Chapter 10

Ruby in the rough

“So he won’t be coming.” Scarlett was repeatedly tapping her hoof against the table. “Doesn’t it seem suspicious to you?” She pursed her lips looking at me.

I sighed. “You’re right, although I must admit it does make sense for him not wanting to show up for the job. Afterall, we are going to be (hopefully) out of town in the next couple days, but he will have to live with those guards going forward.” I put my hoof on her shoulder. “We’ll just have to be more careful.”

“So…” Scarlett said, in a more confident voice. “…what is our plan here?” she stopped her tapping and straightened up.

“We know their names, descriptions and where they live, all that’s left is to take surveillance and watch if any of them will try to do something fishy at night.” I stood up and started checking on my guns. “They live pretty close to each other so if anything happens I should be able to help.” I said, putting the magazine back in the carbine and flicking the safety.

“And then we meet back here?”

“No, too risky. Let’s meet behind the clinic, then we can decide what to do next.”

Scarlett sighed, her gentle green eyes meeting mine. “So you’ll be going now and I should move out a few minutes after, right?” She said, starting towards the door to make her own preparations.

I nodded, looking over her. She may be way more helpful than I thought.

“Uh… Midnight?” The white unicorn stopped in the doorway. “Good luck.”

***

It was a lovely evening, or at least as lovely as it gets in this Celestia forsaken wasteland. Quite a stark contrast to the always noisy and dirty streets of Rusty Horseshoe. However I didn’t have much time to enjoy the surroundings. By now Scarlett should have taken her place and all that’s left is to stalk this otherwise unassuming house across the street.

Time went slow, my concentration growing with each passing minute. I felt like my heartbeat slowed down and I became more aware of the world around me: silhouettes of the buildings were getting clearer, the rare sounds of the sleeping city got more pronounced, and I could swear I almost heard Scarlett’s nervous trotting somewhere nearby. It’s hard to tell how long I stood there like this, before I saw a small movement in the corner of my eye. It was Scarlett’s target. The urge to follow them was strong, but I had to keep waiting in case they anticipated an ambush and sent a decoy first.

My patience paid off faster than I anticipated, if somewhat unexpectedly: I heard somepony running down the same alley I was hiding in. I listened closer. Two ponies. It wasn’t an arcane science to put together what was happening. As soon as I saw a hooded pony approaching my position I jumped out of my cover right in front of them, pointing my carbine right at the surprised face.

“Stop right there. Good, now take a step back and show your face.” The earth pony hesitated for a moment, but then slowly did as I said. An old and tired face appeared under the hood. Short, ashen mane with black stripes, scar on the left cheek, and dark olive coat: perfect match for Shiv’s description.

“Go ahead. If you kill me, your Collective will be thrown out for sure, and persecuted, as they should.” His gray eyes were glaring daggers at me.

“We aren’t the Collective, now tell us where you hid the drugs.” I shifted slightly to the right so I could stay closer to Scarlett. I could feel her anxiousness, and there was no doubt our target could too.

“What are you talking about?” His eyes darted between me and Scarlett, breathing fast and uneven.

“Drugs that were meant for the hospital.” I retorted, taking a step forward. “Come on, Smokey, there’s no point in denying that.” Saying the stallion’s name seemed to have had an effect on him.

“How did… “ The look of confusion on his face quickly changed to one of anger. “Whoever you are, you ain’t getting them.” Well, that was all the proof we needed.

“I don’t think you’re in the position to argue.” I deadpanned, my carbine pointed at his chest.

The stallion growled, his ears pinned to the head. “Who said that you are?” He suddenly spat at the ground. “Fucking useless raider cunts. If they could finish their fucking job I wouldn’t have to clean up after them.”

The new information was unexpected, and it took my brain a moment to try and process it. “Wait, what do you…” That moment was enough for the guard to get the jump on me, and knock me off my hooves. Sharp pain struck my flank, and I felt his heavy weight pinning me down. I noticed the knife coming down on me just in time to grab it with my magic and try to push back. I put all my remaining strength into the spell, but only slowed it down. At the moment it felt like nothing else existed except us. Only me and the blade moving towards my head centimeter by centimeter. Suddenly a sharp scream followed by a crash pierced my ears and the knife disappeared along with the weight that’s been holding me down.

Immediately I jump to my hooves, breathing heavily. Scarlett was pinning the stallion to the wall with her magic, looming over him.

“I’ll break you in half and feed you to the dogs, you pathetic sack of shit!” She quickly turned around and slammed both rear hooves into the guard's chest. The bright red grip of her magic flashed brighter as she lifted the struggling stallion up, only to bring him down with a loud crack.

“Scarlett!”

She raised her hoof for another strike before looking at me. I recoiled: a pair of glowing red eyes glared at me. My mind raced back to our conversation. Right.

“You pity him?” The unicorn started moving towards me. “Maybe you wanted him to kill both of us? Maybe I should’ve let him end you then?”

“Don’t be ridiculous!” I took a few steps back, the sharp pain piercing my left flank. “Killing him will only cause us more problems instead of solving them.”

“Us?” The closer she got the better I could see her. “I don’t see any problems here.” She still looked like Scarlett, but her facial features were sharper, more predatorial-looking.

“Listen, Scarlett, or… whoever you are, we don’t…”

“Oh, so she told you about that, huh.” She said, giggling. “Ohh, the poor thing must be pretty desperate.”

“Can’t say I blame her. Can’t imagine being stuck with some… thing in my head.” I mumbled, to myself. And instantly regretted it, when a swift strike to my chin sent me flying to the nearest wall.

“Maybe you should.” Her voice almost shifted to hissing, as she closed in, looming over me. “Whatever she might think, I do care about her. Oh, and you may call me Ruby.”

I was panting, trying to manage the pain. “You have… a very strange way of showing it.”

“Oh really?!” She screamed, her horn flashing red. “What do you know, you… uh… what?” Scar… uhm, Ruby stumbled back looking confused.

“What’s wrong?” I didn’t know if I should be relieved or worried about this sudden change. She looked at me, one last time before collapsing on the ground.

I slowly stood up and levitated a healing potion out of my bag. As much as I hated to waste the precious liquid for something as trivial as some bruises, I didn’t know how much more beating I could survive tonight. After downing the bottle, I went towards Ruby. I checked her pulse, and she appeared to be sleeping. I looked around. Judging by Smokey’s rising and falling chest he was alive as well. Well, that’s a relief. But I can’t just let any of them lie around until morning.

With a defeated sigh I concentrated all my remaining magic to lift Scarlett on my back. Thankfully the Collective’s office wasn’t that far away.

After five minutes of stumbling my way through the dirty alleys of Safe Harbor, I finally knocked on the door of the book store. When it opened I was greeted by no other than Dry Ink himself. “Midnight? What happened?” He stepped away, allowing me inside. He was also kind enough to help me put Scarlett in the chair behind the counter.

“We have the information.” I steadied my breath the best I could. “But things didn’t go exactly as I hoped.”

The earth pony attentively looked at me. “Tell me.”

I took a deep breath and leaned against one of the empty shelves. “It was Great Smoke, he noticed that he was being followed and tried to run. I intercepted him, but… well, you can find him back in the alley and see for yourself.”

Ink’s glare hardened. “Did you…”

“He’s alive.” I added hastily. “Just unconscious.”

“Much like your friend over there.”

“I guess so.” The adrenalin began to wash away and I suddenly realized how tired this whole situation made me. “If you excuse me I should go and take care of her.”

“Of course, you’ll be paid tomorrow after we confirm your information.”

I stood up and put Scarlet on my back again. “Oh, and before I forgot. He also may be responsible for the recent raider attack.’

“I’m sorry, what!?” The stallion’s ears perked up, eyes wide open.

“At least he said something like that. I don’t know if he just tried to throw me off.” And quite successfully. I shrugged, or at least tried to, with the entire unicorn on my shoulders, it was harder than I thought.

Dry Ink seemed to collect himself rather quickly. “We’ll look into that, thank you and farewell.”

Without any more delay, I started towards the apartment.

Next thing I remember was the sweet embrace of my bed. I didn’t know how I got there or where Scarlett was. Nor did I care, as I closed my eyes, waiting to fall into oblivion.

Author's Note

At long last another chapter is complete! It was probably one of the hardest I had to write yet, due to many reasons, and so it took me much longet then I hope it would. Really happy to go into some of the concepts I've been sitting on for awhile, too. On another note I do want to try and do slightly longer chapters going forward, so I guess we shall see how that'll go in the next one.
Huge thank you to Dandy for helping with editing, and giving some nice suggestions. Follow them on twitter for some awesome art.