory package set in its head. Each one carried beam weapons that I didn’t recognize, mouth carried pistols and battle saddle mounted rifles that fired blue bolts and had large, white, plastic housings. One of the synths even had on armor.

I decided that I would prefer not fighting them on the likely terms (with me being outnumbered and surrounded) if I could help it and continued to run. I lifted my wings and covered Star with them as blue laserfire flew around us and even into me occasionally. I ignored any damage to my bionic limbs or barding and put the pain from a few burns out of mind. Getting away is what matters right now.

I soon crossed the park and passed a memorial sitting in the center of a cul-de-sac. The ice covered, dark blue alicorn sat atop its marble pillar, looking down on me as I ran past. To my left, the purple highrise rose promisingly.

At my first opportunity, I charged up an alley that lead north. My intention was to use my two frag grenades and rifle on the pursuing synths when they entered the narrow road. This plan was ruined by what I ran into coming around the corner. I quite literally collided head on with a synth that had been running to intercept me. The synth and I bounced off each other, the sounds of breaking bones, plastics, and metal ringing out. Star was hurled off of my back by the impact and my rifle went flying with her.

I landed in a heap and was a bit slow to recover, little Stars prancing around my vision while I took stock of a broken nose and collarbone. I hefted myself up and looked around. The synth I had run into was unmoving on the ground while another two stood in front of me. One had a fancy beam battle saddle while the other was looking at its fallen comrade with a beam pistol clutched in its mouth.

Without really thinking, I pounced on the battlesaddled synth and smashed its head in with a few strikes from my hooves. My wingblade swept through the other robot and it collapsed with a loud pop and fizzle as I tore something out of its chest. The lack of an intact head, however, didn’t really impair the synth I was on top of as it kicked me off with a buck to the gut.

The headless synth tried to stand but was unable to gain any balance, only succeeding in thrashing around in the snow. I stumbled up onto my hooves, clutching at my abdomen and coughing. Blood was running out of my mouth and nose again. I swayed as the pain from several broken ribs and a thoroughly bruised midsection radiated through me, just generally absorbing how bad I’d gotten at fighting since my prime.

I wasn’t even able to gather what was happening before the synth I had sliced with my wing lifted its head, pistol in jaws, and melted the left half of my face off. It was a lucky miss for me but, I still wailed in agony and reeled. Just to have another synth came out of my peripheral vision and drive its head into the left side of my rib cage, since none of those ribs had been broken yet. I felt my back get thrown out as I landed and my vision went white with pain. I was almost completely incapacitated when I landed in a heap in the snow.

Another synth was quickly on me. It smacked me across the face with its forehoof, ripping off charred skin. I bucked that one in its chest, breaking something and getting it off of me. However, more hooves fell on my battered chest and legs as I tried to drag myself away. Soon the dozen synths that had been chasing me were pounding me into the snow. I was quickly reduced to simply trying to cover my body with my wings and hooves.

I was starting to lose consciousness when there was a whoosh of air, and a shadow passed over me. Most of the synths were knocked away by something that made a mighty crash as it hit the ground a small distance away. The sound of suppressed gunfire followed. I lifted my head and looked where the object had landed and rolled.

A large dumpster sat at the end of a trail of crushed robot pieces, the metal box dented from its journey. Most of the synths had been shattered under the bin but a few struggled back to their hooves just for bullets to tear into them. Turning the other direction revealed my salvation. Star stood with her horn flared as she levitated my carbine.

“You threw that?” I asked weakly and gesturing vaguely in the direction of the dumpster. Star nodded and I started laughing. That damn thing probably weighed a ton; most full grown unicorns couldn’t move something like that. The act of laughing sent pain lancing through my chest and black blots dancing in my vision.

Star didn’t say anything, but worry was etched on her face as she trotted over to me. Her horn flared brighter and a warm tingling sensation filled my chest. Star only seemed to make sure all of my ribs were in their right spots and that I wasn’t bleeding internally before the magic faded. I felt myself get lifted up out of the snow and my carbine’s sling settle around my neck before the glow faded from Star’s horn.

I cried out as my back tried to support weight, my spine messed up to the point that breathing made me sick and the pain was causing my vision to blur. Star was forced to use her magic to hold me upright as we stumbled through several more alleys and to the back of a building that I recognized.

Looking up revealed two shattered windows in the wall of glass, the panes not surviving a cyberpony crashing into them a few hours earlier. We made it. Star picked a back door and I was escorted into a large industrial kitchen. Stainless steel appliances and counters with black and white checker patterned tile on the floor was the flavor of the place.

Star eased me down onto the floor while she slammed the door. She looked over her Pipbuck for a few seconds before I felt the poke of a needle and the pain faded away a little. Star then went off to check the area while I leaned up against the a counter. I pressed my face against the cold metal surface and let the sensation help numb the pain. Even with the drugs, my face stung, my head was throbbing, breathing set my chest on fire, my back ached to the point that motion was pretty much impossible, I felt like I was about to literally puke my guts out, and my computers were feeding a staticy haze of signals into my brain.

No, I wasn’t capable of much more then pressing my face against the nice cool metal for a good five minutes. Unfortunately, I didn’t have time to be lounging around right now. I pushed myself off of the counter and turned to look at it. My barding was scorched in a few places but other than that I looked relatively okay, save the half of my face that was missing.

It was a sight that sent a shiver down my spine. The skin on the left side was blistered and peeling off, my coat burned away. The synth’s hoof had slid across my skull and sheared the flesh off from the top of my jaw to the bottom of my eye. The metal socket my cybernetic eye sat in and the white of my skull were exposed in places. That wasn’t what made my skin crawl though.

I could see the black plastic of my gums. Steel, silicon, and copper snaked around my cranium in a fine grid lines looking like a reinforced motherboard printed on the bone. An occasional crystal dotted buses that did Celestia-knows-what. There was more plastic in the wound that served to maintain my face’s shape when it had its normal layers of flesh. The steel, disk shaped actuator at the pivot of my jaw was poking through the skin and flesh as they tried to regenerate.

“Holy fuck,” I mumbled to myself in disbelief and horror. I was torn between being shocked at the damage or what the damage exposed. The whole left side of my face had been rebuilt and I flet another wave of sickness wash over me as the memories set in.

I studied the macabre sight of my own reflection for several more seconds before shuddering and turning away. I looked around the kitchen for Star and was drawn to sounds coming from a walk-in freezer off to one side. “Star?” I whispered.

I didn’t wait long before the door opened wide and the filly walked out levitating a pail of ice cream. I burst out laughing (which hurt like hell) while Star trotted over to me and summoned a pair of spoons to her side. She blushed a little but looked no less pleased with herself as she sad down in front of me and opened her prize.

“Seriously?” I chuckled. “It’s a bit cold out for that isn’t it?”

“Well I’ve only heard about ice cream and strawberries in books,” Star said, showing me the pinkish white contents of the pail and rolling her eyes, “I’m not going to pass up an opportunity like this.”

I tried to laugh more but was just left wheezing as Star levitated me a spoon. “You’ll like it,” I choked out. “Strawberry is my favorite flavor and ice cream is always good.” I gawked a little at the immaculate condition of the frozen treat. “This doesn’t even look a day over expiration. Letting anything like this go to waste would be criminal.”

Star grinned, the filly’s behavior struck me as odd. On one hoof, I expected her to be on the edge of a breakdown from recent events. On the other, the filly I had seen was one tough piece of work and never one to pass up on an opportunity. But eating ice cream in the cold wasn’t very sensible and Star was one of the most sensible ponies I had met in ages.

My worries melted away as Star chipped some ice cream off with her spoon and shoveled her bounty into her mouth. Her eyes went wide and she let out a squeal of pleasure, quickly driving her spoon in for more.

I laughed again and plunged my own spoon in. “Easy with this. Don’t need you getting brain freeze.”

“Mm-hum,” Star grunted around a full mouth, already massaging her forehead.

I helped myself to a bit of the frozen delicacy. The two hundred years had been very kind to some high-class quality ice cream. I let the sweet taste of strawberries and cream cascade over my tongue while the cold numbed my brain.

“Shadow,” I looked back at Star who had stopped gorging herself to look at me, “are you going to be okay?”

“I’ll be fine, Star.” I smiled at her. “Thanks for having my back.”

The filly blushed again and dug her spoon back into the tub. “It was nothing.”

I found myself laughing again. “Nothing? Star, you threw a Celestia damned dumpster with gusto and control, while operating a firearm.” I paused to swallow a spoonful of ice cream. “My younger sister, Ray, was a magical protege. She graduated from Celestia’s School For Gifted Unicorns and was one of Twilight Sparkle’s top researchers in the Ministry of Magic. She wasn’t able to do anything like that at your age.”

I smiled nostalgically. “You have no idea how much trouble I would have caused if Ray had been that powerful when she was a filly. There would have been a wall of wagons and garbage bins in front of the school everyday. Or all of the desks would have wound up on the roof of the building across the street. Or inside the police station”

Star giggled. “You didn’t tell me about her.”

“Ehh, Ray always tried to distance herself from me as she got older. Thought I was a bad influence.”

Another giggle. “She sounded cool,” Star said.

I chuckled, “She was a sourpuss. Mother was always a bit miffed that she didn’t get a daughter with a sun name with me so she tried again. Sunshine was a gloriously ironic for my sister and I always called her ‘my little ray of sunshine’. Soon the whole family was doing it.”

“Who were your other siblings?”

“Well there were my younger brothers, Trade Wind and Beryl; they were both block heads. Angel Cake was my ‘not-a-unicorn buddy’ -since she was the only earth pony in the family- and general accomplice-in-crime. Then there were the twins…” The light faded from my voice and I cast my eyes down at the last two.

Star noticed my fall in attitude. “Were they alright?”

“Yah, they grew up fine from what I heard. I was just never a part of their lives…” I stood up, hissing and groaning in pain but not wavering. “Let’s find somewhere else to wait out the storm, I don’t trust here.” I quickly turned and started trotting through the kitchen.

Star scurried to keep up with me, the tub of ice cream still floating along with her. “What’s wrong with here?” Star asked as she trotted alongside me.

“I don’t want to try and cross Amethyst Avenue in good weather. We need to be on the far side of it by the time this storm hits,” I answered as we trotted through a door and into a dining area.
We went through the restaurant and found ourselves in the lobby of the building. It would have been a gorgeous place in days past. There was a very tasteful use of crystal in a modernistic water feature in the center of the lobby while most of the space was done in marble floors and glass/crystal walls supported by brushed steel. Of course the centuries had led everything in the space to fade: the steel rusted, the glass cracked, and the floors dirty. Everything was coated in a uniform layer of frost, much like the rest of the Empire.

I was just getting to the entrance when Star called out, her voice quiet and ashamed. “Shadow, I’m sorry.”

I stopped and looked back at her. “It’s not your fault. I loved my family but it was a damned mess.” I placed a hoof on her shoulder. “I can deal with that later. Right now we need to be on our A games. OK?” Star nodded and gave me a forced smile. “Good.”

A mountain of shattered glass from the sides of the tower crunched under our hooves as I crept from the entrance and into the street. We were at 53rd St and Amethyst Rd, a couple miles from the Wintergreen Landing’s train station. The two of us had made decent progress in our trek south just to turn around.

I checked the roofs and the streets then darted across with Star on my heels. I was halfway across the street when I thought I spotted movement on one of the roof tops. I continued running for the rubble of the store the Rangers had been in and dove for cover.

“Stay down,” I hissed to Star as she found herself being pushed further into the building while I turned my attention to the roofs. There had been something on one rooftop. I scanned the roof line with my cybernetic eye.

The average pony would never spot the shimmers and most would have struggled to see them if pointed out. Even as a mare who had fought zebras in stealth cloaks more than a few times it was difficult to see but I had no delusions about ‘heat waves’ or ‘tricks of the light’ after zeroing in on my targets.

The invisible observers’ breath was also showing up in the cold and that almost made being invisible pointless. There were two of them standing side by side. They seemed to be talking to each other; one cloud of breath would be slow and steady while the other shot out in broken torrents, then they would exchange roles.

They weren’t using stealth cloaks; the distortion cloaks caused had very defined edges if one could see the apparition. These had blurred out lines like a Stealthbuck but lacked the wavy shimmering that the Pipbuck mounted devices created as their spells constantly refreshed.

I won’t say that I could read their lips or anything, and body language is pretty hard when there’s no body to look at. However, I was able to look at the breath clouds, the distortions, their orientations, and any changes to extract some meaning out of the discussion our shadows were having.

The one on the left did most of the taking, a constant stream of steam shooting forth as they whispered their companion’s ear off. The stream and distortion shifted up and down and left to right; they were uneasy in their babble. The one to the right just breathed calmly, occasionally interrupting Lefty’s commentary. I got the feeling Righty was the leader and that she and I were analyzing each other. I could almost feel the scrutinizing glare her invisible eyes shot at me.
Righty was probably thinking about how to react to the pony that could see through invisibility spells. I found myself reflecting on the situation too; I hadn’t seen these two when I was running across the road. No matter how perceptive I could be (and I did have my moments), I wasn’t going to claim to have spotted two cloaked creatures looking down from the roof of a four story building while going at a full sprint. Something else up there had caught my attention.

Several minutes passed as the two blurs and I stared each other down. Lefty’s chatter ended as she just accepted that Righty was going to let me make the first move. I just laid there like a corpse, putting years of experience as a sniper to good use and wondering who I was facing off with.

Our long distance stare down was ended when a head popped up behind the two invisible ponies. A purple unicorn looked around for the thing that her companions were observing. She looked like a big filly, her eyes full of curiosity and her mouth a bit agape as she searched for me.

The purple unicorn jumped a little as Lefty turned around and said something loud enough that I could hear a little echo. Purple looked at Lefty and her mouth formed one word: ‘Why.’ Righty turned and told Purple something and a horrified expression spread across the unicorn’s face before she ducked back down.

I smiled, it was an understandable reaction to being told some mystery pony was pointing a gun at you. Lefty started shifting again and her breathing had quickened but Righty was back to calmly observing me in an instant.

Well, she was either waiting for me to lose interest and scurry off or to make some sort of move.

“What are you looking at?” Star whispered from the rubble behind me.

“There’s a pair of cloaked ponies standing on the roof across the street,” I answered, not taking my eyes off the duo.

“What do you mean cloaked ponies on the roof? Like invisible?”

“Yeah.”

“Huh, I wonder what the alicorns are doing this far south,” the filly muzed.

“The alicorns can turn invisible?” I asked.

“Some of them can, yeah.”

“You said they were friendly, right?”

“They’re more kinda semi-friendly,” came the answer, “friendly by Wasteland standards.”

Well, they hadn’t flown off, so they were interested in us and they hadn’t attacked so they probably weren’t interested in killing us. This was a good opportunity to let these ponies know that we weren’t enemies at the very least. I lowered my carbine, got to my hooves, and took a step out with a neutral expression. I stood in the building storm and waved a hoof to the alicorns.

Purple poked her head back up over the wall. Righty then revealed herself to me and Lefty followed suit soon after. The three alicorns and I stood, staring into each other’s eyes. I heard hooves behind me as Star moved to my side.

Several seconds pasted with nothing moving other than what the wind stirred up. Lefty was a pretty cyan color with a pink and light blue mane that looked like cotton candy. She looked tense; ready to flee or fight at the drop of a pin. Righty, however, looked the role of group leader; she was a dark midnight blue with a wavy, silvery blue mane and a set of piercing amber eyes. The mare stood with her head held high and body in a calm, collected stance that was just intimidating enough to not invite challenge.

I was just starting to question the wisdom of my decision when Righty lifted her hoof and waved back. I smiled as she lowered it before turning around. Purple gave an exuberant wave before following after her. Lefty fingered through, her eyes locked on me for a spell before she nodded curtly and was off. I turned around and walked away, Star following after.

“What was that?” Star asked me as we reentered the ruined building.

“Big Blue and I were just feeling each other out.” I answered. “Luckily for us, she wasn’t looking for a fight either.”

“But how did you see them? Those two blue alicorns were invisible!”

“I saw the purple one peaking out at us. After I got an idea where they were, I spotted the other two’s breath and the visual distortion from their invisibility spells.”

“Whoa, so you can see through invisibility spells?” Star asked, her awed tone making me blush a little under my black coat. “That is amazing!”

“Shh, no need to stroke my ego. Invisibility magic has its limits,” I said. “Let’s get moving, we’ve lost time.”

“Why can’t we stop here? It’s on the far side of the road.” Star stopped and looked around what had once been the main floor of a department store. Clothes, perfume, technology, jewelry, and all other manner of consumables sprawled around us in a uniform state of decay. The back half of the store was blocked off by a collapse and the storefront was pummeled rubble. “I’m sure we could find a janitor’s closet or something to spend the night in.”

“No, we need to move on,” I answered firmly, “it's not safe here with the synths.”

“I don’t even see any signs of synths, Shadow,” Star shot back. That’s exactly what’s putting me on edge, the ground should be scattered in synth parts. “Besides,” she continued, “if we go deep enough into the store I doubt they would find us.”

I huffed, “We are going to move on. There’s only one way in and out of here and I don’t want to get cornered while we sleep. Come on,” I turned and started walking back to the front. I wasn’t going to end up trapped in here like the Rangers.

“Fine,” Star pouted, following after me.

I crept up to the edge of the building, checking the roofs and streets. I froze as a hacking sound echoed around the buildings. “What’s that?” Star asked behind me.

“Nothing. We need to get moving.” I started to trot away from where I had heard the cough. I didn’t get far before another echoed across the followed by the much more distinct sound of a weak voice crying out.

“Help!” The call was followed by another cough and then the pony started crying.

Star froze in her tracks and looked back toward the intersection. “Star, ignore it. It’s a trap,” I said to the filly but had already started away. “Stop, you can’t go back there.”

“Somepony needs help, Shadow,” Star said as she bolted off.

Damn us ponies and our bleeding hearts. “Star, leave them alone!”

“I’m not going to leave somepony to die out here, Shadow. I’m not some callous monster.”

I stopped in my tracks. Callous as I may be, that statement still hurt. I could only stare after the filly as tears burned in my eyes.

“Eep!” Star let out a choked gasp.

“Starprancer!” I jolted toward the filly. She was staring down at a heap of bloody steel; tears running down her face. A green mare in Steel Ranger armor looked up at Star with a mix of hope and disbelief.

How the fuck did she survive a .50 cal to the chest? I mentally swore.

Before I could get too close though, the mare’s hope melted to fear as Star’s face was twisted with pure rage and anguish. She grit her teeth and growled, her horn burst to life and the Ranger was dragged into the air. The armored pony screamed out in fear and pain as the air filled with the smell of burning hair. Star’s eyes glowed white, the snow around her flashed away in a cloud of steam, rubble and trash started to float around the white and red demon.

Small bolts of lightning lanced off of Star and into the ground and buildings around her. The Ranger’s screaming only intensified as her limbs were jerked around in Star’s magical grip. The mare’s wailing was cut off when Star’s magic focused around her throat and she was driven into the ground. I could smell ozone as energy built on Star’s horn.

I started running toward my charge as she reared up onto her rear hooves, energy racing across her body, for the death blow. The energy surrounding the unicorn burned me as I got near; screaming “STAR, STOP!” was all I could contribute.

Star lifted up into the air, the air crackling with energy and her looking down on her victim like a spiteful god. The mare could only look up in terror as tears ran down her face. Her limbs weighted down in the dead power armor and her throat locked in a magical clamp. Everything sat still for but a second as Star’s gaze burned into the Steel Ranger. Then, she pulled her head back her magic focusing into a sphere, before the surge shot forward.

The entire intersection was bathed in light bright white light; a brutal concussion blasting outward. Ozone burned my throat and nostrils, my face and barding were scorched; the air filled with dust and ash. I was beaten into the dirt by the blast and rose dazed.

Blood started running from my mouth and nose again. My brain throbbed against my skull. My computers had been scrambled by the magical energy. I could move my body erratically and a haze of signals was bouncing around in my dazed mind. Something wasn’t working right though, my vision was darkening and I felt the burning of suffocation in my muscles despite breathing freely. I staggered, growing light headed from lack of oxygen. Still, despite my pain and the primal panic welling up in me, there was only one thing I was thinking about.

Starprancer!