Chapters "And you will it is the end, for fire shall rain down from the heavens," a voice says waking me up.
I turn to an earth pony in a bed across from me, "What's with the end of world talk?" I ask him.
"I don't know. Just a prophecy from a novel I read a long time ago."
"I wouldn't know it. I don't read much."
"Well isn't that a crying shame."
"You read a lot?" I ask.
"Yeah, I used to work in the Manehattan Public Library. I must've read every book in there at least a dozen times each, too bad that it'll probably the last time for a lot of those books. The name's Book Binding, your's?"
This was the first time since I got here that I had to think about who I was. I look down at my cutie mark for answers and see two unfamiliar dice on my flank. "I don't know. I... I can't remember. It's all kind of a haze really."
"You'll get it back it eventually. That's how these things usually tend to work."
"And if I don't?" I ask him somberly.
"Then you shouldn't let it hold you back. I mean who's to say that the Equestria will ever be the same, it might be better for you this way," he reassures me.
"You're probably right," I say. "Do you know what happened?"
"Well, right now a lot of us are thinking that it was the dragons."
"Dragons?"
"Oh yeah. They must've gotten jealous of us ponies sitting in their Dragonland, and decide to take Equestria for themselves."
"But, wouldn't have the Princesses have tried to stop them?"
"I'm sure they did try, but it wasn't enough. We're almost positive that Celestia and Luna are gone."
"You can't know that for sure."
"Well, go take a look outside and you tell me that then."
I get up from out of the bed. My shoulder was sore, but it was bearable. I begin to make my way over to the window. What I see in front cause me to give an audible gasp. The Manehattan skyline was virtually nonexistent, merely a shadow of it's former glory. The skyscrapers had been cut down like trees. Only a few remained standing, but even then there were entire floor missing. The scale of destruction was appalling, and I could make out shapes here and there of what could only be the bodies of deceased ponies. Earth, Unicorn, and Pegasus all alike in the end.
"This is terrible," I say unable to look away.
"Now take a good look at the sun."
"What about the sun? It's setting big deal."
"You want to know the big deal. The big deal is that it's been setting for three days now. Hanging there just above the horizon doing nothing but sitting motionless."
"It can't be," I say in horror.
"I assure you it can," a voice says from behind, and I break my gaze from the carnage to find Dr. Cross. "If you would, I'd like to speak to you in my office."
The doctor's office was cliche right down to the portraits of whom could only be his family. The question was how much of his family survived the attack. The indication on his face when he looked at them told me not many were left.
"Have a seat," he tells me solemnly.
"Might I ask what this is all about?" I ask.
"This is about you. Now if you would take a seat we can begin."
"I think I'd prefer to stand."
"Who are you," he says almost accusingly.
"I wish I knew, but I can't remember much of anything right now," I admit.
"Well I'll tell you who I think you are. Based on your cutie mark I can say assume that you were most likely some kind of gambler-"
"What does that have to do with anything?"
"Now, normally that would be fine," he says ignoring my question. "But, to be completely honest I think you were a entirely different type of gambler altogether."
"And what would that other kind be exactly?"
"A criminal," he says sending a chill down my neck. "I think you were some sort of gang member."
"No, you can't know that. You don't have any proof."
"Oh I have proof, and it's enough to make more than an estimated guess. For starters you have various laceration scars. That were probably caused by a knife, and not to mention the mark that could have only been caused by an old gunshot wound."
"That doesn't prove anything."
"Would like me to go on, there's one last thing?" he asks rhetorically. "You have a tattoo behind your left ear, and not just any tattoo. It's one I've seen before, and I know that it linked to a gang here in Manehattan."
"That can't be me."
"Well, I were to take a Gambit I'd say that you were a dangerous pony," he says in a way that felt different.
"What are you going to do with me then. Throw me out?"
"Under normal circumstances I would hand you over to the authorities. However if you'd recall these aren't normal circumstances. I could use somepony like you."
"What?"
"This hospital has... limited supplies, and we have a lot of patients who are need of those supplies. I need somepony like you to help make sure that the recovery team is safe from anypony who might want those supplies for themselves."
"But, what if I'm not who you think I am?"
"I'm hardly ever wrong. Now if you're going to stay you're going to need a name. At least until you remember your real one."
"I guess you're right. Got anything in mind."
"As a matter of fact, I do."
As I walk to back to my room I hear a voice and the sound of small hooves trying to catch up to. I turn and see a small unicorn filly running towards me. She was a the shade of purple twilight and her mane of a night sky indigo streaked with blue. Her eyes seemed to sparkle as she came running. "Hey mister you're awake now," she said. Her voice was familiar, but I couldn't really place it. " I was waiting for you to wake up so I could say hi."
"You were the filly from yesterday," I say remembering where I had heard her voice before.
"Uh huh, and the day before that and the day before that one. Sometimes it can be hard to tell what time it is now that the sun doesn't go down," she adds on the end.
"I'm pretty sure it must be."
"Do you think that something bad happened to the princesses?" She asks in a sad low voice.
"I don't really know for sure, but..." I don't want to lie her, but something instinctively tells me that this would be the best for her right now. "But things will be okay in the end. I'm sure that the princesses are just too busy beating up those dragons to bother with the sun and moon."
"You really think so?" she asks me perking up.
"Yeah, they're probably fine. Well, I should be on way then."
"Hold on," she pleads.
"What is it?" I ask her.
"I don't know your name."
"My name?"
"Yeah, I don't know your name."
"My name is Gambit, but that's not my real name."
"What is your real name?"
"I don't know, I'm trying to figure that out," I tell her.
"How can you forget your own name?" She exclaims.
"I'm afraid I don't the answer to that one either."
"Well, I know my own name," she says giggling.
"Prove it then," I say jokingly.
"That's easy, it's Melody Moon."
"Well it's nice to meet you Melody Moon.".
With ears ringing, breathing heavy, and vision blurry I struggle to my hooves. A pain in my shoulder causes me to let out gut wrenching cry. I turn my head as far to find the source of the pain, only to make out what could only be a large piece of shrapnel jutting out of my flesh. I call out for somepony to help me, but to no avail. I can feel the blood dripping down to my hoof. I have to go find help. I try to take a step forward, but trip on a pile of debris. The pain so unbearable I nearly black-out. I manage to recover and taste iron as spit out some blood. I call out for help a second time again with no answer that I could hear. I grab a hold to the shrapnel with magic and give it a gingerly tug to see how deep it is, and my shoulder explodes in agony. I couldn't pull it out even if I wanted to, but just then I feel something yank it out with an immense force causing me to fall to the ground passing out.
"I think he's waking up," I hear a young filly say.
"Then you should probably go play with the other children. He'll need a little bit of time to situate himself," a stallion says. I try to take a good look around, but the room is bright for my unadjusted eyes.
"Is she your daughter?" I ask the stallion groggily.
"No, she's just another refugee, like yourself. She has taken a keen fascination to you ever since you arrived here. I told her to leave you be and let you get your rest. That she didn't know you, but you know children. They don't care, they never do. It doesn't who you are, or what you've-"
"Did you say refugee?" I ask interrupting what he was about to say.
"Well not yet at least, but I'm afraid we all might be soon. Refugees just sounds better than victims if you ask me."
"Where are we?"
"This is Manehattan General, we brought here after the attack several days ago."
"The shrapnel?"
"Ooh I am sorry for that, but-"
"That was you!"
"Yes, you were bleeding out, and I need to cauterize the wound with magic. You can thank me for you life later."
"What caused all this?" I ask more in general than to anypony directly.
"We can talk more tomorrow morning," he says ignoring my question. "Right now you to get some rest" he tells me and begins to leave, but stops. "My name is Dr. Cross bytheway."
"Gambit wait," Melody calls to me. A fondness for the filly standing in front of me had grown in me over the past couple days. "You forgot to say goodbye."
"I'm only going to be gone for a little while," I say to her.
"But, what if something happens to you?"
"Melody I promise that I'll be fine, okay."
"Okay," she says a little dejectedly.
"I gotta go now the others are waiting for me."
I go find the others, who have already cleared away the barricade in front of the entrance, and we set off.
Five of us made up the recovery team. There was Dr. Cross and Book Binding, who was brought along in hopes that something he had read would be useful to us. Then there was a retired E.U.P. guard named Lancestriker and one of the Doctor's nurses whose name I couldn't recall.
We step out and find that up close the city looks so much worse. It's just so more... more real. The leveled buildings who would touch the heavens no longer, and the bodies. Oh the bodies. Some are burned beyond any form of recognition, a husk of their former selves. While others look like they could just get up and walk away, as if waking from some terrible nightmare and right into another. Then the foals who only just a week ago had so much life to look forward to now lay dead on the cluttered street unmoving like ragdolls. This is what Equestria is now. A mass grave that the living have to suffer through, and highlight it all was that red burning hole frozen in motion most perhaps to stay there never to move again.
As we walk through the streets of the forsaken the nurses spots something and falls to the ground screaming, "Oh Celestia," in tears.
"Are you alright," Dr. Cross says as he rushes to help her.
"Yeah... yeah I'm fine," she says calming as she gets to her feet. "It's just that I used to know her," she points to a body covered in pieces rubble. "I was one of the bridesmaids at her... at her wedding," she finishes as she started in an overwhelm of tears.
"Let's move along best not to dwell on the past," Cross urges as he escorts her away, and it occurs to me that I'm the lucky one in all of this. I have no past to dwell on, no friends to find dead, and no family to worry about. No sorrows and no regrets.