A Trip With a Caravan
Two griffins fly to a small town in search for something or someone. Both are wearing combat armor and an assault rifle on their side, but one has a combat knife on his side. One has brown fur and white feather while the other one is all white but the tip of his feather and tail are black. The brown griffin point at a pink mare with a white mane wearing a western hat who is waving at them, beside her is a brahman with crates tied to her back. Both griffins landed close to the mare noticing the saddle on her back as well as her cutie mark: a white splat in a shape of a horseshoe. “Are you Sticky Hooves?” ask the brown griffin.
Sticky grabs his talon and started shaking it violently. “Well yes I am Sticky Hooves. I hope your the mecs I hire, old mailmare nearly got herself killed to a bloatsprite if you believe that.” Sticky let go of the talon.
The griffin shake his arm to make sure it’s still attracted to him. “Ya, we are from the Talon Company, My name is Gave and this is Gnow.” Gave point at Gnow who just wave.
“Well my trip to the next town was cut short after a group of raiders killed my last guards, so I hope you last long then them.” Sticky then pull out a combat knife from her duster pocket. “And I believe this belong to you? It’s best you keep your stuff glued to yourself partner.” Gave snatch the combat knife from her hoof mumbling to himself. “Now that you griffins are here let start heading out, I want to get a good distance before it start getting dark. Come on Daisy”
“Where are we even heading to Sticky?” Gave asks as they began following the mare.
“A Stable about thirty miles from here are accepting traders from the local settlements, but they are not allowing us in because we’ll ‘spread our outsider disease into their stable.’ Dang those ponies are a few screws missing,” replayed Sticky.
Gnow point to the sky and pertinent to have binoculars to Gave before flying over the group.
“Now I’m sure you mercs did some odd jobs here and there, why not tell some of it?” Ask Sticky
“We had not done any odd jobs, mostly clearing out area that someone want cleared out.” said Gave
“I’m sure you had so close-”
“Nope just mindless ghouls and raider who don’t know how to hold a gun right, but we were forced to take these jobs,”
Before Sticky could response there was some gun fire above there which cause them to take arm; only for Gnow fly toward a radhog corpse off to the side.
“Look like Gnow got dinner for later.” Gave lookback at Sticky and notice her holding a grenade with the pin in her mouth.
“What?” Sticky put the grenade back into her saddle.
“I’m... going to help Gnow with the radhog.” Gave go beside the brahmin where Gnow is waiting holding parts of the radhog. It didn’t take to tie down the corpse as they continue to down the path.
“Now, what do you mean that those jobs where punishment?” Ask Sticky
“Well Gnow has his own reason, as for me. I kind of killed the person I was supposed to guard thinking he was a low life thug.” Gave rubs his talon on the back of his neck. Sticky look at him questionably till Gave let out a sigh.
“Alright. I was looking for the pony and came across a group harassing a young griff, so I decided to help the kid and to make a story short the leader was the pony I was hired to guard.”
“Well at least you help that kid out,” said Sticky
Gnow landed between the two and pointed what is up head. In a distant they notice something in their way. In the middle of a road on a dam is a makeshift gate
“Garsh darn it, now who would set up a gate here?” ask Sticky as they walk to it. When they got closer they notice a group of raider waiting for them.
“Well what do we have here? A caravan being guarded by two mercenary form the Talon Company.” One of the raider who look like a rotting corpse walk up to them as the rest kept an eye on the griffins.
“Why the hell did you raiders built a gate on this road?” ask Sticky
“Well me and the gang wanted to start up our very own toll and this road has a lot of caravans crossing it,” replied the raider. “Now our pay is 100 caps per person and from the look of it it will cost you 400 caps, or I let you through for free if you give your body for us to use.”
“Well I rather pay then fuck a rotting corpse.” Sticky shove a sack of bits into the raider chest.
The raider laughs as he tosses the sack to one of the raider. “They paid up, let them through.” Two earth pony raiders go to the gate and start pushing it to move it out of the way. As the caravan goes through the other side, Gnow saw Sticky hoof put something inside one of the raider pouch. The two raider then closed the gate as the caravan continue to move forward.
When the caravan is far from the gate, Sticky going into her saddle to grab something. “Can you partners kill off any straggler that survives, I don’t want anyone try to follow us to get revenge.”
“What did you do?” asked Gave as he look to Gnow who just shrug.
Sticky pulls out a detonator from her saddle bag. “Let say I gave them a big surprise in their pocket.” As she bite down on the detonator, an explosion was heard behind them a second later.
Both griffin look back and saw the toll destroyed and a few raiders missing body parts. “I’ll go deal with the stragglers.” Gave fly back to the toll as Snow and Sticky continue walking down the path.
“We been walking for a good few hours, yet I never heard you talk ones Snow. Hellhound got your tongue?” Sticky nudges Gnow. Gnow just open his beck and point a talon to it. Sticky took a look and saw that he didn’t have a tongue at all. “Well I’ll be damned, you don’t have a tongue. Now how did you gone and lose it?”
Gnow Starts charades as an angry giffin, he then act smudged and pretend to say something. He go back being the angry griffin and grab the air the use his claw to cut the area he grabbed. Sticky try to put together what Snow just showed her. “Let me get this straight. So one of your kind was mad about something and you joke about that thing they were not pleased to hear, so he went and cut your tongue off with his talon. Am I getting that right?” Snow nod to her response. “Well I’ll be an radhog cousin, that is one way to lose your tongue,”
Later Gave join up with the group with ammo and caps he split with Gnow as payment, but gave the 400 caps back to Sticky.
As the darkness began to cover the land, they made it to a cave and in front of it is a makeshift caravan stop.
“Now this is the place. You boys get the food ready as I’ll head into the cave and contact the stable and inform them that we are here to trade.” Sticky head into the cave leaving both the griffin with the bramen. Gnow started to grab the cooking supply off the brahman, as Gave startup the campfire.
“You want to know something Snow, when we were given this job I thought our boss wanted us out of the base,” said Gave. Gnow rotate his talon to signal Gave to continue as he put a metal stand to hold up a cooking grid.
“Going on job to clearing out an area got boring; all we needed to clear out tend to be brain dead or the raider had never been in combat before. This job is more interesting than I thought it was going to be: alway on guard if we ever get attack in the open, dealing with the wildlife, and the person you have to protect have great personality.” Gave notice Gnow giving him a smug look. “What is it?”
Gnow point at the cave then he imitated sex with his talons. Gave toss a rock at Gnow only for it to hit the helmet. “Oh fuck you Gnow. I’m glad that Gally cut your tongue off.”
As Gave cook some radhog meat, Sticky came back with a stable guard wearing a gasmask. The guard just head to a raised wooden platform to keep watch as Sticky sit down by the fire. “Well we will be staying here for a day, then we will head back to the settlement. Most of the ponies in there where already hitting the sack, so we are not going to get a lot of trade tonight.”
The group begin to eat and tell stories throughout the night.
