FoE: Festering Virtues

We left the wagon and headed over to the edge of the largely devastated single family houses, stopping behind a ruined wall, looking out into the 4 lane avenues running between the massive apartments. The big change was that behind us was six kilometers of cover and relatively sane ponies. In front of us, we had massive open areas, metal wagons that had been crushed by sledgehammers into cover-less piles, and young angry nutjobs. We were dealing with a proper city, abet empty and fortified. Even at the apartment level, set a few guards at the stairwells and entrances, and a competent commander could hold off an army. Especially if these buildings were strong enough to shrug off a balefire blast’s pressure wave.

Last piece of cover, a small brick wall.

“Melody, you scan to the right, Judgment scan to the left. If you don’t see anything after 5- no 10 minutes, I’m going to go across and scan right. Melody, after I am set, you will follow me and scan left. Judgment, when she is set, you will come across and scan above us.” I took a breath, and replayed the words in my head. Yeah, makes sense.

“We’re going to move like that to the door, constantly scanning for enemies. When we get to the door, regroup and breach.”
I paused again, then turned to Melody. “What are you going to do?”

“Cover right, you go across, follow, cover left. Move to door.” I nodded.

“Judgment?”

“Left, over, up!” She said, gleefully. Reminds her of security training?

“Good.” I looked over the road. It had been mostly cleared or the wagons had been crushed. Almost no cover, but not much that could trip ponies up. somepony didn’t like the idea of other ponies having cover.

“The street should be clear, anyone hanging out on it is an easy target from above. When we reach the door, I will be closest to it. My job is to breach, either by opening it and moving or bucking it off its hinges. Melody, you’re next.” I hesitated and rethought. “No, Judgment you’re next. Go inside and figure out if anyone’s non-hostile. S.T.A.T.S. would know that, right?”

“Yep, it can find and discriminate between friendlies and enemies out to a distance of 30 meters!”

“Even through walls?”

“Walls reduce distance based on the thickness of the wall. Stable-Tech’s Rough and Ready Guide, tee em, says that if you can hear through it, distance is reduced by the same reduction of volume.”

“How does that work?”

“I don’t know. Something about being linked to your nervous system.”

“So, if you can hear it, then it can detect it?”

“Something like that.”

“Probably uses magic to isolate heartbeats and breathing, then feeds the left and right ears into the spell matrix. Would give you direction, but not distance or elevation.” Melody chimed in.

“Sounds right. I think. Might have fallen asleep for that lesson.”

“Ok, in that case, your job is to try to find ponies and yell out who is non-hostile. If you can do it before I break down the door, good. If not, shoot first and ask questions later. When you go in, you will go forward two steps, then turn to the left and follow the wall until you’ve seen all the hidden places on your side of the room. Melody, do the same, but for the right side. I’m going to come in, and check the ceiling, before helping with anyone behind cover. When you clear your part of the room, yell ‘Clear.’” I turned towards Melody.

“Third in line, second through the door, two steps forward, right, along wall, clear.” She said, bored.

Judgment chimed in with “S.T.A.T.S., door, step, step, left, clear!” I felt a little uncomfortable with how relaxed they were being, but I wanted to see if they got it wrong before going Staff Sergeant Tree on them.

I paused for a few seconds, thinking over what grandfather had taught me.

“I think that’s everything… Ready?”

The other two nodded, and we started scanning. The street was dead silent, Judgment couldn’t see anything on S.T.A.T.S., and, aside from a gunshot off in the far distance, it seemed safe.

After 10 minute, I nodded and hurried across the street, trying to hurry and be quiet at the same time. I weaved around some scrap, but it was surprisingly solid underfoot. Guess they had a higher construction budget. I thought glumly, compared to the broken and tilting streets back in Mane. Still, I made it to the other side without any obvious clangs, crashes, or booms. I clung to the wall, not directly touching it, and scanned the left. Seconds later, I heard Melody take up position behind me, and Judgment followed. We paused for a few seconds, searching, and I tapped Judgment to get her to follow me towards the door. We inched along the building until we reached the stairs towards the entrance and lined up. I glanced back; both Melody and Judgment looked scared but determined.

“Ready?” They nodded.

I quietly moved in front and to the side of the door, giving Judgment room to get through when the door opened. The door was unlocked, and pulled out. I hooked a hoof in the handle and pulled, pivoting out of the way. Judgment shouted and charged, spooking Melody who needed a second to recover.

As soon as Judgment cleared the door frame, she started shooting. Melody darted after her, unloading both barrels almost immediately. I followed, freaking out. Shitfuckshitfuck!

Clearing the door, both Melody and Judgment were on the ground, there was blood. I looked wildly around the room for cover, and dove towards the receptionist’s desk, causing the room to shake. I looked for vantage points where the shooters could be. All exits still had their doors, no real cover besides the desk, no hole in the ceiling. Shit they need to be behind the desk.

I rolled to my feet and tensed, before jumping over the desk, coming down with as much force as possible on whoever was on the other side, kicking out. The tile floor shattered, practically cratering, but nobody was there. I stood up, confused, and looked around the room again.

Melody and Judgment were still tangled up, and, after looking more closely, there wasn’t nearly enough blood for a serious injury. In fact, it looked like…

“Did you ram into each other?” I asked, looking at the bullet holes scattered around the room. All opposite of the entrance and scattered. Panic fire.

They finally sorted themselves out, Melody looking livid, Judgment looking sheepish. Neither said anything.

“Well?”

“She stopped to reload.”

“Well, she didn’t turn.”

“She didn’t give me room!”

“I took two steps, then turned. I did exactly what I was supposed to.”

“I still didn’t have room.”

The argument gradually grew in volume, and pettiness. Finally I cleared my throat, shaking dust from the lights. They stopped.

“Both of you, follow me. Don’t argue.” I walked over to the door marked ‘Stairs’ and pushed it open, keeping my rifle trained up the shaft. Didn’t see anyone, but I kept that position, checking blindspots the entire way up to the seventh floor. Both Melody and Judgment were panting a bit when we reached the exit I wanted. I peaked my head out the door, looking down both kilometer long hallways, but didn’t see anything out of the ordinary. Looked like somepony had cleaned it at one point, because there wasn’t even anything to show a hasty evacuation.

The apartments were differentiated from the maintenance rooms by having alcoves, trying to give visitors a feeling of privacy. I darted for one and tested the door. Locked and opens outward. I inspected the area around the doorknob. Larger gap than normal, different color between the lockface and the door’s anti-breach plate. Probably wouldn’t stand up to a good buck, but, well, there’s quieter ways of dealing. I pulled out my multitool, and pulled out another replaced tool, switched the bottle opener for a thin metal rod with a 90 degree bend at the end.

Insert between door and plate, push on the catch, plunger is not engaged, and the door popped right open.

“How did you pick that without telekinesis?” Melody demanded.

“How did you pick it so fast?” Judgment wanted to know.

“I didn’t pick anything. They didn’t install the right lock for the frame, so the anti-shim part of the lock didn’t engage. Now, please get inside.”

The two walked in, and I closed the door. It automatically locked, with a very final sounding click.

“Alright, we’re going to learn how to clear rooms.” I looked around the apartment. Looked like a bedroom, a kitchen/living room, and a bathroom. Some aged pictures, not much mess. Looked like nobody had been back.

Grabbing two pillows, red and blue, I held them up, before dropping them on the ground. Couldn’t talk with them in my mouth.

“These are your targets. Red is bad. Blue is good. Shoot the bad, don’t shoot the good.”

“Erm, I can’t really lock onto those with S.T.A.T.S....”

“You’re going to learn. I don’t trust it after that grenade.”

“I don’t need to do this, Judgment was the one that messed up.”

“I don’t care. We’re going to be doing a lot of this, so we need to get it down.” Melody looked annoyed, but sighed and nodded. I pointed towards the bedroom, and they both went inside, as I began setting up the room.

Furniture against the walls, pillows on the opposite side of the room. I went through the cabinets and fished out a set of non-dried out markers (“Hermetically sealed markers! Will stay working through the end of the world and beyond!”) and a roll of duct tape. A minute of careful tugging with the needle nose pliers on my multitool, and everything was ready for final touches.

Smiley face on the blue pillow, angry teeth face on the red. Then about thirty seconds of carefully holding the cap between two hooves and trying to get it on. I will admit that I made a hoofpump when it finally resealed. Fortunately, there wasn’t anyone there at the time to see.

The duct tape was for the door. I expected to be doing this for a while, and I wanted to get in reps as if I was breaking it down. So, I taped the bolt back and squeezed into the tiny mostly undecorated bedroom.

“Alright, we’re going to walk through this. Shoot any enemies twice, then move onto the next one. We are literally walking through this one. I will tell you what you are doing wrong, so we can do it better on the next one. If we do it well enough, we’ll iterate. Got it?”

Melody and Judgment nodded, cautiously and energetically; we lined up on the wall. “No, move off the wall, somepony can pop out and shoot along it.” We lined up off the wall, I kicked the door open, and Judgment walked through, concentrating on keeping her pistols steady. She quickly spotted the angry pillow, pulled the trigger twice, then turned and continued on her route. Melody followed her through the door and ignored the “killed” target. She turned and did the same in the opposite direction. I walked through and scanned the ceiling.

“Ok, better, but you need to call out hostiles, friendlies, when the room is clear, and move to a non-hostile after the room is clear to make sure they don’t have a weapon. Let’s reset and do it again.”

***

Crunch, crash, “Clear!” Crunch, crash, “Clear!” Crunch, crash, “Clear!”

It went on and on. And that was after four hours and more than 200 repetitions before I was comfortable. A quick snack, and we started the practical exercise.

“You see this wall?” I asked rhetorically, pointing to the bare cinder blocks. Judgment nodded anyway. A line of liquefied plaster on the ground showed that a water leak had sprung up sometime in the last 50 years, but the more relevant thing was a clear crack in the wall, making the outline of a door. “I’m guessing that there’s a penthouse or suite apartment version, and they just made all the rooms the same. Easier to build, and just brick up the holes. Why is this good for us?”

“Umm, it means we know how the rooms are laid out?” Judgment offered.

“No.” I paused. “Well, yes, but that’s not what I was thinking of. It means we can do this. Line up.” Melody and Judgment jumped to it, the action ingrained to reflex. I stood in front of the cinder block door and bucked. With a crack, the cinder blocks on the bottom of the door shattered, and the door fell outward with a crunch. I jumped to the side, Judgment darted through the door, followed a second later by Melody and I. We moved smoothly, the shattered cinder blocks not offering much to make us trip. It was done in a couple seconds.

“Clear!” “clear.” “Clear.” The room was pretty much the same as the one we had come through, aside from an awful faded flower aesthetic and being mirrored. Melody and Judgment looked surprised for a moment, then Melody nodded in an understanding way.

“What would you have done if there wasn’t a bricked up door?” Judgment asked.

“This. Line up.” This time, I kicked right through the wall. The crunch was more of a controlled explosion and sent shards flying. Melody and Judgment darted through the two overlapping meter and a half holes, and I managed to squeeze through a second later.

“Clear!” “clear.” “Clear.” Lots of family photos, pegasus and unicorn, with a few foals. Toys were still scattered around the room. The cinderblock shards were embedded inside the plaster, and had cracked the cinder blocks beneath.

“That could be lethal.” Melody said, looking under my shoulder. “How are your hooves?” I held them out for inspection. “Looks like the shoes take most of the contact. We’ll need to check them every so often to make sure that there isn’t too much metal fatigue.”

“Sounds good. Let’s keep going.”

And we continued.

***

Crunch, crash, “Clear!” Crunch, crash, “Clear!” Crunch, crash, “Clear!”

The issue with competence is that it implies you’re used to it. You let what’s drilled in take over, rather than thinking.
“Red, hostile behind us!” Judgment shouted, looking up from a quick perusal of the cabinets. I spun around, and saw a pony with a shotgun peeking his head, and the muzzle, around the broken down frame. He screamed, and frantically pulled the trigger, jerking it wide. Melody and Judgment returned fire, as I dove for cover. .50 caliber rifle rounds aren’t exactly the most reasonable in close combat, and I wasn’t about to charge when my allies were shooting.

They stopped firing, and I slowly got up. The pony was a ruin of buckshot and pistol rounds.

“Ok… I’ll cover the rear.” Melody said, panting from the aftereffects of the adrenaline high.

***

“Line up.”

“Red, there’s hostiles on the other side.” Judgment warned, pointing through the wall.

“Got it. Ready?” The other two nodded.

I bucked and moved. The wall fell in, and the two darted through, and started shooting. Turning after them, I followed and scanned.

Two adults, both with guns, dead. Elderly buck, gun, dead. Two screaming, behind sofa.

“Dead space behind couch!” Melody shouted, moving along the wall to get into a position to shoot.

“Mine!” I shouted, and charged forward, revving the chainsaw. Double barrel shotgun wasn’t the best for multiples.

I jumped over the couch, and shoved the saw into- a crying filly and young mare. I jerked off, and landed heavily on my side. The mare, frantically trying to pull out a knife, jerked away from me, shielding the filly.

“Cease fire!” I called out, not taking my eyes off the two. I slowly got up and backed away.

“They’re still hostile!” Judgment shouted, her pistols aimed squarely at them.

“They’re not threats. We’re letting them go. Line up.” Melody and Judgment warily headed towards the bricked up door, and I got in place. I mouthed “Sorry.” to the two ponies, surrounded by the ruins of their world, and bucked, continuing clearing.

***

A couple dozen rooms later, and a very jumpy Melody staring at the wreckage of the previous doors, Judgment said “Red, we’ve got a friendly.”

“Next room?”

“Yep.”

“Alright, line up.” Buck, quick clear, and we disarmed the friendly.

“Sorry about that, sir.” Melody apologized, nominated as our friendly face, since she was the least threatening waster we had. “We live in dangerous times, and didn’t want anything hasty to happen.”

“Not a problem, my dear.” The elderly buck, red, yellow mane, with an orange flame cutie mark, chuckled, getting back up as I got off him. “I was half a second from burning the lot of you alive.” He said, patting the bulbous hunk of metal fondly.

“That was some skill. Haven’t seen something like that from my army days.” I looked a little closer. The rags, more accurately well worn battle fatigues, he was wearing were reinforced with ceramic plating, I could see the straps and sharp breaks of the armor, and it had that weird lined look of fire resistant gear.

Judgment perked up at that. “I know! We spent forever working to get that right!”

“Oh, so you’re trained?”

“Umm, not really. I’ve done the basic Security training, but that’s more about like bringing ponies in and stuff.”

“What about you, my dear?”

Melody snorted. “I’m an administrative pony. This is the most time I’ve spent with a gun in years. Main reason why I’m carrying a shotgun. Point and shoot, you know.”

He glanced at me, and snorted. Apparently, I rated as dumb muscle. Which, considering the fact that I was nearly a hundred kilometers from home, helping a Stable pony find an ancient password that might or might not exist, while keeping a member of an enemy organization armed, wasn’t that far off the mark.

The three continued chatting, so I decided to look around the room. Pretty standard, though this one had something approaching military clean. He’d obviously been here for a while. Makeshift still in the corner of the room. Something rotting into alcohol. I sniffed a bit deeper. Aside from the underlying rot from the still, presumably for both pleasure and work, there was something a bit sharper. More burned…

I sniffed a bit more, and followed it to the refrigerator.

“He’s a hungry one, isn’t he?” The old buck called out, a chuckle in his voice. Though there might be a hint of an edge…
Inside was charred meat. Not properly cooked, charred on one side, barely touched on the other. Weird cuts too. Too small for brahmin, manticore, or rad-gator. Too large for molerat, dog, or blowfly.

“Now, don’t you go through my food.” I shrugged and closed the fridge. He calmed down.

Ok, old man, military experience, much better armor than it appears, flamethrower, charred weird size game. Off feeling, interested in combat experience, alcohol. Where is he getting the raw plant matter?

I kept nosing around, something didn’t feel right. Inside a closet was a few packs of emergency rations, Fillydalphia standard issue, serial number 158,940,286. Explains the plant matter, and why ponies can live in the city. Millions of meals stored underground would support the entire wasteland for centuries, without needing many farmers, but would probably only support the normal population for a year or two. That made the meat weirder, though. Why an entire refrigerator filled with meat? Why not bother to properly cook or preserve it?

I REALLY wasn’t comfortable with this guy.

I lumbered over to where the three were talking and joined in.

“- and I’ve been wearing the uniform ever since.” The old buck finished, showing off the remnants of a pair of Equestrian battle fatigues.

“Have you had to upgrade it much?” Melody asked. “I’ve spent a lot of time trying to get pre-war equipment wasteland functional.”

“Nope, not even for fire resistance. Even the standard issue infantry gear was well armored and lovingly assembled.”

But… I know for a fact that armor was separate, that shit melted to your hide when it caught on fire, and it was made by war prisoners.

“What type of weapon is that?”

“This is my flame tosser. I trained on it for months. Shoots a stream of flammable liquid, and we used it to incinerate entire platoons of zebras as they charged our trenches.”

Ok, flame tosser, might be an inside joke, months maybe, depending on what he considered training. They shot flammable gel, though. And it was mostly used for clearing trenches and bunkers, not shooting out of trenches. Works by burning up oxygen, so open spaces aren’t great.
So, liar, probably doesn’t have military experience either… I didn’t trust him, but I didn’t really have anything solid. There was a lot of strangeness, but nothing that could justify more aggressive actions. If I was a murderous flamer psychopath, how would I hide it?

Well, he’d kept everything neat. The main room was very clear. The food was in the refrigerator and cabinets. He didn’t like ponies looking at his meat collection, but that’s sort of reasonable. What was left? Bathroom and bedroom. Well, might as well take advantage of his prejudice.

“I wanna see my mane. It feels like it’s ugly.” I said thickly. Melody and Judgment looked confused, but the buck smiled tightly and said “It looks fine, my boy. Don’t bother yourself.”

“I wanna.” I repeated and loomed. I was starting to get really good at looming. A couple different expressions passed across his face, worry, debate, certainty, and “Well, hurry along. I just cleaned it, so it might smell a little sharp.”

I walked over to the indicated door, locked. The buck danced over and opened it. I nodded my thanks, and walked inside. Looked expensive. Large cast iron bathtub, standing on legs. Ornate toilet. Large mirror, which I studiously ignored. Something that looked like it sprayed water, not sure what it was for. My eyes watered as the smell of bleach assaulted my nostrils. Wish I had a blacklight. I thought glumly. Even if I found something in here, what are the odds that it will be identifiably wrong? Guy would be weird for butchering something in the bathroom, but it wouldn’t be something to bring up. And it only makes sense to clean obsessively if you plan on living in the same place for any amount of time.

Still, I looked around the room for anything interesting. Grout was stained reddish-brown, a couple cracks in the bathtub were the same. Assuming that it was blood, it must have splattered everywhere. Same issue applied. Might as well check the hard to reach places. Older, so hip issues are a possibility? Definitely willing to scrub for hours, but maybe underneath? Laying down on my side, I squinted under the tub. More bloody residue, but nothing big. Maybe a rag that got shoved against one of the feet.

Well, its something, I suppose. I tugged it out and glanced it over. Burnt cloth on one side, and charred leather on the other. Weird, I didn’t think that leather stuck to cloth. Something felt off, even more than the rest of this place. The leather didn’t feel right. Slippery, rather than leathery. And rough? Not rough, uneven. I sniffed, and gagged. Charred flesh.

Ok, so weirdly friendly fire obsessed pony who lies a lot has a refrigerator filled with charred meat, and a bathroom where most of the floor was covered in blood. The walls didn’t have much blood splatter, and there isn’t anywhere to hold ponies, so he did something after death. Dismemberment of many ponies is probably the only way to get that much blood everywhere. If hide is sticking to cloth, that implies serious burns. And we have a pyro. No identifiable bones, so probably not a burial thing.

So, the old buck burnt somepony or, I looked around at the cleaned pool of blood and lack of blood splatter on the walls, many someponies, and dismembered them after death. Ripped off their clothes, pulling hide with it. The refrigerator was probably filled with their meat. I didn’t know why he was doing it, and I didn’t really care.

I prepared to barge out and confront the buck when I caught sight of myself in the mirror. Ugh… yeah, still not used to that face. Or the crew cut. Or needing to shove the impulse to start crying and screaming into a deep dark hole every time I saw it. I opened the door, my rifle and chainsaw readied.

“Everything alright, Red?” Judgment asked. I shook my head.

“No, I believe our new friend here is a liar, a murderer, has butchered dozens of ponies, and has tried to strenuously hide his actions.” The conversation died immediately, and the old buck swallowed audibly.

“Why- why- why are you claiming that?” He stammered, reaching for his flamethrower. I moved the oversized rifle from its vaguely non-threatening direction and aimed it squarely at the buck.

“Don’t move. First, you have a large amount of charred meat in the refrigerator. It is unevenly cooked and carbonized, with some parts still uncooked. That is evidence of a very hot flame applied quickly, like would be seen from a flamer.” The buck opened his mouth to argue, I boomed over him. “The size of the cuts are too small for large game and too large for small game. There are still bones in them, so they are medium game.”

“Medium game exists, and I hunt with my flame tosser.” He said hotly.

“There’s no reason for you to hunt, there’s millions of survival rations, and they’re common enough that you’re turning them into alcohol. Then were your lies. If you can get close enough to game with a flamer to kill them, you’re one of the sneakiest or fastest ponies I have heard of. Every single thing you said about the military was flat out wrong. From your uniform being unimproved to what fuel the flamer uses.” He looked less comfortable. “Then I looked inside the bathroom. You needed somewhere to cut up the meat, and I didn’t notice nearly enough blood by the door if you dragged all that in. Mostly cleaned up drops in the grout, had to be the bathroom. You were pretty good about cleaning it up, but there was a pool of blood that covered most of the ground, judging by the stains. Had to be dead, since no restraints and blood spray, so that was a lot of ponies. Burial process unlikely, since you disposed of the skulls and trunk, so what the hell were you doing with those bodies?”

He looked me in the eye for a split second, then bolted, running for the door. Judgment started and robotically raised her pistols, both aimed at his head. She hesitated for a moment, and fired, the pistols wavering slightly from the recoil.
I cursed, and leveled my rifle. Definitely not designed for this range, but an arthritic buck fumbling with a door wasn’t exactly a difficult target.

He exploded, the high caliber round shredding his torso. The corpse fell to the ground with a sodden thump.

I looked at it for a couple seconds, then moved on. Just a bloody mess.

“Alright. Line up.” I took a few deep breaths, then moved to my position against the wall.

“Shouldn’t we try to find out more about what he was doing?” Judgment asked, looking around the room.

“Why? He’s already dead.” I looked at the corpse again, and made a decision. “Though I will take that flamer. Might be useful.” My chainsaw, anti-material rifle combination was a little excessive for most situations. Not that the flamer would be any less excessive, but it would be useful against fortified strong points. Maybe I could pick up a grenade launcher…
I had to wait for Melody to lash it to my harness. The Lieutenant Colonel’s decision to not issue me a battle saddle was getting increasingly irritating, though I was starting to see why he did it. A harness with a couple hard points to attach specially modified weapons is a lot less dangerous than something that can attach multiple anti-armor cannons anypony happens to find.

Still, it was only a couple minutes from use, which should work well enough.

And we continued.

***

After what felt like forever later, we hit something different and froze. The room was absurdly large, the right side faded off into the distance.

It took a minute, but I finally realized that we had cleared through the entire building, and, fuck, I was exhausted. Melody and Judgment weren’t much better, both were swaying on their feet.

“Alright, follow me.” I said, walking quietly down the hallway, looking for a door where the jam looked different from the knob. Well, they all looked different, they were different things, but I was looking for one which had been switched out, a different style or color. Like that one. With the gap between the door and the frame. Plunger, hook, twist, open, in, scan, drop bags.

“We’re done?” Melody asked, swaying on her hooves.

“Yeah. Can’t go much longer.” High summer, light until maybe 2145, twilight, you’ve got another hour or two. We were in the tail end of that, traveling, training, and clearing for far too long. And we hadn’t rested since the cannibal. I felt a little guilty about that. “Alright, you two eat. I’ll pull guard.”

Five minutes of tugging and pushing later, I had the flamer braced against the counter, a couple meters away from the weak points on the walls aimed at the door. Definitely not secure, but I trusted that a shot with a flamer would catch anything from the door, and a reflex blast to the sides would cover any breach pretty easily.

Still, I tried to make things a little safer. Furniture was shoved against the bricked up doors, and I duct taped the deadbolt. Even if somepony knew the hook trick, they’d need to pick the bolt. And if they picked the bolt, they’d need something like 40 kilos of force to twist the tape off, and not many torsion wrenches could do that much. And whatever could probably couldn’t do it quietly.

The front door was the most likely direction of attack, so I kept my flamer braced on it. Honestly, I wasn’t completely confident about using a flamer in an enclosed area. They mostly killed by using up all the oxygen, and that would kill us as dead as anyone it was aimed at. Still, we could use Judgment to detect an enemy, then back up until we could close a door or something, burn up the air, and walk through a few minutes later. If I kicked a hole in a wall, same effect. But trying to coordinate shoving the flamer into a hole after kicking it seemed like it might not work out too well.

Reflex fire was a thing, and a half second between kicking and fire on might give them enough time to get accurate fire on target. But what if I strapped the flamer to the chainsaw, so it automatically engaged? Put a plunger on the top of the flamer, when it reaches flush, starts spraying through the cut. Definitely would eventually destroy the blade cutting through cinder block and rebar, but it might be worth it for enough targets, or when there’s enough danger. Wasn’t like I was using the chainsaw much now. Plus, if you’re planning on using a saw to cut through ponies and armor, you’re probably using a heavier gauge chain.

Wonder if that would be remotely useful in a fight? I didn’t really like the idea of fighting something that needed to be sawed in half and set on fire to kill, but maybe Hellhounds? The stories I’d heard about those monsters varied from terrifying to unbelievable, but I guess that stuff that durable existed in the Wasteland.

“Red? Hey, Red!” I jerked up, looking around wildly. I hadn’t exactly dozed off, but I definitely wasn’t paying as much attention as I should have. Judgment stood there, looking a little concerned. “I finished eating. You want me to take over?”

“Yeah, sure.” I stood up, joints cracking, and lumbered over to where Melody had dragged the saddlebags. Judgment stood behind the flamer. Heh, I could sit down. I shook my head and grabbed five or six ration bars and started chowing down.

“I don’t know why, but these are so satisfying.” I said idly to Melody.

“Well, yeah. They’re designed to sustain a pony through a full day of combat. “

“But I eat like 5 a day.”

“Yep.”

“… that’s kind of horrifying.”

“Yep.”

“… wait, so the entire 3rd Experimental eats this much?”

“Yep.”

“How the hell do you feed everypony?”

“Why do you think the Colonel has been so aggressive?”

“Why the hell did he invade a place with no farms and no ruins?”

“He probably thought it would be like everywhere else. We’re mostly living off the emergency stores at the Lobsters’ Pot.”

“Huh…” The 3rd Experimental was definitely a lit crate of TNT. I just wasn’t sure what direction it would explode.

Still, not really something I can do much about now. I pushed it to the back of my mind and started bedding down to sleep. Either Melody or Judgment had dumped out all the clothes on the ground, which I was pretty grateful for. I’ve slept on concrete before, but I don’t like it night after night.

It was a nice sleep.

Footnote: Level Up.

New Perk: Bloody Mess – Be it the .50 caliber rifle, the chainsaw, or your absurd weight, enemies explode into pieces more often when you kill them. +5% to damage, and enemies will occasionally flee in terror when you eviscerate their friends.