Ace in the Hole

by jaysnotreal

Rating: teen
Tags: Adventure, Sad, Dark
Length: 48044

Three Guild ponies become embroiled in a civil war.

Surefire, just your usual guild pony, gets embroiled in a civil war that takes over his own kingdom of Bastion. Along the way he makes friends with another earth pony named Pearl and a pegasus named Windstorm. Together the three of them make their way around the world.

This was my submission for Noble Cause's National Pony Writing Month Competition in August of 2012.

Give some support to the other wonderful writers who participated. Their works are listed here!

For anyone that cares: I know I haven't updated the story in over a month and apologize for this. I promise I haven't stopped working on it but school is taking up most of my time. I have the rest of chapter 15 completed I just need to piece it all together from my notes and type it up. Enjoy!

Published 1970-01-01 00:00:00 UTC
Last updated 2012-09-01 01:16:45 UTC

Chapter One - A Celebration to Die For

Chapter One - A Celebration to Die For

“Kings and Queens and guillotines, taking lives denied…-Aerosmith”

Today is going to be a big day for all of the guilds in town. Though the coronation of Hammerhead is only mandatory for the richest of ponies, nobody would want to miss this once in a lifetime event.  This meant that the thieves like us would be looking to steal enough goods to secure us a place to sleep for weeks. That's the way guilds work around here. You pay your daily dues and you have a place to sleep for the night, you don't and you have to survive the night alone.

Spending the night alone in the Drudge, the part of town with the factories and homeless ponies, is like playing Russian Roulette. You could get lucky and hide from the hood ponies that roam around the Drudge looking for stragglers. If you don't get lucky though, the screams of those found haunt the dreams of the young and old ponies alike. Even though the heads of the Guilds charge ridiculous fees for staying in the shelters, nopony wants to be left alone at night.

“Oh sorry,” said Scarlet, bumping into one of the market stands selling jewelry.  I quickly went to work “helping” the vendor pick up her spilled goods.  This was the third vendor we had hit that day and by the time they found that something was missing, it was too late for them to find us the growing crowd.

“I got two gold rings and a ruby pendant,” I told Scarlet. “What did you get?”

“Oh just this,” she said pulling out a jeweled gold watch.

“This is enough to get let us stay in the shelter for a week and get a decent meal for once,” I said enthusiastically.

“Good job Shrimp,” Scarlet said. “Let’s go see if we can get a caramel apple and watch the coronation.”

The ponies in my guild, the Horseshoe Guild, call me Shrimp because I’m tiny. I don’t have a real name because I never knew my parents.  Unlike the other orphans in the guild, I don’t try to think of my parents as noble heroes that were forced to leave me at birth.  The only reason I made it as a child was because of my small stature and my night black coat and dark red mane.  I escaped from the feared hood ponies by hiding in barrels.  After a few close run-ins, however, I joined the Horseshoe guild.  They accepted me because they saw my potential as a great thief.  A small stature and a dark coat the renders me close to invisible in shady areas was sure to be beneficial.  Some of the other guilds rejected me because they reasoned that I would be a hindrance because I wouldn’t be able to hold my own in a fight.

The ceremony was beginning. I'm sure that the other ponies in our guild would make the most of the distraction to pickpocket unsuspecting victims, but I was more interested in the ceremony. Unlike the some of the other ponies in my guild, I was too young to have seen the queen before her and her advisers were killed by the usurpers.

The coronation was to take place in the town center where a large viewing platform had been erected in the middle of Bastion, one of the largest cities in Equestria, where magnificent marble buildings have been erected and the roadsides didn’t stink of manure.  Where we are right now is the town square, where most of the rich ponies do their shopping.  For today’s special occasion, however, the vendors market stands have been moved to the sides for the large platform.  The coronation was to start just before noon so that when the crown was presented, the sun would shine at the perfect angle and all the light would fall on our new king.

‘Who is that?’ I thought to myself as a saw a lovely pink unicorn with a grey mane come to address the crowd.

"Ponies of Equestria!" the mare yelled, silencing the crowd. "I regret to inform you that Hammerhead will be unable to attend this coronation." Confusion spread throughout the crowd like wildfire.

“What does she mean that Hammerhead can't attend?” somepony in the audience said.

“What a fool. Late to his own coronation,” another pony chimed.

Somepony in the crowd yelled "Who are you and what have you done to Hammerhead?!"

The mare smiled. "I am Smoothtongue," she began, "and now I am also your queen."

With this, Smoothtongue levitated the ornate crown, which she had been carrying on a pillow, onto her head. The crowd responded with an uproar. Some shouted obscenities at her while others rushed onto the platform in an attempt to subdue her. A blinding flash of light erupted from the end of Smoothtongue's horn. When everypony's vision returned, nothing made sense. The attacking ponies were all chained to the ground with ropes of pure magic that resembled obsidian.  Also the important ponies that had been required to come were now likewise trapped in a cage made of the same material.

"Guards please escort Blue Bell here. And be quick about it," Smoothtounge snapped.

I was utterly confused at the proceedings. Is this what rich people considered entertainment? What could possibly cause Hammerhead to miss his own coronation? If the gossip of the other ponies in the guild was anything to go by, then Hammerhead was supposed to be one of the strongest ponies in Equestria. Nothing should have been able to stop him.

"I regret to inform you all that Hammerhead and the rest of his family and his advisors have died. Unexpectedly. Well everypony except me and Blue Bell, his daughter, that is.  Now is the time to correct that.“ Blue Bell was brought whimpering before Smoothtongue. "You see," Smoothtongue continued, "I was going to kill everypony with the poisoned cider. However, I think that everypony will remember this example much more... vividly."

If everypony hadn't been dumbstruck by Smoothtongue's speech, then they were still in for a surprise as an ornate knife, lifted by Smoothtongue's magic, flew out from underneath the pillow that had held the crown. With a precise cut, the knife slashed across Blue Bell's throat, spilling her lifeblood across the platform.

"Guards please bring everypony that was involved in the plot to overthrow the monarchy onto the platform." The guards did what she asked, though whether out of fear or loyalty it was hard to tell. Once all these ponies were rounded up, Smoothtongue said that she wished to honor their contribution to helping her take control of Equestria. Intrigued by the offer, the ponies stood listening attentively to hear the reward they were to be given.

"All of you," Smoothtongue said almost cheerfully, "will be used as an example to show that I need nopony’s help and all who side against me shall face death." The ponies tried to bolt away to save their lives, but the guards stopped them before they could escape. A guillotine was procured and the executions began. Someponies begged for mercy, while other ponies cursed Smoothtongue's name with their last breaths, but in the end, everypony that Smoothtongue wished dead was dead.

"You are now free to leave," said Smoothtongue with a smile and a wave. The crowd remained dumbstruck and unmoving as they tried to comprehend what had just occurred.

‘Damn,’ I thought, ‘that is one mare I wouldn’t fuck with.’

Chapter Two - Place For My Head

Chapter Two - Place for my Head

“I’m sick of the tension, sick of the hunger, Sick of you acting like I owe you this… -Linkin Park”

The coronation was the only thing ponies talked about for days.  When we came back, I asked one of the older ponies about Smoothtongue.  Apparently, she had posed as everyponies spy during the power struggle and later betrayed all of them.  Well, I guess it does make sense; she certainly didn’t seem to be the friendliest pony I had ever seen.  Anyway, almost everypony from our guild came away with more stolen goods then we had ever seen in one place before. Scratch, one of the younger ponies, hadn’t been so lucky.  He had been caught by a guard and was now in jail awaiting his punishment.  I felt bad for the kid. I mean I know that stealing is bad and all, but when that’s the only way you’ve got to stay alive and now he might not get to see another day. It’s a tough life here in the Drudge and the only way out is to get a job.  Now though, with some of the new machines that are being developed, it’s harder than ever to get a job and most people are losing their work.  It’s not that getting a job is that much better (the employers rob you blind), it’s that it doesn’t eat at your consciousness.  Most of the ponies we steal from had to work hard do get what they’ve got, and who are you to take that away from them. But to survive, I will do anything and that’s all that’s stopping me from going mad with guilt.

“Shrimp!” yelled one of the gryphons that helped run my guild. “Come show me what you’ve got so we can determine how long you can spend nights with us.”

I was excited. This was the biggest haul of loot I had ever brought in and I might actually be able to take a day off. Days off in the Horseshoe guild only came once a year on a pony’s join date, kind of like a benefit for choosing to be in this guild.  The relief that you feel when you realize that nopony wants to kill you is unbelievable.

“Shrimp! Are you coming or are you to embarrassed to show everypony that those short stumps of forelegs you have are completely useless?” the gryphon asked.  The ponies that heard laughed and made a point to make fun of my short build. I ignored them and quickly hurried over to show him that I had, in fact, been able to get a bunch of jewelry and even a new knife (Which somepony had dropped, but I forgot to mention that.)

“That will get you a week in the shelter. Not bad Shrimp.” The gryphon handed back the knife I had found.  “Keep this either for yourself or save it for some food and take a day off.” The gryphon winked at me and started calling for Scarlet. I guess this was just his way of apologizing for making fun of me. Interesting, I never knew that gryphons could have sympathy.

As I headed to the back of the squat building everypony slept in, I heard Scarlet begin to sob.  I quickly rushed over to her to see what the matter was; after all, I had been her partner in crime today at the coronation.  Scarlet was being told that she was going to have to spend the night outside.  I quickly jumped into the conversation.

“What do you mean she has to spend the night outside?! She got even more loot than I did today. Did you not see that jeweled gold watch?” I yelled.

“No Shrimp, they didn’t see it,” Scarlet said.  “Somepony must have stolen it and everything else I had along with it.  All I have now is a this lead filled bag.” With this she began sobbing. “And now, I’m going to have to spend the night…,” with a heaving sob she screamed “outside.”

See this is the problem with being in a thief’s guild.  Things got stolen.  While, most of the time, the other ponies were at least decent enough to only steal from ponies that could live without it, other ponies enjoyed stealing and watching ponies suffer.  This is what makes me mad. If I could, I would beat anypony that lacked the empathy to realize that what they were doing could kill the other pony. And these are ponies that know what it feels like to have nothing to give to the gryphons that run the guild and know the horrors night’s hold in the Drudge.

‘Damn,’ I thought to myself, ‘I thought I could finally catch a break.’  I walked up to the gryphon that had given me back the knife and I gave him the knife.  “Can Scarlet sleep the night with this?” I asked him.

“No, but I can take one of those rings you gave my from your account and Scarlet can stay the night. In that case, you would also be down to four nights.” The gryphon replied.

“Wait, that means I have to pay over three days’ worth of sleep for her one? Isn’t that unfair?” I asked. ‘So much for sympathy.’

“You want the deal or not kid? This is your only offer and,” he pulled me close. “It looks like your girlfriend over there is going to cry if you don’t.” Damn, it did look like Scarlet was about to let loose another one of her racking sobs if I didn’t agree.

“Fine, Damn you. Do it.”  With that I turned around and walked away with Scarlet.

“Thank you so much Shrimp,” she said hugging me.  “I don’t know what I would have done all alone at night. I doubt anyone else would have done the same for me. You’re a real hero.”  With that, Scarlet kissed me and ran off to talk to her friends.

'So I just payed a ring and a knife (which would have meant a free day) for a kiss?' I don’t know. I just expected something more for possibly saving her life.  It would have been nice to cuddle with her and feel the warmth of another pony’s body next to mine, but I guess I wouldn’t want to be seen with a pony that goes by Shrimp either.

I know that life is rough in the Drudge and chances are, in my place, Scarlet wouldn’t have done the same for me.  Still I felt good about what I had done and it showed that even in this rundown place we call the Drudge; there were still ponies that were willing to sacrifice something they had for the good of another.

Who knows, maybe tomorrow I can scavenge enough to still be able to get a day off this week.

Chapter Three - Overclocking

Chapter Three – Overclocking

“It’s been a hard day’s night and I’ve been working like a dog…-The Beatles”

I woke up early the next morning but I felt well rested.  If I worked hard enough today, then maybe I could still get that day off.  After all that happened yesterday, I feel that I really need a day to just think through everything.

Scarlet was still asleep when I left in the morning and, in truth, I really just wanted to be alone.  I went to the Mistress to see if she knew where I could find some work today.  The Mistress is what our guild leader is known by.  She is a strange pony that always hides behind a thick cowl and is in overlooks everything that our guild does.  Everybody has to report what they are doing to her so she can keep track of how many ponies we have doing certain jobs.  She uses these records to then handout any leftover jobs to the ponies that slept in.  This keeps our guild’s presence spread throughout the city and stops other guilds from claiming territory.

“Mistress, I came to see where I could be of the most use today.” The Mistress looked at her lists, face hidden behind a cowl. ‘I wonder how she can even see anything,’ I thought, ‘with her eyes always in the darkness.’

The Mistress laughed as though she had read my mind.  It sounded more like a deep gurgling than a laugh, but that just made it that much more disconcerting.

“It seems we do have a job for you, Master Shrimp.  One you’ve never tried before. It seems that most of the usual jobs are taken, so today you will be going hunting with Gizmo.” With this, the cloaked figure of the Mistress lay back down and said nothing else.

Well I can’t say I was displeased, after all it was a break from the usual routine and its one job that I won’t feel bad about doing.  You see, hunting for us is treasonous. All of the good hunting grounds are owned and privately used by the obscenely rich.  Most of these wealthy landowners gained their riches through backstabbing and black mail. I definitely wouldn’t feel sorry for these people if they lost some rabbits from their large estates on the outskirts of town.

There is another option for hunting but nopony I’ve known has ever braved the Haunted Hollows.  The Haunted Hollows is what everypony calls the large forest outside of Bastion.  With the constant shade that the trees provide, it is always dark underneath.  This is probably what leads to all of the ghost stories told to the younger ponies and has deterred anypony from venturing in there. No, most ponies decided it was a safer bet to risk their lives poaching in the hunting grounds of the estates.

I spent a couple of minutes trying to find Gizmo, a rather small filly that was purple and had a light blue mane.  I found her asleep in one of the lofts that we use when we have a surplus of members.  We didn’t have any extra members at the moment, but I think that Gizmo was just staying there because she didn’t have that many friends.

“Gizmo let’s go.  The Mistress assigned us to go hunting today. As it’s my first time, I’m assuming that you have some experience with it?” Gizmo, who had been groggy since I woke her up, was suddenly quite excited.

“I love hunting. It gives me time alone in the woods,” Gizmo said. “Hey Shrimp, after I show you the basics, would you mind trying out one of my new inventions?”

“Sure Gizmo. What is it?” I asked.  Gizmo spent most of her free time tinkering with things which usually backfired on her.  I just hope whatever she’s got won’t kill me.

“It’s like the crossbow’s the gryphon guards have, except it automatically resets itself and has a clip for the bolts,” Gizmo said excitedly. So much for not being dangerous.

“Well let’s head out. Do you know which hunting grounds we are supposed to go to?” I asked.

“I’m guessing it’s the same one that I’ve been going to over the past month,” Gizmo replied.

“Then, by all means, lead the way.” With that we set out to hunt.

Gizmo set me up to train with a knife first.  Though she gave me constant encouragement, I couldn’t get the form right for the life of me.  I would grab the knife with my right hoof, but whenever I would lunge at the practice dummy Gizmo set up (a small stuffed sack) I would lose my balance and usually end up landing face first in the dirt.  Even though Gizmo was trying to be polite, she couldn’t help from giggling at my failed attempts. I was starting to feel bad about hunting because, if I couldn’t hit a sack, what chance did I have of hitting a moving target?

“Let’s move on to bows,” Gizmo suggested, obviously unable to stop herself from laughing anymore.  We had wasted about an hour while I fiddled around with the knife.

“Why not? I obviously have no hope with this knife,” I said throwing the knife back into the pile of practice weapons.  Gizmo handed me a small bow because it would be easier for me to pull back.  Taking the bow in one hoof and the string in another, I began the pullback. The motion of pulling the bow back felt natural to me.  Once I had the bow in position, I began lining up my shot.  After taking a moment to determine where I should aim, I let the string free and watched my shot fly. THWANG! The sound of the bow was intoxicating.  The arrow landed with a solid thud inside of the target!  I felt like cheering. I had done something right, and after a day of failure, that sure made me feel good.

“Wow, that was really good Shrimp! You got within 5 inches of the center.  That’s generally what the more experience archers achieve.  I think we’ll be sticking with the bow.” Gizmo said, obviously pleased with my performance. “Now will you please help me try out the crossbow?”

“A promise is a promise,” I replied. ‘And hopefully it doesn’t kill me.’ Gizmo handed me the contraption she had made. It was one of the crossbows that the gryphon guards carried around with some mechanical parts attached to the string and a hollow stock.

“The hollow stock is so you can insert these little boxes of bolts,” The bolts are fed back into the shooting mechanism by a spring system that detects when the string is pulled back. Oh well… I guess you don’t really care about all of this. Basically you aim and shoot, then wait a second, and the crossbow takes care of the rest for you. Go on. Try it out,” Gizmo explained.

Right. Point and shoot. Simple enough.  I took aim at the target again. At least there is a sight on this crossbow; otherwise I wouldn’t know where to aim with all this mechanical stuff attached to it.  I fired again at the target.  This time the crossbow gave a nearly silent shot and again, the shot landed in the target with a thud.  Before I finished admiring my shooting, I noticed that the bow was already ready to fire again. ‘Let’s see how many times I can hit the target,’ I thought to myself.  I emptied the five bolts that the cartridge had left into the target.

I went over to inspect my handiwork and was pleasantly surprised.  All six bolts were five inches from the center in a densely packed circle.

“Wow,” said Gizmo.  “I’d say this invention has been a success.  Let’s go get you geared up so you can do some real hunting. I’m going to continue working on this crossbow to see if I can make it work better.” I was enthralled. The woods would provide some of the time I desperately needed alone.

Gizmo geared me up with some light brown clothing (with matching saddlebags) that would help to keep me out of sight in the dim light of the forest and a map of the best places to find the rabbits I was hunting for.  I was also equipped with a short bow and a quiver with a supply of twenty arrows. Then Gizmo, handed me a small knife.  I wondered why. She had seen how awful I had been with it earlier.

Upon seeing my puzzled expression, Gizmo said, “If you don’t get a clean kill with the arrows, finish off the rabbits with this knife.  Although I know we need them to keep us fed, I hate seeing the rabbits suffer any more than they need to.”  I promised to put them out of their misery, and with that, I was off. Honestly, I didn’t even know whose hunting grounds I was intruding upon nor did I care.

‘Okay,’ I thought to myself ‘according to this map there should be a nice area up ahead where I can lay in wait for some rabbits.’ I walked as quietly as I could through the bushes both because I didn’t want to scare the animals away and for fear of being caught by some of the gryphons that patrolled this area looking for poachers.

I found a tree that overlooked the area marked on my map as a premier hunting spot.  The tree had a large overhang and branches that looked like they could support my weight. As stealthily as I could, I began climbing the tree and found a nice, thick branch that concealed me from above and gave me a good view below me.

I began waiting out the rabbits. Gizmo had told me that they only appeared at certain times during the day and I would usually have to wait for them to show up.  I had assumed this waiting time would allow me to think about what had been happening within the government over the past couple of days.  This turned out to be a false hope.  It took skill to stay on the branch without falling off and it was even more difficult for me to pull the bow back without falling over.  I spent twenty minutes practicing the form before I figured out how to use the draw weight of the bow to steady myself.  Then came the first sentry.  The gryphon was flying alone above the forest, looking lazily about for intruders like me.  I had almost forgotten all about the guards but now I realized that hunting would mean that I had to focus on the prey and the predators.  I took careful note of when the first gryphon had passed.  The same gryphon came flying through about thirty minutes later.  I wondered if it was this gryphon’s routine to do a sweep every thirty minutes.  I find in life that everyone falls into habits.  It doesn’t matter who you are, without constant vigilance you’re going to go into autopilot and stop paying attention.

I began to see rabbits fifteen minutes after I saw the sentry the second time.  If my suspicion about the guard was right, then he would probably fly overhead while I was securing the kill, but if I didn’t then the rabbits might move on and I would be without any game to bring back. ‘Better to be safe than sorry,’ I recalled one of the older mares telling me when I had almost gotten caught stealing an apple.  I guess I’ll wait another fifteen minutes and once the guard passes over, I’ll go for the kill.

Those fifteen minutes were filled with worry and doubt. 'What if the gryphon saw me earlier and is now bringing other in to help? I bet I could get one of those rabbits before he comes back around and nopony will be the wiser.’  At one point, I began to take aim at the rabbits, but stopped in fear when I heard the leaves behind me rustle.  I nearly lost my grip on the branch from the terror.  It turned out to be nothing more than the wind.  I realized that if the wind was going to scare me this bad, I would probably be stiff in terror if a gryphon opened fire on me with a crossbow.  I decided that it was in my best interests to stay put.

The gryphon passed overhead when I assumed he would, and I was grateful that I hadn’t rushed the kill but waited.  Otherwise, I might have been somebodies catch of the day.  Calm after figuring out that the gryphon had a schedule I began taking aim at one of the older rabbits that appeared to have an injured hind leg.  I abhorred the thought of killing another animal, but I needed to stay alive.  I picked the old rabbit because I figured he had less time to live and I could more easily catch him if I didn’t get a clean kill.  With my heart pounding, I readied the bow.  I cleared my mind and pictured the arrow’s flight in my mind, straight into the heart of my target. TWANG! I released the string and listened to the hiss of the arrow in its flight.  As if compelled by a sudden urge, I took another from the quiver, figuring that it would be best to get two arrows in my target.  Within a second, the second arrow was on its way.  While the rabbits were still dazed from the ambush, I began pulling more and more arrows from my quiver and sending them at different targets.  Who knows, maybe I’ll get lucky and kill something.

After five arrows had been fired, the rabbits scattered in all directions and I knew that any shots I took now would be wasted.  I hopped from branch to branch on my tree to get the ground faster.  I noticed that my original target was already dead. I reached the ground and I was going to throw his corpse into my saddlebag when I noticed another rabbit, a rather plump one, pushing with all his strength to get away from me.  I grabbed the knife with my right hoof and dashed after the rabbit.  Once I got there, I grabbed him and was about to finish him when I was overcome with a feeling of nausea.  Killing this injured rabbit seemed so cold hearted that I almost left him, but then I thought about how I had just killed another rabbit and hadn’t had any qualms about that.  Also there was the promise I made to Gizmo.  With a wave of gritty resolution, I stopped the poor rabbit’s heart with the cold steel of my blade.

“Promise made, promise kept.” I said to nopony in particular. I threw the rabbit into my saddlebag, suddenly feeling very emotionally taxed.  I went back to the older rabbit and retrieved the arrows from his body.  One seemed fine while the other was bent and of no use to anyone.  I threw the older rabbits body into one of my saddlebags and went looking for the rest of my arrows.  No use letting anyone who stumbled in here know there had been poachers.  Both of the last two arrows were broken from hitting the hard ground although it appeared that I had grazed some other rabbit with one due to the small smudge of blood on the tip of one of them.

During the time it took to complete all of this, twenty minutes had passed.  I hid the broken arrows under a bush and I crept into some dense shrubs to wait for the gryphon to run his usual route. During these few minutes, I noticed a dead deer off to the side of the path.  It looked to have died of old age and I wasn’t one to pass up opportunity.  I waited for what seemed like an eternity for the gryphon to pass overhead before I could go collect my prize.   People paid extremely well for the skins of deer because, before hunting was made illegal, they had been overhunted. Their skins could be used to make nice clothing and fetched a good price in the market. I slung the deer over my back and started a slow march back to where I had left Gizmo earlier today.

When I was safe, I yelled to get Gizmo’s attention. “Gizmo! Come and see what I got today!”

Gizmo appeared from her workspace with her horn glowing and the parts of a crossbow magically levitating behind her.  After seeing me, she quickly set down the parts and ran up and hugged me.  “I’m so sorry, Shrimp,” she wailed.  “I forgot to tell you about the guard’s schedules. I was so worried you would get caught that I haven’t been able to concentrate all day.  I was so happy about the success of my crossbow that I forgot you had never been hunting before and so you didn’t know about the schedules and normally ponies don’t stay in there that long and I was so worried…” By this point Gizmo was out of breath. “I’m just so glad you weren’t caught.  I couldn’t get ANYONE else to try out my crossbow.  They were all to scared that something would go wrong…”

“It’s okay Gizmo. Seriously.  I figured out the gryphon’s schedule on my own and look what I got.” I lead Gizmo to the place where I had left the animals.  Gizmo gasped. ”How did you kill all of these, especially that deer?” I recounted my adventure out in the woods to her and Gizmo was happy to listen.

“That’s great, Shrimp.  You can keep this smaller rabbit and the deer,” she said, handing me the older of the two rabbits and the deer. “I’ll turn this other rabbit into the Mistress as your payment for using the guild’s hunting equipment,” Gizmo said in a matter-of-fact tone. “But really, this is impressive for your first time hunting.  Let’s get you out of that gear so we can go back to the guild and celebrate.”

As Gizmo helped me out of the tight hunting attire, I thought to myself.   ‘A deer and a rabbit.  Looks like someone will be taking TWO days off.’  A smile crept onto my face.   I was ready to return home with my prizes until I heard Gizmo make a choking sound.  I turned around to see what was the matter and all she could do was point at me.  What, did she just realize that I’m short or something?

Gizmo stopped gawking at me long enough to say, “Look at your flank.”

I turned my head around and noticed, to my great surprise, that my cutie mark had appeared.  The cutie mark took the shape of a barbed arrow.

I was practically radiating happiness.  I had been the one of the oldest ponies without my cutie mark (which is pretty embarrassing to say the least).  “Looks like I’m going to be hunting more often,” I said with a smirk and I ran as fast as I could back to the guild.

Chapter Four - Pearl

Chapter Four – Pearl

“Kaleidoscope eyes sparkle at the world. My emerald city, downtown girl…-Panic at the Disco”

Last night was spectacular.  When I got back to the guild, I made sure to show off my newly found cutie mark.  When asked about the story behind the mark, I recounted my day’s adventures (I may have exaggerated a bit to impress the mares but that’s irrelevant). Everypony decided that I should come up with a new name, so it better reflected my cutie mark.  I mean how does Shrimp have anything to do with a barbed arrow? (I would have died if my cutie mark had been a fishing net.  I would have been Shrimp forever) I decided to go with Surefire because my special ability had something to do with my shooting abilities.

To celebrate getting my cutie mark, I decided that I was going to take the day off.  After all, that had been my plan all along.  I traded the rabbit I had caught to somepony who offered me five apples for it.  I had food to eat and a day to do whatever I pleased.  I left the shelter after a nice long sleep and a generous breakfast of two apples.  I quickly became engrossed in my thoughts and began wandering around the Drudge.

One thing I thought about was evil and how it manifested itself in different ponies.  Smoothtongue had been pure evil.  She held nothing sacred and would do anything for power.  Other ponies, like Gizmo, hardly ever talked to people for fear of offending them.  I’m sure that those ponies must have evil thoughts but they never acted upon them.  After a long time pondering this, I still couldn’t figure out why some ponies could be so insensitive.  Were they born without compassion or had they been treated badly and felt like they should treat others the same way?  In the end, I realized that it didn’t matter.  The ponies that let evil overcome them, in my mind at least, were less than ponies.  How can a pony that throws away friends without thought and causes pain, be as good as a pony that wants to help others?

Amid these musings, I stumbled into a back alley in the Drudge.  What I saw there shocked me out of my daydreaming.  Lying on the ground was a pony that I had never seen before.  It was a white mare that was bleeding from cuts over her entire body.  I gagged at the sight of her.  The wounds looked fresh and the pony was unconscious.  She seemed to be a little younger than me.  I knew there was no way I was going to leave her to die, but I also realized that I had no clue where I was.  During the time I had spent roaming the Drudge, I had gotten lost and everywhere I looked there was only unfamiliar territory.  I went through all the options I had available to me.  I could go back and look for the guild and maybe get somepony to help me. I could try to ask for help around here, but that meant that I might find somepony that didn’t wish this mare well.  ‘You could just leave her here and pretend you never found her like all the other ponies before you did.’ Where did that thought come from?  There was absolutely no chance I was leaving her here.  I had to take her with me or else she was going to die from the loss of blood.

I carefully pulled the mares body over my back and I could feel fresh blood oozing from her wounds.  The warm blood soaked into my coat and I knew that I had to get this pony help as fast as possible.  I began making my way back in the direction I assumed I had come from while trying not to jostle the mare on my back.  Her body felt warm and I could feel the fever that was beginning to build in her body.  After a few dead ends, I finally found the stream that cut through parts of the Drudge. If I went upstream a ways, I was sure that I could find the guild and things would be okay or so I told myself.  I kept moving toward my goal and I noticed that the sun was also beginning to set.  Without the weight on my back, I would have already been in the guild and content after a nice day off.  I also remembered another problem, to stay in the guild a pony had to pay.  That meant that this pony wouldn’t be able to spend the night unless I paid for her.  I wasn’t going to be greedy and keep the deer I still had for myself, but I couldn’t help relishing the thought of at least one more day off.  ‘Well, if all my days off are going to turn out like today then maybe I don’t want a day off.’

I reached the guild a few minutes before sunset and immediately rushed to Doc to get the mare some help.  I promised Doc that I had pay ready for him if he could save her.  He agreed to give it his best try, although he didn’t appear to be to certain about her recovery.  After an arrangement was settled on the cost of care, I ran out to get my deer and brought it in to one of the gryphons.

“Here,” I said, “take this.  This is for the injured pony and everything over one night of her stay give to Doc.”  The gryphon simply nodded and took my deer away.

Everybody had already seen the mare before I was done getting her set up at the guild.  I hadn’t wanted the whole guild knowing about her and pestering her, but I guess blood trails aren’t the best way to keep something a secret.  I didn’t feel like talking about what had happened today but I eventually gave into the incessant questioning.  I explained how I had found her and brought her back. I refused to say anything more than that.

My mind was a complete mess when I again had time to think. ‘Who is this pony? Why was this done to her? Why did I save her? Maybe she had been left to die for a reason.’  I went to go clean myself in the communal tub before going back to check on how the mare was doing.  When I got there, I found that a couple of the mares from the guild had come to fawn over me.  They told me how brave I was and offered to pleasure me in any way I wanted.  I refused them because nothing could capture my attention more than the injured mare.  I don’t even know her name and yet she is all I could think of.  Funny, a day ago, I would have jumped at the offers and now could refuse them without a second thought.  I was startled when I looked down at the tub and realized that entire tub looked like it was filled with blood.  I checked myself for cuts before realizing that it had been the blood from the pony.  How was I so focused on her that I couldn’t think of anything else?

After I was washed, I went to Doc’s working area to check on her.  I finally noticed her cutie mark, a beautiful pearl that outshone the dark oyster that it came from.  I decided that until I knew her real name, I would refer to her as Pearl. Doc had cleaned her up from the blood and bandaged most of her body.  Without the blood covering most of her features, I noticed how beautiful she was.  She had a pure white coat with a light pink mane.  She had a small build, which made me assume that she was younger than me.  She looked to have been in good health before she had been beaten because she didn’t look emaciated most of the other young ponies that lived in the Drudge.

It was filled with rage at seeing all the wounds on Pearl’s body, and I swore to myself that I would do anything in my power to make sure she made it through this all right.  Tomorrow would be a day of hard work.  I intended to go hunting again, and I would need to buy or steal a bow to so that I can keep my kills.  I lay beside Pearl’s sickbed all night and eventually fell into an uneasy sleep.

I awoke early the next morning with the intent of going to find a bow and maybe some arrows.  I went and reported what I planned on doing to the Mistress who appeared to nod and mark down my job for the day. ‘Where can I find someone who sells bows?’ I thought to myself.  I had only been hunting once and I still could use a little help figuring things out.  I went to go see Gizmo and asked her about purchasing a weapon for hunting.  She had heard about Pearl and was willing to help me by providing me with a small knife and an old short bow.  She had spent my day off making me a short bow after one of her traps had caught a rabbit.  I was elated.  This meant that all I needed was some arrows.

Gizmo recommended a hunting store that the lords used.  I guess it was a logical place to start, but there was a problem.  I didn’t fit in with all of the other lordly ponies.  I would have to ask for some help.   I went to see Starlight, one of the mares that specialized in stealing from the rich.  She always kept herself clean and pristine so that the rich would not know the difference between her and one of their own (most of them ignore each other and are stuck up anyway).  I requested a quiver full of arrows in return for one of my extra rabbits.  The way I figured it out, I was going to need at least 3 rabbits to be able to pay for everything I needed for myself and Pearl.  Looks like I’m going to have to work my flank off to provide for myself.

I worked harder than I ever had before in the next few days.  Hunting was steadily becoming easier for me and every day I was able to catch the three rabbits I needed.  Unfortunately for me, this wasn’t enough for me to get a decent amount of food for myself. I decided to spend my nights learning to make my own arrows so that I could cut out a third of my expenses.  Another problem I had was camouflage.  I tried to hide in a tree similar to what I had done on my first day hunting, but because my black coat and red mane stood out against the color of the tree, it was harder for me to remain undetected.  I fixed this problem by adjusting how I hunted.  Instead of having an overhead view, which had been convenient, I now hid in the densely shaded portions of the forest and rained death with arrow after arrow.  I was also becoming steadily more accurate with every day I practiced and now I could better conserve my precious arrows.  I soon was able to feel where my shots were heading, and using this feeling, I could judge whether the target needed another arrow or not.

Another problem that I faced was finding animals to hunt.  The animals appeared to have certain areas of the forest that they preferred and if I could only figure this out I would be able to make the most out of the daylight and bring in even more.  This task took most of my time at night and with Gizmo’s experience I was able to piece a pattern together.  In return for Gizmo helping me, I promised to test out her inventions and sometimes made suggestions to her on possible ways to improve the crossbow she was building based upon my own field experience.  The first two days after I had found Pearl, I was able to catch three rabbits and pay the dues with that, but then I had to also pay to stay the nights in the guild for myself.  This meant that if I wanted to eat, I was going to have to either brave nights outside or catch at least five animals a day.  The next two days were hard work, but I managed to come out with 5 kills by the end of the day.  I was feeling comfortable with my ability to hunt and was confident that I could keep up with paying for both me and Pearl.

Pearl remained unconscious and Doc was uncertain that she ever would be conscious, even though her wounds had started to heal and her fever had broken on the fourth day.  Any time I had left over, I spent beside her sickbed in hopes that she would wake up and see the pony that had saved her.  In my imagination, she would fawn for me and we could make a life together.  Then again, I knew nothing about her and she might just turn out to be like the other mares that usually chose to ignore me.  Something about her made her seem different than the other mares, whether or not it was my imagination or something else, I could not tell, but it gave me hope.

The fifth day after I had brought Pearl back had come around.  I went through my usual hunting routine and managed to kill two rabbits early into the day.  I was elated.  Hunting still gave me an unusual feeling of excitement due to the anticipation of the kill ahead.  I could say that I was enjoying myself, even though taking the lives of innocent creatures still made me feel a bit disgusted with myself.

With more experience, I was able to think about things while waiting in the bushes for my targets. Besides Pearl, one of the main things I thought about was fletching.  I have been spending all the time I could find refining my abilities, but my arrows still came out bent and unusable.  There is no way I can afford paying Starlight for more arrows so I needed to learn fast to keep up with my demand of ammo.  Feathers are important for making arrows and so I look for feathers that fall from nests during my travels.  I’m not sure exactly how different sized feathers affected the flight of the arrows so I collected some of every size so that I could find which type worked best for me.

I almost fell asleep in the bush waiting for the enough rabbits to gather around my hiding spot to begin shooting.  I guess a lack of sleep isn’t good if you’re going to be doing something that involves not moving for a long time while staying alert.  I tried to shake myself awake as I got ready to start taking shots at these rabbits. ‘Wait a second,’ my brain told me. ‘You just SHOOK yourself awake!’  That thought certainly woke me up.  I now began to notice the rabbits leaping away from my hiding place.  As quickly as I could, I pulled out my bow and shot an arrow at one of the slower rabbits.  My shot missed by a good inch and broke upon impact with a tree.  I cursed. How was I supposed to get the five animals I needed tonight.

I doubted I would be able to eat tonight but I still reasoned I could get another two kills at the most promising hunting spot I had, a small stream that most of the animals drank from.  I was on my way to the stream when I noticed a rabbit that looked to have been caught in some sort of trap.  The rabbit had one of its legs brutally snapped in two.  I knew that the rabbit stood no chance of making it through the night and would probably be eaten by some other animal later.  I did what I had to and now had three animals for the Guild. ‘Good,’ I thought, ‘that will cover Pearl and now all I have to do is get two rabbits for myself.’

I made my way down to the stream and found a nice dark area in the underbrush and awaited the rabbits.  I made sure not to allow myself to doze off again.  The animals began gathering around the stream.  I would normally have started shooting then, but I doubted that I would be able take down two before they got away. It was getting late and this would be my last attempt before going home.  Then I saw it.  A deer had appeared out of the forest and was cautiously approaching the water to get a drink.  A deer would be a real test of my hunting abilities.  I would have to kill the deer with one or two arrows; otherwise, the deer would be able to run away before I could finish him.  I slid out from the underbrush and readied an arrow on my bow.  I set another arrow beside me so that I would be able to shoot twice to insure the kill.  I pulled the string back and began visualizing the path of the arrow.  I took a deep breath and shot.  The second arrow was on its way in no time and the shots were lined up perfectly.  At least one of the arrows was going to go through the deer’s heart.  Well they would have, if three crossbow bolts hadn’t hit the deer in the throat first.  The deer crumpled and my arrows flew high.

It took me a second to realize what was happening.  The crossbow bolts had come from the crossbows of the owner of the hunting grounds and his two friends.  ‘I’m screwed,’ I thought.  There was no way that the other ponies hadn’t seen my arrows and been notified of my position from the direction the arrows had come from.  Now I could hear the ponies running towards me.  I bolted in the direction of the densest woods so that the other ponies wouldn’t see me.  I dodged into the bushes and hoped that the other ponies had lost track of me. ZIP!  A crossbow bolt stuck out of the tree right beside me.  No, they definitely knew where I was.  I sprinted as fast as I could trying to stick to the denser forest so I could be seen less and they wouldn’t be able to get a clear shot at me.  With adrenaline pumping through my veins, I pumped my legs faster than I ever had before.  No matter where I ran, I could not shake my pursuers.  These ponies had plenty of experience hunting (it’s all the rich ponies did in their free time) and they were able to follow me like they had followed the deer earlier.  I just hoped I wouldn’t end up like the deer. Another bolt was fired at me and this one struck home.  The bolt must have struck something before hitting me, but it was still stuck in my hip.  I yelped and ran faster even though my vision was turning black around the edges.  I knew that if I passed out there would be no hope for me.

I was beginning to get tired.  Being a smaller pony, I just never had the endurance that other ponies had and it took most of my strength not passing out from the pain of the bolt stuck in my hip.  The only advantage that I did have was that of my mind.  I decided my best approach would be to lead them off my trail and escape while they were confused.  I knew that I would have only one attempt at tricking them.  If my plan failed, they would catch up to me and it would be over.  Not just me, I realized, Pearl would die too without anybody to provide for her.  I decided that the best option would be to create a false trail.  One of the stories told in the guild was about a pony leading hunters down a false trail to save an innocent animal.  Hopefully it worked on not so innocent animals, such as myself, too.  I dashed behind a grove of willows and made some deep hoof marks going in the opposite direction of the base camp we had.  I lightly traced my steps back to the place where I had gotten off track and was going to move in the other direction while wiping my tracks clear.  Unfortunately, I didn’t have time for this kind of approach.  I could hear the hunters not too far away from the dense grove and so I took the second best option, climbing the tallest willow and hoping for the best.

The hunters came crashing into the grove and began following my fake trail.  After they had gone a ways, I hopped down from the tree branch and had to stifle a cry of pain. I quickly and quietly ran away while the hunters were looking for where my trail picked up.  I made sure to cover my tracks for a while and eventually made it back to the base camp.  I was exhausted and bloody from the confrontation.  I pulled the crossbow bolt out of my hip.  It’s a good thing the bolt wasn’t barbed or poisoned, but it still hurt like hell pulling it out.  I was definitely ready to head back to the guild.

I was looking forward to a bath and some much needed rest when I realized that I didn’t have enough animals to pay for my own stay tonight.  I walked into the guild and traded in my kills for Pearl.  I went to go see her before I was forced out for the night.  Doc told me that she had started to seem like she was conscious for a while but kept lapsing back into her coma-like state.  I gave Pearl a kiss before I left.  Hopefully this wouldn’t be the last time I saw her, but I knew there was a chance I wouldn’t see anything ever again.  Her life right now, depended on my ability to provide for her.  She still might die with the care, but she had no chance if I didn’t make it through the night.

Chapter Five - A New Face in Town

Chapter Five – A New Face in Town

“Fear of the Dark, Fear of the Dark.  I have the constant fear that something’s always near. Fear of the Dark. Fear of the Dark. I have a phobia that someone’s always there…-Iron Maiden“

I got away from the guild as fast as possible.  The ponies that roamed the streets at night weren’t exactly dumb.  They knew that they had a good chance of finding a lone pony near a guild, begging to be let in.  A good hiding place was one that nobody expected and this was what I intended on finding tonight.  There was no way I could outrun a pony with my injured hip and my fatigue.  Tonight I couldn’t afford to lose my concentration or else I would probably lose my life.

I spent thirty minutes scouting out the area around our guild for the best hiding places.  Barrels were no longer an option for me as I had outgrown them, so I had to move on to larger hiding spots.  My ideal location for a hiding spot was above eye level and in a dark location.  Most ponies only see what is straight ahead of them and don’t look up to often.  This tidbit of knowledge combined with the stealth that my coat provided, would probably end up being sufficient cover for the night.  Another thing I looked for in a hiding place was room to maneuver.  The idea was simple enough, if I was found and couldn’t move, I was dead, therefore, if I had room to move, I had a chance to escape and maybe stick somepony with the knife I had brought with me.  I found a hiding space that suited these needs and had a crack that I could see through to look at the street outside.

I was holed up in my hiding place for a few minutes before I started hearing the screaming.  It was much louder than the screams heard at the guild.  It sounded as though a mare had been caught only a few streets down.  I tried to ignore the sounds, knowing that there was nothing I could do to help her.  It wouldn’t make it easier even when the screaming stopped because at that point she was either dead or had given up fighting.  Any pony that didn’t escape the ponies that roamed the streets at night was usually found the next day with their organs spilling out of their corpses.  Mares were usually abused before they were killed and were usually found with their legs broken and their flanks rubbed raw before they were killed.  Nobody had sympathy for the hood ponies, but there weren’t any ponies willing to challenge their authority in the night.  Guilds had been formed by desperate ponies that were tired of running and built up defenses.   With enough ponies in a guild, the hood ponies stopped preying upon them, favoring the easier pickings of lone ponies.

The screaming lasted for around five hours and ended abruptly after a final wail that conveyed the agony that the mare had gone through.  I hoped that that mare could finally find peace in death that she had not been granted in her life in the Drudge.  I’m ashamed to say that after that, all I felt was a sick happiness that I hadn’t been the one to die.

I stayed vigilant constantly throughout the night.  Whenever I felt that I was beginning to doze off, it was easy to wake myself by thinking of what had happened to the mare.  I saw a few passing groups of cloaked ponies through my crack in the wall.  Most of them appeared to be drugged up with brightfire, one of the local weeds that caused a pleasant, warm feeling in the brain. Though most of these hood ponies wouldn’t notice it if a pony ran in front of them, a few of them had bloodlust in their eyes and only death would satiate that need.  These ponies appeared to be in charge of the groups of ponies and they were the ones I needed to avoid if I wished to stay alive. They weren’t under the influence of any drug and only thirsted for violence.

The night was surprisingly uneventful and for that I was glad.  There were only about three more hours until sun-up and safety.  Still a lot could happen in three hours and I continued watching.  There had been more screaming throughout the night, although it was much farther away from me.  I thought I was going crazy when I heard more yells coming from the street I was overlooking.  I thought my mind was just replaying the screams I had heard earlier, until I realized that the yells were masculine.  Through my peephole, I saw a pegasus running wildly from a group of ponies.  This pegasus began attempting to fly away and would have made it if a rope from the pursuing ponies hadn’t caught him around his neck. Surprisingly, the pegasus managed to break through the rope that held him. He attempted to take flight again but was stopped when a knife clipped off a small chunk of his wing, and he crashed into the alley I was hiding in.  The pony was trapped in this alley and now he had inadvertently trapped me also.  There was only a slim chance that I wasn’t going to be seen from the ground directly beneath me.

I took the split seconds I had to formulate a plan.  The hood ponies did not know I was there and so the element of surprise was with me.  However, the pegasus also did not know that I was there and surprising him might ruin any of my attempts to flee or fight.  I decided that this was a risk that I would have to be willing to take.  I would prefer if I could save both the pegasus and myself, but I knew that the chances that either of us would escape was low.  The ponies approached the cornered pegasus who refused to whimper or cower in the face of death.  I admired his strength and courage and decided that I was going to do my very best to get him out of this situation.  One of the hood ponies that had been slowly approaching started laughing hysterically and quickly jumped forward to stab the pegasus.  The pegasus, in return, jumped out of the way of the knife and landed a devastating kick on the offending ponies leg.  I dared not jump out of my hiding place too soon and lose my only advantage.  The other ponies closed in quickly and the pegasus had nowhere to move.  Now was my chance.

I quietly hopped down from my hiding place with my knife.  I joined the pack of ponies that were beating the pegasus to the ground.  I hoped that my black coat would slip beneath these ponies notice.  I jumped onto the back of the pony farthest back and pulled my knife across his throat, giving him a red smile.  Unlike killing helpless rabbits, killing this corrupt pony filled me with a sense of justice. The pony crumpled to the ground and I took out four more of the ten ponies that were attacking the pegasus in a similar fashion.  Only after the number of attackers had been halfed, did the hood ponies notice me.  Deciding that it was time to use their weapons to carve us up, they pulled out their knives that looked sharp enough to cut steel.  Three of the ponies lunged at me. Luckily for me, my senses were much more honed to the movement of animals.  I saw the lunge before it happened and I rolled underneath their attacks and knocked the feet out from underneath one of them.  I propped my knife up underneath the falling pony and he died once he hit the ground, my knife passing through his windpipe and cutting off his air supply.  The other two ponies seemed to be under the influence of brightfire and appeared confused as to why their companion wasn’t standing back up.  I took this moment to scoop up three of the knives from the fallen ponies. ‘Time to try something new,’ I thought.  I lifted the most balanced of the three knives behind my head and released it with as much force as I could muster.  At the close distance, the knife fixed itself squarely in one of the pony’s shoulder.  The pony fell back with a howl and attempted to pry the blade from his shoulder.  The other pony, a mare by the look of it, continued her charge.  There was no chance of me being able to throw another blade before she reached me.  I decided to do what she least expected me to do.  I stepped right in front of her charge.  She ran into me at full speed and we both came crashing to the ground.  I had been ready for it and so I was able to recover and sink a blade into her chest before she figured out what was happening.  Only one pony was left attacking me.  I looked over to see that the pegasus had been able to crush in the heads of one of his attackers.  That meant the fight was finally fair. Two of us and two of them.

The pony with the knife in his shoulder managed to dislodge it and was now holding it in his other hoof and he looked like he was about to charge at me.  I was about to throw the only remaining knife I had at him until I noticed that the pegasus was down.  The other attacker had managed to rope his forehooves together and was now going in for the killing blow.  I reacted as quickly as I could and hurled the knife at the pony.  I didn’t have a chance to see where the knife hit because my attacker stabbed me with one of his two knives.  Getting hit with a crossbow bolt was nothing compared to having a sharp knife dig deep into my flesh and get lodged into my bone.  Everything that was going in my mind came to an abrupt stop.  All I felt was the pain of the knife.  The knife had passed through my skin and the blade was lodged in my rib.  I saw the offending pony ready to go in for a killing strike and I was sure that I was about to die.  All of a sudden, my attacker crumpled to the ground.  Behind him, I saw that the pegasus had slain his attacker and mine.  I wanted to thank him for helping me but then I passed out.

I woke up looking at the face of the pegasus that fought with me.  He appeared to have bandaged my rid and hip wound.  He appeared anxious when I was awake, but politely waited for me to initiate the conversation.

“Who are you?” Yep, great way to start a conversation.  Go me.

“I’m Windstorm.  And you are?” The pegasus replied.

“I’m Shrimp… I mean Surefire.  What guild do you belong to?”  I replied.

“What are guilds?”  Windstorm replied.  Oh he’s new around here.  That would explain why he might have been caught outside at night.  Where was he from anyway, that wouldn’t know about the hood ponies?

“Well I’ll explain it to you when we go back to my guild, the Horseshoe Guild.  Help me loot these bodies.  With any luck, they will have enough stuff to loot that we can pay dues for me, you, and Pearl.”  He quickly went about obeying his orders and we had a large pile of stolen jewelry, knives, and cloaks that would keep us warm during the colder months of the year.  My side ached pretty badly and I knew that I wouldn’t be able to go hunting or do any other jobs without a day’s worth of meds and some painkillers.

We walked back to the guild with the loot wrapped up in makeshift saddlebags that I made from cloth.  On the way I explained to Windstorm the way that guilds worked and why night times were bad.  After he appeared to grasp the basic concept of guilds, I began asking him questions.

“Windstorm, how is it that I’ve never seen you before and you don’t know anything about the Drudge?”

“I lived in the palace for most of my life,” Windstorm began.  Great I just saved someone important, maybe I could cash in on this.  “My father, he was the chief advisor to Queen Borea    before she was killed in the coup.  My father was killed as well and I only made it out of the slaughter because of my wings.  I was one of the fastest ponies in my class, and I was able to outrun the gryphons they sent to hunt me.  I’ve been running around the Haunted Hollows for a while now, but I never dared go farther than a few hundred feet in.  I got hungry, so I spent most of yesterday scavenging for food.  I decided to spend the night in one of the alleyways until I got caught by that group of hoodlums.  I would have been done for if you hadn’t saved me.  I owe you my life and will do anything in my power to try and help you.”

Very noble and well phrased.  I like this guy.  We walked into the guild and we quickly became the center of attention.  Thieves knew what loads of loot looked like and I bet some of them were planning the best way to take care of some of it for us.  After a brief introduction, I went up to one of the gryphons and gave them everything we had collected minus three cloaks and two knives.  It was enough to pay for all three of us.  I told Windstorm that I needed a little rest before I explained to him how the rest of his life was going to run.  I took Windstorm to the sickbeds to check on Pearl and take a nap.  I talked to Doc who reported that Pearl had come to for a moment before falling back into her unconscious state.  I was also able to get both me and Windstorm some of Doc’s painkillers by promising him early access to our adventures from last night.

With all the little things out of the way, it was finally time for me and Windstorm to catch up on some much needed rest.

Chapter Six - Paying the Rent

Chapter Six – Paying the Rent

“Now that I know what I’m without, you can’t just leave me. Breathe into me and make me real, bring me to life...-Evanescence“

The next day, Windstorm and I got up early so that we could get a head start.  The Mistress assigned us to do some scavenging and stealing from the food market.  This wouldn’t be a bad place to start, as we didn’t know what type of job Windstorm was the best at.  While we walked to the market, I explained to him who Pearl was and how I have been working to keep her alive.  Windstorm agreed to help me and for that I was grateful.  I’m not sure how I would have been able to provide for two ponies solely on my own.

Windstorm had grey coat with a mane that looked like the sick green color of a storm right before it hit.  He was very gallant and despised those who took advantage of others.  He was a creature of honor and felt that he owed his life to me for saving him from the hood ponies.  It shamed me that I never had the courage to tell him that I probably wouldn’t have tried saving him if I hadn’t been forced to.  Windstorm’s cutie mark was a tornado, which reflected his speed in the sky.  He had shown me his flying abilities after we awoke from our nap and I had been deeply impressed.  He zipped through the clouds like an arrow that I shot from my bow and when he landed, he claimed that he could normally go faster but his wing was injured from the fight the night before.  I believed him too.  His character wouldn’t allow him to exaggerate because he seemed to value honesty more than anything.

We made it to the market right as it opened.  This was when people were the most cautious, when they had no customers and the most produce.  I took some time to show Windstorm some tricks that I had picked up over the years of being in the guild.  Always look like an honest buyer and then help the vendor if they drop something.  That gains you their trust.  Then you have to wait until they start talking to somebody else or are otherwise distracted.  That’s when you go in and take a few things of little value.  Chances are that they will not notice the missing goods, and if you can do this with a lot of the vendors, then a lot of low value items will add up to a good days work.

Windstorm resented the idea of stealing but I managed to get him to practice on me.  He tried his best, I’ll give him that, but he was hopeless.  He didn’t have the sleight of hand to steal the goods and because his conscious made him feel bad, you could just tell that he was guilty.  I decided that we would go scavenge some food before we were going to try stealing and risk being caught.  Windstorm didn’t mind taking food that people had thrown out and thanked me for not forcing him to steal.  I had to think of something else, there was only so much we could scavenge and we still needed to get enough to stay at the guild tonight.  One night outside was one night to many in my opinion.

I thought about all I knew of Windstorm.  Loyal, honorable, and courageous were all words that came to mind.  I guess that comes from being son of the royal advisor to the queen.  He was a good flyer, but how was that going to help us pay the rent?  A thought sprung into my head.

“Windstorm!” I called.  “Do you think you could put on a show for the ponies in the market?  If you do that, I can steal and you don’t have to feel guilty.   Ponies might also be willing to give you a few bits to pay if you give them a good enough performance.”

“That’s a great idea Surefire.  There’s only one problem though, I have guards trying to hunt me down and a show isn’t going to be my best option for remaining incognito,” Surefire replied.  “If you could find a way to disguise my appearance, then I would be more than willing to try.”

He was right of course.  I had forgotten that some ponies wanted Windstorm dead. I was going to suggest that he wear one of the cloaks, but then he wouldn’t be able to fly.  The camouflage of the hunting uniforms would make him stand out even more than he already did, and wasn’t going to be an option.  We needed to give him something that would give people something to look at and distort his real appearance.  Paint would be the best option for this, but since paint is expensive, we decided to go with berry juice.  Some crushed berries mixed with mud should provide enough temporary covering to tell us whether this was a good idea or not.  I told Windstorm what types of berries we needed and sent him off to the outskirts of town to find them.  In the meantime, I managed to steal a couple of apples and a few bits from one of the vendor's coin bags. ‘Well maybe this will pay for Pearl,’ I thought to myself, silently hoping that our crazy scheme would work.

Windstorm returned quickly with the required berries and we quickly got underway making his disguise.  I’m not the most artistic pony, but I hoped that my art would be enough.  I added bright, red lightning bolts on his side.  I covered his face with a mask of purple mud.  I colored the feathers of his wing in alternating colors of red and blue.  I covered his flank and his cutie mark with black paint and we were ready to begin our show.  I could hardly tell what color he had originally been, and he looked as though he had gone bathing in different vats of paint.

I spent a few minutes gathering a crowd around Windstorm.  “Fillies and gentlecolts! Come one and all to see the Jester preform a flying act just for you!” After a few minutes of drumming up sales, Windstorm, whom I dubbed the Jester, began his flight.  His unparalleled abilities in flight brought in more ponies in than my yelling.  Though I would have loved to watch the show, I quickly got down to work taking more big ticket items from the marketplace than I normally would.  I met no resistance and before Windstorm’s show was over, I had to make a trip back to where we stashed our goods to deposit the items I had stolen.

Windstorm’s show had been spectacular.  He managed to impress the entire crowd and the spectators all threw money into a collection saddlebag.  I was astounded by the weight of the saddlebag after the show.  I congratulated Windstorm on his stellar performance and we decided to look over our days earnings.  What I had stolen and what we scavenged was enough to pay for all three of us to stay at the guild.  I still hadn’t counted the money we made from the show, but decided that Windstorm should do with it as he would.  I gave him the saddlebag for him to count.  He reported an outstanding total of 47 bits.  That sent my mind reeling.  That was more money than I had ever seen in one place at one time.  I guess that meant that of the twenty or so ponies that had been watching, everypony had donated about two bits.  If we could keep these shows up throughout town, we would be the richest ponies in the Drudge and might make our way out of there into Bastion.  Well, I guess it would be a long shot for us to leave the Drudge without attracting unneeded attention to Windstorm.

“Surefire, I want to use this to help you and Pearl.  If it hadn’t been for you, I would have died and Pearl also would have died without your intervention.”  I was taken by surprise. I mean, I knew that Windstorm was a nice pony and all, but could somebody really be that nice?  "Surefire, you're a good pony and I admire you for doing your best to help a pony in need.  I also want to see Pearl get well, but I do have one request.”  Windstorm looked at me with a questioning look in his eyes, as if asking whether he should continue or not.  I shook my head, still to dumbstruck by his offer to talk.  “Once Pearl is healed and all, do you think that maybe… possibly… you two would consider leaving with me?”

“Leaving? Where are you planning on going to Windstorm?”  Well I guess that it made sense that he would want to leave.  I would want to leave too if the governing body in this area wanted me dead.

“Well, anywhere I guess.  I’ve heard tales of different kingdoms over the mountains to the west and they aren’t as corrupt as this one.”  His eyes glazed and his eyes got a faraway look.  This was something I had to think about.  In reality, there was nothing that was keeping me here in Bastion.  I didn’t have any power or family that kept me rooted here, but I resented the thought of leaving everything and everypony I had ever known.

“I’ll think about it, Windstorm,” I replied, suddenly not as excited as I had been before. “I’m not making any promises to you right now and I can’t speak for Pearl, but I will think on what you’ve said.”

“That’s all I’m asking for, Surefire.  Thank you for not making me have to go through with the theft.  I’m sure that I would have screwed something up and we would have been done for.  You found something that suited my strength and look at the profits that we racked up doing that!”  I smiled.  I guess my crazy scheme had worked after all and now we had enough money to pay the guild for a good while.

“Let’s go back to the guild,” I said.  “I’ll have an answer for you a week after Pearl recovers.”

We arrived back at the guild and immediately turned in our earnings to the gryphons.  I didn’t doubt that we would have had some trouble with the other members of the guild.  After all, what kind of a thief is a thief that passes up the most money they’ve ever seen in one place.  Windstorm and I went to go check on Pearl.  To our surprise, it wasn’t Doc that greeted us at; it was Pearl.  She was awake and appeared to be fine.

Safe to say, neither Windstorm nor I were expecting this turn of events.  I quickly introduced the two of us to her.  I began trying to explain to her how she had come to be here until she interrupted me.

“Doc already told me about how I how I came to be here.  I find myself in your gratitude, Surefire.”  She walked up to me and gave me a tender embrace.  I found myself hugging her back.

“It was no problem,” I told her.  “I just couldn’t bear seeing you in such pain and so I rescued you, that’s all.”

“Well, whatever you did, you still saved me and I’m grateful for that.  Let’s go find someplace quiet to talk,” Pearl said.  I lead her and Windstorm to the guild’s unused loft.  The only person that ever frequented there was Gizmo and she was nowhere to be seen.  After we took a minute to get comfortable, Pearl began her story.

“There’s something important I have to tell you two,” said Pearl, waiting a second to make sure we were listening.  “I don’t remember anything before waking up here today.  I don’t know why I was attacked or who attacked me.  I don’t remember anything about my life before today and I guess I’m just going to have to live with the knowledge that I may never know a thing about who I used to be.  Doc talked to me when I woke up and when he heard about my condition, he told me that I had amnesia.  He told me that it was still possible to recover my memory, if something sparks a memory, but it was more likely that this will never happen.  The chances that I do get my memory back are further reduced by the fact that nobody here knows who I am and can point me to anything that may trigger something.”  Pearl looked exasperated and sad at the thought of not being able to remember who she was.

“I don’t know about Windstorm, but I will do everything to care for you.” I chimed in, doing my best to try and maintain a happy disposition.

“Pfft, I wouldn’t dream of leaving her or you alone.  I’ll stay with you and Surefire until you two no longer want my help.” Windstorm quickly replied.

“Well then it’s settled.  We all stick together, all for one and one for all right?” I said, concluding the conversation. “I do still have a question though.  What do you prefer we call you Pearl?  I just decided to call you that until you awoke and were able to tell me yourself.  Is that what you still want to be called?” I asked.

“I guess I don’t really have a choice in the matter.  People have already been calling me Pearl and, because I don’t remember my old name, I guess I’ll have to go with Pearl,” she replied.

“Well then, Pearl, let’s go back with the other ponies and discuss what we are going to do tomorrow.  Do you feel good enough to scavenge us some food while we try to get some money to pay the rent?” I asked.

“If that’s what you two need, then that’s what I’ll do.  Maybe I could even help one of you two even more depending on what you do tomorrow.” Pearl replied.  We quickly talked as though we had been old friends and split up who was going to do what the next day.  Windstorm was going to perform in a different part of town tomorrow, I would go hunting, and Pearl would try to tag along with another pony and see what type of job she would be good at.

Chapter Seven - Flight and Flight

Chapter Seven – Fight and Flight

“I’ll be with you until the end. Let’s walk through the fire together. Disappear in the golden sands…-Bush“

We all had our own specialties in our little group.  I was the hunter and would bring home plenty of small animals that would pay for at least two of us.  Windstorm was the showman of the group.  Windstorm brought in the most money in the group. As he refined his talents and performed in the wealthier areas of town, Windstorm brought in enough money so that we could eat well and could begin saving up bits.  Pearl quickly became the artist of the group and managed our money.  She was able to create Windstorm a uniform that helped his performances.  The surplus money was used to get me a crossbow that felt very natural in my hoofs.

Within a week, we were the richest ponies in the guild and we became an inseparable group.  Tomorrow was going to mark one week after Pearl had awoken.  I was going to break the news of Windstorm’s request to her and see how she reacted.  I had decided that I was going to stay with Pearl even if Windstorm left.  I hoped that Pearl would agree to go with Windstorm, but I realized that she may refuse.  If we left, she would lose all hope of regaining her memory.  That night I approached her alone, while Windstorm was off paying the gryphons.

“Pearl,” I said, “we have to talk about Windstorm.  The day that you awoke was the first day Windstorm and I had done a job together.  After that job, we had had more money than we would need for a while.  He gave me the money to help you and me out.  In return, he asked that I would consider leaving Bastion with him and running away, possibly to one of the kingdoms rumored to be situated over the mountains in the west.  I promised to give him an answer to his question tomorrow.  I have to know, are you going to go or not.  I’m going to stay with you.”

Pearl sighed, weighing the options.  “I’ll go with you two.  I don’t know what my past held but if it nearly got me killed, I’m not sure that I really want to know.”

I sighed.  I was hoping for this answer, but leaving everything that I knew would weigh heavily on me. I awaited the next day to talk to Windstorm.

The next day, our entire group got off to work early.  Pearl and I knew that it was likely to be our last day here, so we were going to have to make the most of the time in the Drudge.  Windstorm also got caught up in the excitement and set off to go perform in the Town Square.  It was going to be Windstorm’s biggest performance yet and was sure to bring in a nice paycheck.  I was excited to go hunting. Now that I had plenty of experience I was able to multitask and think about other things while hunting.  I had moved from hunting ground to hunting ground over the past week and had ended up learning how animals usually moved around.  With my crossbow in hoof, I usually had no problem picking up five kills a day which kept us all happy and fed.  Pearl spent the day scavenging for food that we would probably need as we left the city.

I got home the earliest of our trio and gathered up everything we would need in for our new life.  I had started packing the cloaks, knives, and my hunting equipment when I noticed Pearl running around, looking frantic.  When she saw me she pulled me aside and told me that somebody had recognized Windstorm and now the gryphon guards were after him.  I told Pearl to grab as much as she could and meet me and Windstorm at the Haunted Hollows.  She complied with my demands and ran off with most of our money and a few cloaks.  I grabbed my crossbow and put as much as I could into my saddlebags and ran out.  I was stopped short by Gizmo.  She had her automatic crossbow levitating at eye level and it was loaded.  I stopped short.

“What are you doing Gizmo? I have to go save Windstorm.” I yelled at her.

“Oh sorry, Surefire,” Gizmo stuttered.  “I just wanted you to have this as a goodbye present.” ‘Whoa, whoa, whoa.  A goodbye present? How did she know that we were leaving?’ I thought.

“Wait, where am I leaving to…” I began.

“Oh I know enough that when I see you three making plans and hoarding things that you’re going to make a break for it.  I just wanted you to have this,” she said lowering the crossbow into my hoofs and then taking my old one away. “I know I got the balance just right.  I’ve been watching you the past couple of days and I hope you remember me wherever you go.  I’ll miss having you to test my inventions…” Gizmo began to cry.  “I’m sure you’ll be able to figure out the cartridges.  I’ll miss you, Surefire.  You were only friend I’ve truly had here at the guild and I’m glad to have known you.”

While I was grateful for the present time was wasting.  I was going to have to make this one short goodbye though before I could go rescue my friend, again.

“I’m sure that this will be invaluable to me.  I’m going to need it if it comes down to me outshooting the gryphons to save Windstorm.  If I ever come back to town, I will be sure to come and visit you and try out all your inventions.  I have to go now.  Time is wasting and Windstorm needs help.  Goodbye, Gizmo,  I can’t tell you how much you’ve helped me in this short time we’ve been friends, but I know that you can help others too if you just apply yourself.  Good luck, Gizmo.”  I gave her a quick hug and was on my way to save Windstorm.

I ran to the Town Square first.  It wasn’t that hard to tell where Windstorm had flown off to by the path of overturned vendor’s tables on the ground.  Following this path in a straight line was going to be hard, especially since I have no magic powers or any wings.  I decided to go for the second (or third depending on how you count) best way to pursue the pursuers.  I hopped, skipped, and jumped on the overturned market stands until I reached my first roof.  From here it was just like running on the branches in the forest, except much easier.  I caught a glimpse of some of the gryphons over to my right and took a long jump from the marble slab roof of one building to a smooth stone roofing of a building across the street.  The gryphons appeared to be within sight of Windstorm as they were firing their crossbows.  Unfortunately, I didn’t have the viewpoint to be able to see where he was.

As I rushed closer and closer to the gryphons, I began to take count of how many targets I had.  My hunting senses took over me and I began to scout out the best place to net kills from without being seen.  There were five gryphons chasing Windstorm and, from experience, I knew that I had five bolts in each of the cartridges of Gizmo’s crossbow.  I either had to disable or kill five gryphons with one bolt apiece.  I was beginning to get worried until I looked and saw that there were two more spare clips in my saddlebags.  ‘Thank you, Gizmo,’ I thought.  Without those two cartridges, I would have had to take some of my precious time to reload each bolt.  With eighteen shots I was sure that I take most of them out.  If it came to it, I hoped that Windstorm and I would be able to escape from a few injured gryphons.

I got into crossbow range of all of the gryphons and began looking for a spot to set up shop.  From where I was standing, I still could not see Windstorm but I knew where he was from the direction the gryphons were shooting.  I found cover behind some stored hay bales on the top of one of the houses.  I still had the element of surprise on the gryphons because they were not expecting anyone to come in and stop them.  If they didn’t know that I was coming then they wouldn’t be expecting some crossbow bolts to be sticking out of their hind ends.  In my mind, I plotted out where I wanted each shoot to go.  I set up the cartridges beside my right, shooting, hoof.  When I ran out of bolts, I was going to drop the cartridge I had into the saddlebag underneath the handle and pop in another cartridge.  I quickly released the current cartridge from its nesting in the crossbow to make sure it wouldn’t get stuck and took aim.  Apparently, Gizmo had been tinkering with the crossbow.  The crossbow fired at the same rate (which was pretty fast) and now it was also much more powerful.  The recoil forced my aim to waver slightly but I was already taking the next shot and taking into account the increased power.  If the gryphon I was aiming for hadn’t been almost directly above me, I probably would have overshot my target.  With the six bolts in the first cartridge, I was able to hit three of the gryphons with at least two bolts a piece.  I popped the next cartridge into the crossbow and fired the four of the six shots into the other two gryphons.  I shot the remaining two bolts at the gryphons that were beginning to recover. I slipped the empty cartridges into my saddlebag and slid my third and final cartridge into the crossbow.  I quickly threw my saddlebags over my shoulder and hopped across roofs in the direction the gryphons had been shooting.  I caught a glimpse of Windstorm taking off towards the woods.  I decided that know would be a good time to run from the gryphons that were sure to come looking for me. I hopped down from the roof where I had been running and covered myself in one of the dark cloaks Windstorm and I had taken from the hood ponies what seemed like ages ago.  I found a dimly shaded alley and hid myself within the shadows until the gryphons had passed.

It was nearly dark by the time I felt safe about leaving the confines of the alley.  It was time for me to head out to the Haunted Hollows and meet up with Pearl.  I doubted that Windstorm would return to the guild and I assumed that he would either run off like he said he would or stay in the fringes of the woods and look for me or Pearl.  I leaned towards the second option because Windstorm wouldn’t want to leave by himself unless he knew that we weren’t going to come with him.  I made it to the edge of the Bastion only to remember that Bastion was walled off and the only exits were guarded.  There was no way I was going to make it out of here through there.

I sat looking at the guards before the portcullis.  There was one pony in plate mail and two gryphons.  It appeared that the pony was in charge.  I considered shooting all three of them and just leaving through the gate but they were too well armored and I don’t know how to operate the gates.  Another flaw with that plan is that I practically tell anyone who wants me captured the way I went.  I sat looking at my surroundings to try to figure out another way out of Bastion.  There is always more than one solution to a problem.  You just have to focus on solutions, not the problem, and something will always come to you.  I continued looking for a solution and it came to me.  The roof of the guard’s tower was high enough for me to climb onto the top of the walls.  I could either wait for the guards to change shifts or distract them enough to climb up to the top of the tower.  Between these two options, option one sounded much safer.  The only flaw with waiting for the guards to change shift is I had no clue when that would happen and I wanted to get to Pearl as quickly as possible.  Option two involved distracting the guards.  To distract someone, you have to make sure that they are forced to look for the source of the trouble.  With guards, this was particularly easy. Guards were responsible for keeping people safe and stop them from killing each other.  If I could cause a commotion, then the guards would be forced to respond and my way would be clear.  Luckily for me, there were still some ponies shopping right before sunset.  I hurried over to the vendor and looked around.  I spotted a stuck-up pony.  He was going to be my victim.

I stole a beautiful jeweled necklace from a vendor.  It had been the centerpiece of his most expensive collection.  With my years of practice, it had been relatively easy to take.  I now had a limited amount of time before the salespony would notice the missing necklace.  I slipped the necklace into one of my victim’s saddlebags.  When I heard the salespony begin shouting that there was a thief, I bumped into my victim, causing him to spill everything he was carrying onto the ground.  The salesperson immediately noticed his precious necklace skid across the cobbled path and he immediately fell into a rage.  I ran away from the scene, but I could still hear the sound of my victim getting kicked and called a thief.  Apparently, I wasn’t the only pony that had heard this.  The guards quickly came to investigate, probably the only commotion they had seen in a long time.  Now I took my chance and slipped into the front door of the guard tower.

I ran up the first flight of stairs and was about to continue going up the tower until I heard voices coming down the stairs from the third floor.  I hopped out of the stairwell at the second floor and hid in one of the closet that appeared to contain janitor’s items.  Through a crack in the closet door, I saw two gryphons joking around and laughing walking down the stairs.  From what I heard, the two gryphons were the night shift going to replace the guards I had sent off.  Well I guess there is no going back now.  After I heard them, leave the stairwell I began creeping out of the closet.  Then I had an idea.  I stepped back into the janitor’s closet and donned the disgusting garb.  I packed the rest of my things into my saddlebags and grabbed a bucket and mop.  I confidently stepped out of the closet and spent a bit of time sweeping the floor around me.  It would give me some credibility if was to get questioned.  I began working my way up the stairs until I reached the third floor.  It was a good thing I hadn’t tried sneaking up the stairs.  The third floor was the guard’s barracks. In my janitor’s uniform, I attracted no attention and was able to slip past the gryphons and other guards before anyone got a good look at me.  The fourth floor was nearly empty and I made it to the fifth floor without any problems.  The fifth floor was devoid of any guards when I reached it.  It appeared that this was just where they stored armor that the guards didn’t need.  I decided to help myself to a spare crossbow and a good amount of bolts.  Those would definitely come in handy in the Haunted Hollows. I opened the window on this top floor and climbed out.

Climbing.  Usually I felt pretty sure about myself while doing it, but it was considerably harder when it was nighttime.  The outcropping on the window wasn’t that large and it was made of stone so my hooves were having a hard time finding purchase.  I had to go about this quietly if I didn’t want the guards below me to notice me and send word into the tower.  If I got caught now, there would be no escape.  I firmly planted my two hind hooves on the outcropping and my front hooves where holding on to the outer frame of the window.  A small railing on the top of the roof was just about a meter away from where I was.  I was going to have to try to grab onto it and pull my body up without falling or making enough noise to alert the guards below me.  To say the least, I was nervous.  I was beginning to sweat and I knew that if I just waited here at the top of the tower with the wind buffeting me, I was going to lose my nerve or get spotted; neither of these were good options.  I began loading all of my weight into my hind hooves, preparing for a jump.  ‘Just a hop, skip, and a jump,’ I thought to myself.  With a burst of energy, I sprang towards the roof. My front hooves made it to the top of the roof.  I couldn’t find any purchase until one of my hooves reached a ledge.  There was a ridge on the end of the roof.  I swung the rest of my body back and forth in an attempt to get the rest of my body up onto the roof.  After swinging my body back and forth a few times, I was able to get onto the roof of the guard tower.  It was just one more hop and I would be over the wall that guards Bastion.  I wound up and jumped.  I caught onto the top of the wall and looked down towards the ground.  I was pretty high up, but it looked like the outside of the wall was in a worse state than the inside of the wall.  Not that I was surprised, everybody wanted an appearance of perfection but didn’t care enough to actually fix the problems.  I slid down the wall, and jumped in between the large cracks.  I made it to the ground safely and now I had to go find Pearl.

I found Pearl still waiting for me where I told her to wait earlier.  I led her into the fringes of the Haunted Hollows and told her what had happened over the course of the day.  She was worried about Windstorm, but I consoled her by telling her that I thought that he would stay in this area for a little while to try to see if we would accompany him.  Tomorrow, I promised, we would go look for him and tell him that we would go with him.

We hunkered down and tried to sleep.  Because we couldn’t risk a fire, we had to sleep close together underneath the cloaks we had.  I found it reassuring to have Pearl’s body warmth next to mine.  She was the only thing familiar to me in this new life that we found ourselves in and we were going to have to depend on each other.  The Haunted Hollows, the place that everypony I knew had ever feared, was now our home and we were going to have to face its terrors to reach the happiness promised on the other side.  I hoped that Windstorm was all right.  He had nobody to sleep beside him and keep him warm and he was smart enough not to use fire to avoid being seen.  Tomorrow, I was going to find him.  The three of us had formed a special bond in the past week at the guild and I wasn’t going to allow it to break apart because of a change in location.  Pearl had more practical thoughts.  She didn’t even consider not finding Windstorm a possibility and was more focused on where we would get our food and water.  She had looked through everything we brought with us and organized everything into things we needed for survival and things that would be nice to have but weren’t necessary.  I admired how calm Pearl could be, even though all hopes of finding her past were gone.  She had lost that life and was again transitioning into a new lifestyle.  She made me feel good with an aura of security and calm.  I knew that I had made the best choice of my life by saving her and that was one decision that I would never regret.

As we lay in the dark, attempting to fall asleep, I could not help but being a bit nervous as to what our future would hold.  Did we have a chance of even making it to the kingdoms in the west?  Would we be killed by the forest like all the stories said, or would we persevere and come out to find a better life?  Who even knows if life is better in those kingdoms to the west?  What if it was just as bad there as it was here?  I felt Pearl roll over beside me and decided that with her and Windstorm at my side, I would face whatever this world threw at us.

Chapter Eight - Survival of the Fittest

Chapter Eight - Survival of the Fittest

“It's the eye of the tiger, it's the thrill of the fight, Risin' up to the challenge of our rival…-“

Pearl and I awoke the next day at daybreak.  We each took a meager bit of food out of our food saddlebag and had breakfast.  Our food wouldn’t hold out long, and we had to conserve every bit of it until we found a good source of food.   We decided that we were going to go after food first.  Windstorm wouldn’t have any food and we weren’t sure what kind of condition he would be in after yesterday.  I decided that it would be good if I went hunting because I was familiar with being on my own in the middle of the woods.  Pearl was going to scout out a good place for us to stay until we were all ready to head off.  We needed a place that would provide decent shelter from rain and obscure the view of any fire that we would need for cooking the animals that I killed.  I was hoping for some small cave that we could use because it would be easier to find than some thick mat of leaves.

I spent about a half hour figuring out how the cartridges of my crossbow worked and the fastest ways to refill the bolts.  I came up with a technique that involved laying six crossbow bolts across my front leg and letting them slide into place within the wooden cartridge.  I would then drop the excess bolts into a saddlebag I held underneath me.  With a quick snap of my hoof, I could ram the wooden cartridge into place and be ready to shoot within three seconds of refilling.  I got this maneuver down pretty quickly and was fairly comfortable with my new weapon.

“I’m going out to go hunting,” I told Pearl.  “Hopefully, there are some animals that we can eat in here and I’ll also keep a lookout for berries.  I don’t plan on being gone for too long so I’ll be back here in around five hours.  Will you be back by then?”

Pearl nodded.  “Yeah, that sounds good Surefire.  Are you sure that you don’t want any help?  I bet I could help you spot some things.”

It was a pleasant idea.  I didn’t exactly relish the thought of going out into the Haunted Hollows alone.  On the other hand, I realized that we would get more done if split up than if we worked together.  “I’m sure, Pearl.  In five hours, we will meet back here and you can show me what kind of place you’ve found.  After that, we will have another five hours of daylight where we can search for Windstorm.”

“If you think it’s for the best, I’ll go look for a place to camp.  Just stay safe please?  I will be waiting here for you when you come back and if you don’t, I don’t know what I’ll do.”  She walked over to me and gave me a tight hug, as though she was afraid that she would lose me if she let go.  I knew that we would both be worried for each other over the next five hours, but there was nothing that we could do to alleviate that fear.

“There is nothing in this forest that can stop me from coming back to you, Pearl. Nothing.  The same goes for Windstorm.  The two of you have become closer than family to me and I refuse to give up on either of you without a fight.  I’ll be back here.”  With this emotional speech, I gave her a quick hug and walked off into the depths of the Haunted Hollows.

The Haunted Hollows honestly weren’t as scary as everyone made them out to be.  I mean sure, I ran like mad away from some large beast that I had never seen before, but other than that, it was almost the same.  I found two rabbits in the first three hours of hunting, which was less than I was used to. These rabbits were also much thinner and more spread out throughout the forest.  I reasoned this was because of a larger number of predators and more competition for food with all the strange animals that I had seen around.  I had seen a deer, but I doubted that I would get anything beneficial from killing it.  I would probably have to waste time skinning the meat off of its body and leave most of it behind because I doubted I could carry it through the rough terrain.  The thick underbrush provided splendid cover but it was extremely dense and very hard to move through.  The deer would have only slowed me down further and I would have been late to the meeting place with Pearl.  After finding a couple bushes of familiar berries, I decided to head back.  It was enough food for all three of us to eat, but it would not provide any leftovers.

Another problem we had was water.  I had forgotten about the need for a portable water source as I had lived close to a relatively clean source of it.  Now, in the wild, water became a commodity.  I found a stream while wandering around and spent a few minutes drinking as much as I could.  I didn’t know when I was going to have another opportunity to get a drink and I wasn’t going to waste this one.

After my drink, I decided to take a short break before setting off to the meeting place again.  I spent my short break lying on the ground thinking about how we could get some sort of canteen to hold water.  Making one out of wood would be no good because wood is too porous and would lose the water quickly.  A metal canteen would be nice, but in the wild, we had no access to any place to produce something of that caliber.  These thoughts were flowing through my head and I soon began to feel that I was nodding off.  My eyes had closed and I was beginning to fall asleep.  I was shaking myself awake when I began to feel a warm rain. ‘Strange,’ I thought, ‘I didn’t remember it looking like it was going to rain today.  And since when was rain this warm?’ I yawned and opened my eyes.  I stopped mid yawn.  Standing over top of me was the beast that I had run away from earlier today.  With a head of a lion and a tail of a scorpion, I was finally able to identify it as a manticore from the stories that I had heard in my childhood.  It appeared to be about to begin its evening meal, me.  I gave my brain a split second to evaluate my situation.  My crossbow would be effective at this close range, but I somehow doubted that I could take down a beast as large as this one with a few bolts from a crossbow.  My knife was in the saddlebag near my front hoof and I could reach it with a quick roll.  I again decided that this wasn’t a good option either as I probably couldn’t even kill the thing with my knife.  My only other option was to roll away from my weapons and make a run for it.  It would be disappointing to lose my gear, but it would be even more disappointing to lose my life.  I decided that this was going to be my best option and took it.

In one swift and violent motion, I threw my body weight to the side as fast as I could and I was able to pull myself up onto my hooves.  I made a mental note of where I left my stuff and ran in the opposite direction of my meeting place with Pearl.  It made sense that I would want to keep such a dangerous beast away from her.  I knew that I was going to be late to the meeting and she was going to be extremely worried and even more reluctant to let me out of her sight again.  There was nothing I could do about that, and so I did all that I could. Run. ‘Funny how on the verge of death, all I can think about is how Pearl will feel.  I wonder if I’m just a bit to attached to her.  Maybe I need to see a doctor or something.’

The chase lasted for ten heart pounding minutes.  The manticore was pretty interested in me and knew its way around the forest very well.  The only way I managed to elude it was by fitting through spaces to small for the manticore to fit through.  At the end of the chase, I was dead tired.  I could see that the manticore wasn’t tiring as fast as I was.  I came up with a plan to allow me time to recover and hopefully cause the manticore to lose interest in me.  I climbed into a tree that the manticore could not climb and I spent time catching my breath on a tree branch.  The manticore seemed pleased that it had treed its quarry and was now ready for me to climb down and embrace my fate.  I had other plans.  After a five-minute rest, I let the manticore know what my real plan was.  I began hopping from tree branch to tree branch, back towards where my stuff was.  This annoyed the manticore, he appeared to have a much harder time navigating while keeping his eyes looking into the canopy of the forest.  Some story I had heard back at the guild mentioned that a pony a long time ago had made friends with a manticore by pulling a thorn out of its paw.  This manticore didn’t appear to be crazed, I judged based upon its blood red eyes that incessantly followed me.  I thought I lost the manticore a few times in the canopy only to see it reappear thirty seconds later, still following me.

Twenty minutes or so passed in this fashion until I again reached the stream.  I  could still see my stuff was in the same condition I left it in and I desperately wanted to retrieve it.  I hadn’t seen the manticore for a few minutes and I judged that know was a safe time to make a break for it.  I hopped down to some of the lower branches on the tree that I was on and jumped into the stream.  I swam out of the stream and threw all of my things into my bag.  I took a split second to take out the semi-used cartridge of bolts and replaced it with a full cartridge. I began running back towards where I was supposed to meet Pearl.  I was almost hidden by the underbrush, when the manticore again came bounding after me.  I appeared to have irritating it by alluding its attempts to kill me and now it seemed to be in a blood rage.  I moved through the underbrush as quickly as I could, but my hind leg got caught up in some sort of plant.  I couldn’t free my leg and I turned around to face the manticore.  I was on my back and all I had in my hoof was my crossbow.  The manticore came crashing through the underbrush and roared as it saw its query was trapped.  I took this opportunity to shoot at the manticore in a final attempt to slay it or keep it at bay.  I shot three bolts at its eyes, one of which hit its targets and caused the beast to roar in pain and anger.  My remaining three bolts went into the manticore’s open mouth and the manticore appeared unfazed by my bolts and continued on its path towards me.  The manticore began to slow down, I guessed to gloat in its victory before eating its prey.  The manticore then began to make a wheezing sound and its blood started coming out of its lion ears and mouth.  Apparently, my bolts had been effective in hurting it.  The manticore’s eyes showed its unbelieving rage as it felt its life force seep out of its body.  It took a lazy swing at me and gave me four rows of claw marks in my side.  It appeared to be attempting to take another swing at me until it fell over onto me coughing out the last bit of blood onto my coat as he died.

I had to squeeze myself out from underneath the manticore’s body and then untangle my leg from the vines that held me captive.  There was no feeling greater than the feeling of relief I felt at that moment when I realized that my life had been saved.  I stood over the dead body of the manticore dumbstruck.  ‘Wait, I just killed something THIS big?’ I thought. ‘I must be dreaming.’ I pinched myself to try and figure out if I was asleep or not.  I felt pain so I guess it wasn’t a dream.

Well there was no reason that I shouldn’t make the most out of this.  I took out my knife and began carving out chunks of meat that looked edible in the manticore.  I decided to just cut off the scorpion’s tail because I didn’t know if the meat there would be poisonous.  While I was carving the manticore up, I noticed that its stomach looked as though it was made of a very thick lining of muscle.  I spent a couple minutes cutting it out and looked at it.  The stomach lining looked to be extremely resilient and I figured that we could use it to cook things in, like soup, and maybe use it to store water.  Either way, I was excited with the kill and was eager to show Pearl what I had gotten. Pearl.  I was late.  I scooped up my things and ran as fast as I could back to the meeting place. ‘She’s going to kill me for being so late,’ I thought. ‘Oh well, at least we know have a decent surplus of food.’

When I arrived back at the meeting place, Pearl practically tackled me and looked at me with a face full of worry.

“Where have you been, Surefire? You’re over an hour late?  I didn’t know what to do.  Should I have gone after you and looked for you or was I just supposed to wait here?  What if you were injured and you needed my help?”  Pearl hit me across the face and then pulled me into another one of her tight hugs.  “Why would you make me worry like that Surefire?  I thought you were always true to your word.”

She pulled away from me and gasped.  Her white coat was covered in blood.

“Are you okay?  I’m sorry I didn’t realize you were hurt with your black coat and all.”  Pearl began looking all over my body for the source of the blood.

“Calm down Pearl, most of this blood isn’t even mine.  I do have a few cuts on that are hidden by my saddlebags that you can tend to if it makes you feel better.”  She finally let me put down my saddlebags and get comfortable.  When she saw the long deep scratches the manticore had left on my side, she began wrapping it up in some thick leaves and fawning over me.  I didn’t really mind because I liked any attention I could get from Pearl.  While she nursed my wounds, I told her what happened during the day.  She was especially excited about the stomach that we could use to hold hot rocks and make soup when our food supplies were running low.  When I showed her how much meat I brought for us to eat, she was extremely excited and began figuring out how many days it would last us.  After Pearl was satisfied that I was fine and wouldn’t die, she led me to a cave that she had found earlier that day.

“Well, this is home for a little while,” She said welcoming me to a nice, dry cave in the side of a small hill.  Well it was actually more of an alcove than a cave but it would suit our purposes just fine.  I lay down everything that I didn’t need and pulled out my crossbow and an extra cartridge of arrows.  In the couple of weeks ago, I would have scoffed if anypony told me that I would be arming myself for a fight to the death every time I stepped out of someplace familiar.  Experience had taught me that having a little extra firepower on my side was never a bad idea.  Now properly armed, I was ready to go looking for Windstorm.

“Ready?” I asked Pearl, who had been gearing up to go find Windstorm.

“Ready,” Pearl confirmed.  With that, we stepped out of our humble abode and we were on the hunt.  Our target, a grey coated pegasus with a green mane.  How hard could it be for two earth ponies in unfamiliar territory?

Chapter Nine - A Light in the Dark

Chapter Nine – A Light in the Dark

“The boys are back in town, I said the boys are back in town…-Thin Lizzy“

Where exactly do you start looking for a pegasus in the wild?  My guess was where he was familiar.  When I first met Windstorm, he told me that he had been hiding in the fringes of the Haunted Hollows.  I intended to walk just inside of the Haunted Hollows, in the area closest to Bastion. I assumed this would be a good a place as any to start looking for Windstorm.  Pearl and I walked close to each other as we went about looking for Windstorm.  We dared not call his name to loudly for fear that some of the gryphon guards would be snooping around the Haunted Hollows and catch us.  Though I doubted they knew that I was the pony that had done the shooting, what kind of pony would visit this place if they weren’t being hunted?

Pearl spent most of the time trying to piece together the best way to go about looking for Windstorm.  I spent most of my time looking in every direction for anything that meant us harm.  It was tough trying to stay in open areas so that Windstorm would be able to see us without also being visible by any gryphons flying overhead looking for convicts.  We saw a few before they spotted us and we hid in a bush long enough for them to move a safe distance away.

After about three hours of seeing no signs of life in the forest, I began to be discouraged.  Maybe Windstorm had been too scared of being captured to risk staying close to the fringe.  I lost myself in thoughts of how we were going to get Windstorm back when I noticed something in the canopy to our left.  A scorpion’s tail poked out from behind some trees and swayed lazily back and forth.  I didn’t think the manticore had seen us, but I stopped Pearl before she started calling for Windstorm again.  With a movement of my head, I gestured towards the tail sticking out of the bushes.  Pearl gasped into my front hoof that was laid across her mouth.  She had heard enough today about my earlier experience that she knew the danger we were in.

I pulled Pearl back the way we had come from and we headed back as quietly as we could.  The manticore was apparently not interested in us because we saw it come out and look at us and turn away.  I was scared.  The last time I killed a manticore, I had gotten away on pure luck.  I doubted I could repeat the same trick a second time.  We continued away from the where we had seen the manticore and decided that it would be best if we turned around and headed back to our cave.

We reached our cave without any further scares, but we were disappointed that we hadn’t seen any sign of Windstorm.  We decided to renew our attempts on the next day and get some sleep.  It was late fall and things were starting to get cold.  Pearl and I decided that it would be okay to start a fire in our alcove to keep us warm for the night.  We figured that anypony looking for us would more likely freeze to death than find us in this forest.  Pearl and I went to bed, neither of us voicing our concern over our missing companion, in fear that giving thought to the matter would bring it in truth.

Pearl and I both slept poorly.  All of our thoughts were dedicated on how we were going to find Windstorm.  I missed that pegasus and hoped he was doing fine.  I wondered if he was hungry or whether he was able to provide food for himself.

It was a bit after midnight when our fire went out.  We must have burned through all the sticks that we had managed to gather over the night so I set out to gather up a few more.  It was one of the coldest nights so far this year and it would probably only be getting colder.  I was glad that we had the cloaks that we had taken from the hood ponies.  Hood Ponies. Windstorm.  Why is it that everything always brings me to thoughts of my friends?

I walked out a ways to grab the sticks for the fire so that I wouldn’t wake Pearl up with the rustling of branches.  I went about gathering these sticks in a very mechanical fashion, just absent-mindedly doing my duty.  I was jogged back into my usual state of mind when I noticed some light coming from deeper within the forest.  I decided that I would go investigate the source of the light.  What if there was a fire?  We would be in danger and we would want to get away.  At least that’s the logic I used to justify going towards the light.  The real reason was to see whether Windstorm had made a fire like us and was trying to keep himself warm on this cold night.

As I approached the light, I saw that there was more light than could come from just one lone fire.  I still couldn’t see the source, but I thought that there was likely a forest fire.  If so, I had to make sure and go and wake Pearl so we could make a run for it.  I moved closer and closer to the fire until I realized that I could also hear the voices of numerous ponies.  ‘Strange,’ I thought, ‘I thought this place was supposed to be haunted and stuff.  What’s going on?’ I smelled the sweet smell of cooking meet. ‘Well it’s definitely not a forest fire,’ I thought, ‘I guess it’s a camp of some sort.’

With that, I stepped into the light and was overwhelmed. There, in the middle of the forest, was a large camp of ponies that were gathered around large camp fires.  These ponies didn’t look like they were out to hurt anyone, so I approached their camp.  I approached one of the large, roaring campfires that were spread out throughout the camp.

“Excuse me,” I asked some of the ponies at one of the outer fires, “what is this place?  I didn’t know there were any other living ponies here in the Haunted Hollows.”

One of the older mares that was sitting at the fire responded.  “Where have you been that you haven’t heard of the Resistance?  This here is the main camp.  We are the ponies that ran into the Haunted Hollows when Queen Borea was overthrown.  We’ve been waiting for the perfect time to strike back against the usurpers.  How is it that you, little pony, have never heard of us?”

“My two friends and I were chased out of Bastion two days back.  Pearl and I have been trying to find our other friend, Windstorm, whom we lost.  I hadn’t seen anything of this camp before I saw the lights in the forest tonight.  It’s true that we haven’t travelled deep into the forest, but I’ve still never heard of your Resistance.  I thought that everybody who supported Queen Borea was massacred after the coup.”

“Is that what they’ve told you in Bastion?  They don’t even tell the people that there are forces gathering around them because they will turn against the government.  They know that they don’t even have decent control of their largest city.” The mare said. “Did you hear that guys?  The usurpers are so scared of us that they just want everyone to pretend that we aren’t even real!”

“Is there anywhere around here that me and my companions can stay?” I asked, “Is there someone I can talk to so that I can figure out how I can help you guys?  I’m sure one of my companions would particularly interest you.  Windstorm claimed to be the son of Borea’s advisor.”

“Really?” the mare asked.  “I guess you should probably go to the middle of the camp and see the Commander.  She’ll know what to do and tell you where to go.”

“Thank you,” I told the mare, “I hope that we will be able to contribute something to this movement before we head off towards the kingdoms in the west.”

“Good luck,” the mare wished me and she continued her conversation with the group around the campfire.

I decided that I would go wake Pearl up and tell her what I had found.  It would be great to be around other ponies and fires that wouldn’t go out.  I quickly ran back to our cave and woke her up and told her the good news.  She was enthralled by the news and figured that if we had found this large camp, then Windstorm would eventually find it and we would be reunited.  That sounded good so we both headed back in the direction of the camp with all of our things.  It was close to daybreak and I hoped that we would be able to sort everything out at the Resistance camp so that we could go looking for Windstorm again.

We arrived at the largest tent at the center of camp.  Pearl and I talked to the two guards in front of the tent.  We explained our situation and I explained how the mare had recommended that I come see the Commander to figure out how I could help.  The guards decided to let me through to see the Commander.

The Commander was a light brown unicorn with a dark green mane.  She seemed to be around twice my age and looked to be worn down from the constant struggle of staying alive in a forest.  There was something about the Commander that made me perceive her as stronger than she appeared to be on the outside.  She had some type of inner mettle that people could feel radiating out of her and she was able to command her people with absolute loyalty.

“Sit down ponies,” the Commander told us.  “I’ve heard that you two have a story for me that could be potentially useful for the Resistance.”

“We have been looking for our friend who, by the sounds of things, would be invaluable to the Resistance.  Windstorm, the friend that I’ve mentioned, was the son of the Borea’s advisor.  He escaped the massacre of the Queen’s associates and was living with us for about a week.  He had a warrant on his head and was compromised a few days back.  We’ve been looking for him since then.  We were wondering if we could stay here because it’s likely that he will also find this camp and we could be reunited.  We could do some work for the Resistance before we leave.”

“Well this is an interesting story,” the Commander replied.  “I would be glad to offer you a place to stay but I do have a few questions about your story.  Who are you two and how did you come to know this ‘Windstorm’.”

I was pretty embarrassed by my past.  I had been a thief and a poacher, doing whatever I could to make sure that I could stay alive until my next meal.  I don’t even know how we were going to explain Pearl’s past when even she didn’t know what her past was.  I decided to explain the past few weeks when I had saved both Windstorm and Pearl.

“My name is Surefire,” I began, “I was a thief and hunter for the Horseshoe Guild in the Drudge.  I earned my cutie mark by being naturally talented using ranged weapons.  I’ve lived in the Drudge my entire life.  Pearl, I found when taking a day off from work at the guild.  I found her in a back alley and worked to nurse her back to health.  She had been badly beaten.”  I indicated some of the scars that were now a pale shade of pink upon Pearl’s body.  “She was in a coma for a while and when she awoke, she didn’t remember her past.  I met Windstorm about three days after finding Pearl.  I didn’t have enough kills that day to pay to stay in the guild so I was thrown outside.  I was hiding from the hood ponies until Windstorm got cornered in the alley that I was hiding in.  I helped him kill the ponies and we’ve been friends since then.”

The Commander smiled.  “I guess then you are actually his friends.  Who knew that two street rats could become friends with one of the most important pegasi in Equestria?”

“Who are you calling street rats and how do you know Windstorm?” Pearl asked, getting defensive know that we were in the dark.

“Calm down.  Windstorm is fine, he checked back in yesterday and told us about two earth ponies that he had made friends with on his recon mission.”  Recon mission? What was the Commander talking about?  The Commander laughed at the confused expressions on our faces. “Windstorm is, in fact, not the son of the queen’s advisor.  He is the real leader of the Resistance.  He is the son of Queen Borea.  She sent him out, in secret, when she first began to suspect that her power was in question.  She sent him to me.  I was one the leader of Celetia’s guard and she charged me with taking care of Windstorm.”

This was too much for me.  How could the queen have had a child and nobody had known about it?  How long has there been a Resistance force and why hadn’t they shown themselves?  Pearl, fainted when she realized what she was hearing.  The Commander calmly splashed some water over her face and waited for her to come to before continuing.

“Anyway, your friend Windstorm was tired of waiting in this forest and wanted to see what it was his duty to save.  We gave him a week to go into Bastion and see the corruptness of the government.  We also wanted him to look for any ponies that he deemed fit to help with the Resistance.  I guess you two met his requirements.  We all thank you for saving Windstorm’s life.  I’m sure you two are eager to see your friend again and he is also eager to see you two.  When you leave my tent, one of my guards will lead you to him.” The mare said with a smile on her lips.  “Before you go, there is one other issue that needs to be discussed.  We need to figure out how you will be contributing to the Resistance.  You do plan on helping, don’t you?”

“Of course we will,” Pearl and I replied together.  I guessed this would be something to the effect of evaluating our talents to see where we would benefit the Resistance the most.

The Commander gave us a look.  “I guess we can wait until a little bit later today.  Go on.  Go, Windstorm is waiting for you two.”

“Thank you,” I said earnestly and I lead Pearl outside.

“I told you we would find Windstorm here,” she told me with a smile.  “I just didn’t think that we would find him in this manner.”

We arrived at a small hut about a half mile away from the main camp.  Apparently this was Windstorm’s place where he stayed.  We walked in once our guard explained who we were.  There, pacing around in a small living room was Windstorm.  Upon seeing us, his face lit up and he practically flew over to us.

“I’m so glad that you two are all right.  I’ve been worried about you two.  I guess that the Commander has already told you everything about me.” Windstorm said.

“Oh Windstorm, you don’t know what we’ve been through looking for you.”  Pearl ran forward and gave him one of her hugs. ‘Why is it that when I make Pearl worry, she slaps me, and when Windstorm makes her worry, she just gives him a hug?’ Okay so I’m a bit jealous of the attention that Pearl is giving Windstorm.  Even though I was a little envious of Windstorm, I still went up and gave him a pat on the back.

“It’s good to see you’re still alive,” I told him.  “Good to see that you didn’t get turned into a porcupine by those gryphons.”  I smiled.

“If you hadn’t been there, I probably would have been captured and the Resistance would have been compromised.  I knew I could always count on you, Surefire.  Just like your name.  You always come through for ponies in need.”

It was great to have Windstorm back.  We spent some time telling him about the past few days and what we had gone through trying to find him.

“I’m sorry that I lied to you guys,” he said.  “I didn’t know if I could trust you at first and I had to know whether you were loyal to Smoothtounge or the other usurpers.  It killed me to lie to both of you, but I felt that it was necessary so that my cover wasn’t blown.  You know that feeling don’t you Surefire?”  Yeah I did.  It was the same feeling I got whenever I stole something.  I didn’t like doing it, but my life was important to me and I would do anything to preserve it.  Windstorm could tell from my eyes that I knew exactly what he meant.

Windstorm continued. “Well I guess it’s now my turn to tell you what happened at my show.”  That was a good point; neither Pearl nor I knew what had happened to cause the gryphons to chase Windstorm.  “After my show, everything seemed to be going well, I had gathered the most money from one show yet.  I was ready to head back until I was approached by one of those rich ponies.  He came up to me and told me that I was going to be his personal performer.  I politely declined, I was planning on heading back here with you two or alone later that day anyway, so I didn’t need some kind of patron.  Anyways, he didn’t take it as well as I wanted and called the guards for me.  He started yelling that I was a rebel and was planning to overthrow Smoothtounge.  I guess he didn’t know that he was pretty close to the truth, but I fled.  The gryphons didn’t seem to care whether or not I was actually a rebel.  They seemed to care more that they finally had some action.  They chased me through the market for a while and I couldn’t seem to find any place to lose them so I took flight.  They followed me into the sky and began shooting.  They got pretty close and I knew that I was likely going to get hit if I didn’t break my line of sight with them.  I pulled into a dive and hid behind some barrels.  I was planning on waiting until they all shot at my hiding place and fly off, but they kept me pinned down by shooting in turn and called for backup.  The backup would be able to corner me and I would be a dead pony.  Then something strange happened, the ponies stopped shooting and fell from the sky.  I guessed that Surefire had something to do with it and so I flew out into the Haunted Hollows, hoping that you two would follow me and find this camp.  I had to admit, when you two didn’t show up yesterday, I was starting to doubt whether you were going to actually follow me or were too scared of the stories you’ve been told about this place.”

“I had told Pearl the day before you left about the offer to leave with you.  She decided that she would come with you.  We were going to tell you when you came back from your show but we never had the chance.”  I told him.  “So we decided to go hunting in the Haunted Hollows for you and now here we are, reunited again.”

“It sure is good to have you guys back.  It’s kind of hard to make friends with people who think that you are the only hope of restoring the monarchy.” Windstorm said laughing.  Windstorm cut of his laughter after a few moments. “Now in all seriousness I need to talk to you about your future here.  You two are going to be taken around and show off your skills.  I assume that you, Surefire, will be working with our best sharpshooters and you, Pearl, will probably go to work with our tacticians.  Whatever you end up getting signed up for, you will still be working with me.  There was one thing that I didn’t lie to you two about. I still plan on going to the kingdoms in the west to see if they will help us or not.  I would love it if you two were to accompany me there.”

“I’m in,” chimed Pearl.

“You can count on us,” I replied.  “I mean we can’t really refuse you.  You are going to be a king someday.”  I was trying to be light hearted and really didn’t mean that I was only going to go because he commanded me.

“Don’t even joke about that, Surefire,” Windstorm snapped at me. “I don’t think I could take it if you two started following me like religious zealots, bowing to my whims.  There are already enough people in this camp that act like that, I don’t need two more.”

“I’m sorry Windstorm.  I won’t do it again,” I promised.  “Anyway, these kingdoms in the west, tell us about them.”

“Like I told you, we are going there to see if their leaders would be willing to send us a few reinforcements to take back here.  We are outnumbered, as you saw with all the gryphons that the usurpers control.  We need help and I’m hoping that these kingdoms will lend us the ponies we need to turn the tides.  In return, of course, we are going to have to promise them a share of the goods we produce here in Equestria.  I don’t like being in debt to anypony, but I don’t see any other options at this point.”

“Well I guess we’ll be accompanying you.  In the meanwhile, I’ll try to think of anything I can to help the Resistance,” I told him. “Do you have any ponies inside of Bastion?” I asked.

“Just a couple,” Windstorm said. “They can’t report very often though.  You know how strange it would look if ponies walked into the Haunted Hollows for no reason.  Also, we can’t spare too many ponies for espionage.  This is the Resistance’s main camp and it’s less than half the size of the Drudge.  We don’t have any ponies to spare, Surefire.”

“So that’s why you came into the Drudge,” I said.  “The only thing I don’t understand is how you got away with it.  Surely it would have been deemed too dangerous for someone of your status?”

“Actually, I’ve been begging the Commander to go in for a few years,” Windstorm said.  A smile was growing on his face.  “They refused to let me go.  Then one day, I found a way to convince them.  I made the same demand but I had a knife in my hoof and threatened to kill myself if they wouldn’t let me go.  I guess losing your leader is something that groups of people want to avoid.”  I laughed.  I guess that Windstorm can be stubborn when he wants to.  “Time’s wasting.  Go find out where the Commander wants you to work in the camp and we’ll talk more tomorrow.

Chapter Ten - Surefire the Sharpshooter

Chapter Ten – Surefire the Sharpshooter

‘And I can hit a target through a telescope…-Flobots'

The Commander had already gotten ready for our initiation into the Resistance.  Pearl and I were separated so that they could test us in our best areas.  I was taken to the practice field for my tests.

They started me with melee weapons.  Good god was I bad with those.  I was still as clumsy as ever.  I guess that happens when you only use a knife to finish off something that can barely move.  I was pretty much the laughing stock of all the more experienced ponies there.  The guards who had been leading me around today looked disappointed, as though they expected Windstorm’s friend to be the best at everything.  I was ashamed of my performance and the bad light that I was casting on Windstorm with my incompetence.  Being small, I performed poorly with the flails and maces, and I was only somewhat better with a knife.  They had tried finding armor for me to wear while practicing.  They hadn’t found anything in my size so I had been outfitted with loosely fitting chainmail.  Needless to say, the testing went by horribly.  I just hoped that they weren’t making Pearl look stupid with whatever task they gave her.

After what seemed like an eternity, they finally got me into my true love, ranged weapons.  Why hadn’t they just started me here?  They had spent at least three hours marking on paper how bad I was with each and every melee weapon they had at their disposal.  Whatever.  Now was my time to shine.  They started me up with a short bow and put the targets ten yards away. ‘Really?  Is this some sort of joke?  I could hit that in my sleep.’ I shot off all ten of the arrows that they had given me and hit the bull’s-eye every time.  They moved me back 5 yards and handed me the arrows back.  I did the same from fifteen yards and the same for twenty.  It was too easy.  They just continued returning the arrows and backing me up.  The crowd that had gathered to watch me was becoming impressed with my skills.  I was also enjoying the experience.  I had never had real targets to practice on and now I had a real chance to test what my maximum range was.  I missed the bull’s-eye for the first time at thirty five yards.  It was still within the second ring and I was pretty impressed at my skills.  I continued moving further and further back, my accuracy slowly decreasing.  I was beginning to miss shots at seventy-five yards due to the lack of power on the bow.  The ponies that were testing me stopped me there and moved onto javelins and throwing knives.  I was okay with them, but I couldn’t generate much power with my small build.  As a result, I could only barely hit the target at twenty yards.  That’s where they stopped me and gave me a new weapon to test.  The next test was with the long bow.  I had actually never shot one before and I couldn’t even hit the target with it.  I wasn’t able to pull the bowstring back due to the high tension.

I was beginning to feel discouraged until they brought out the crossbow.  I asked them if I could use my own personal crossbow.  They decided that it would be fine and so I began lining up my shot my usual way.  I felt very comfortable with my crossbow, and over the past couple of weeks, I had come to know its capabilities.  I was hitting the target every time until fifty yards, when one of the bolts I used had a clipped feather.  I fell into a rhythm in my shooting and the world around me began to fade out.  All that was left in my mind was the bolt and the target.  In my mind, I would pull the target towards me until it appeared, in my mind’s eye, to be directly in front of me.  Whenever I felt this, I could shoot the bolt and I knew exactly where I had hit the target.

I was pulled out of my state of extreme focus by one of the guards.  He told me that if I hit a bull’s-eye I would tie the Resistance’s record.  I was one-hundred-twenty-five yards away from the target.  According to the guard, a pegasus named Dead Eye had hit the target from this range with a long bow.  I was surprised that I was still able to hit the target with my crossbow, even if it was very powerful (thanks to Gizmo).  I was about to take aim again when I noticed the crowd that had gathered around to watch a record get tied.  I wouldn’t have thought a pony shooting a crossbow would be that interesting, but apparently there wasn’t much else to do in the camp.  I was beginning to get a bit nervous, but I pulled the crossbow up to my eye level and began calling the target towards me.  With the pressure that was now put on me, it was much more difficult to do but I managed.  I pulled the trigger and heard the audience take in a breath of air as the missile flew towards its destination.  In my mind, I knew that my bolt would hit home and was rewarded by a collective cheer from my audience.  I was making a name for myself here in the Resistance.  My guards handed me another bolt.

“Think you can do it five more yards away?” One of the guards asked me with a smirk.

“Of course,” I said, returning a cocky smile.  I stepped back to where the guards indicated and took aim again.  This was for the record.  The audience had grown silent as they eagerly awaited my shot.  I tried my same technique again and found that I was having trouble even seeing what I was supposed to be shooting at.  I decided to take an instinctive shot and pulled the trigger.  Another gasp from my audience and then I waited either for cheers or silence.  Surprisingly, it was a mixture of both sighs of disappointment and yelps of excitement.  The guard and I walked back to the target to investigate what had happened.  Apparently, my bolt had skided off the ground and then popped up into the target.

The crowd that had gathered around me did not know whether to I had broken a record or had tied.  I didn’t know how this was going to count either, but I assumed that I will just have tied the record.  The guards conversed among themselves and decided that I would remain tied with Dead Eye.  We walked back to a small tent in the camp.  I was glad that I had at least tied the record of another pony in the camp and was very surprised when Dead Eye himself walked in to congratulate me.  I had thought that he would have been grumpy that some younger pony had taken his title.

“That was some amazing shooting there son.” Dead eye said, putting his hoof around my shoulder.  “I’ve ever seen a pony that could shoot quite as well as that.  When I shoot, I completely missed the damn thing at that length.  You even hit the thing although it bounced.  The Commander asked me to train you herself.  I’d be proud to teach you all I know.  You’re good with that crossbow son, but you don’t know a thing about any of the other weapons.  What would you do if you got in a fight and the thing jammed or you ran outta bolts?  I’m going to teach you how to use the other ones so you can stay alive if you lose your favorite one.”

Oh boy.  This was going to be great.  I was going to learn all about weapons from one of the best in the camp, or so I heard.  I’ve never had anypony to teach me anything before.  Well maybe except from the little bit of training that I had learning from the other ponies in the guild.

“Yes, sir,” I said, saluting him.  I would have been ready to start training right at that moment if Pearl hadn’t walked in.  Pearl looked to be tired but pleased, a look that I’m sure was reflected in me.  Dead Eye decided to take his leave and leave me alone to talk to her.

“What’s up Pearl?  How did your testing go?” I asked.  I was eager to hear what the day had been like for her.

“It was great.  They started me with some common tasks which I was okay at, like mending clothes and sharpening weapons.  I did fine at most of the stations until we reached a hospital.  I felt so bad for some of the fillies there that I just had to stop and talk to them for a while and see how they were doing.  In the meanwhile, they decided to let me try my hand at nursing them and I did just as well as any other experienced nurse.  The Commander came to watch me and told me that, if I enjoyed it, I could be a nurse like some of the other ponies.  Isn’t that great Surefire?  I get to be a nurse and help people like you when you get hurt.  I’ll learn so much that I can heal you or Windstorm without even the smallest problem.” Pearl said, obviously excited about being able to help other ponies.  Just another thing I loved about her character.

“That sounds amazing Pearl! I guess I’m going to have to get hurt a bit more often so that you can help me,” I said jokingly.

“If you want to get yourself hurt on purpose, I don’t think there’s any cure for you,” she said smiling.  Windstorm walked in just moments later.

“So they told me about you two.  It seems that everybody views you as an improvement to our camp.  I view you two as the only people that will talk to me as though I’m just any other pony.  We do need to talk about leaving however.  I propose that we leave in three days’ time.  That should give you guys enough time to acclimate to the camp, learn a few basic lessons, and then we will leave for the Sunfire Desert.  We will go with a small escort of guards, but it will be better than being here.  We talk freely and hang out like we did back at the guild.”

“That sounds good Windstorm,” I said.  “What about our teacher’s though?  Are we leaving them behind here or are they going to give us some lessons while on the road?  I’m really looking forward to training with Dead Eye.  Who knows, maybe I might need those skills if something goes wrong in the Sunfire Desert.”

“I don’t want to fall behind in my studies either,” chimed in Pearl.  “Nurse Night Gale told me that she would teach me all she knew.”

“Well if both of you want them and feel like they wouldn’t intrude on our trip then that’s fine by me.  The Commander suggested that I take your teachers with us, but I thought that you two would rather get away.  I guess I was wrong,” said Windstorm.  “I guess I was also being a bit jealous.  I wanted you two for my own.”

“It’s okay Windstorm.  We all get a bit jealous sometimes.” I said.  “At least you are willing to admit when you were in the wrong.  Anyways, when do we get to start training?  Dead Eye promised to teach me with the weapons I wasn’t good with.”

Windstorm smiled.  He seemed to be glad that we were willing to accept him for who he was.  “You can start training tomorrow morning.  Tonight though, I just want to have some time to talk like friends.”

“I’d enjoy that,” Pearl said.  “What kind of friends would we be if we didn’t talk to you?”  Pearl began discussing everything she had learned today.  Windstorm and I sat close to the fire that we had just outside of our tent.  We listened carefully, happy that we had this time just to enjoy each other’s company.

The next day dawned and I was up early.  I was excited by the prospect of learning to use new weapons.  In my mind, I pictured myself as a pony clad in shining plate mail rushing in with a sword to save a beautiful pony (who I imagined as Pearl) from some nefarious dogs.  In reality, I realized that, even with a lot of work, I was only likely to be a bit above average with the ranged weapons and probably a bit below average with the melee ones.  It’s not like training for days was going to get rid of the fact that I was too small to generate enough power to deliver crushing blows with a mace.  I hoped that Dead Eye would be able to see beyond my obvious impairment and somehow make a program that would help me learn to use weapons that I was clumsy with.

Pearl’s teacher, nurse Night as she preferred to be called, had come by the tent earlier and taken Pearl away to show her the tricks of the trade.  I eagerly awaited Dead Eye’s arrival.  He only arrived two hours after Pearl’s teacher and still appeared to be groggy.  He was definitely not a morning pony.  He yawned and explained that we were going to head off to a clearing in the woods where he trained.  When I asked him why we were going there instead of the practice grounds, he told me to just wait and he would explain once we got there.

We arrived in a place in the woods that seemed to have been naturally formed.  There was a small cave nearby that would shade us when we got tired and the canopy was not obscuring the sun.  All in all, it was a beautiful place but it was about an hour’s walk away from the camp.  Dead Eye finally seemed to relax, he always seemed kind of coiled up at camp.

“I find this place relaxing,” said Dead Eye, “And so we’ll be training here.  Nopony knows where this place is except Windstorm and the Commander.  I brought some training supplies out here last night while y’all were talking.”

“I really like this place,” I told Dead Eye earnestly, “but why do we have to walk all the way out here.  I mean surely the time spent walking out here would have been better spent training at the practice grounds.”

“Why sure it could,” said Dead Eye.  “Why didn’t I think of that earlier?” he said sarcastically. “Do you not think there’s a reason people don’t know where we are?  I brought you out here because I have to tell you one of the Resistance’s secrets.  We know there are spies in the camp; we would be naive to think we didn’t.  So we come out here to train because it’s hard to follow us without being seen and it’s secluded.”  Dead Eye seemed to be finished.

“So what’s this secret that you’ve been hiding from the camp?” I asked.

“We have a few ponies like us, sharpshooters, spread out throughout the camp.  Though they appear to be learning different trades, they are all trained to be assassins.  Most of them practiced with me for a while and could hit a target accurately up to one hundred yards away.  You, however, have shown that you can shoot beyond that range even without practice.  You’re special and we need you to master any and every weapon at your disposal.  Chances are that when we finally attack Smoothtounge or whatever usurper holds the throne, you are going to be the one we assign to kill the target.  Simple as that.”

“So you guys are trying to turn me into a cold blooded killer?  Am I getting this right?” I asked, slightly annoyed that they had signed me up for this without my approval.

Dead Eye started to crack up.  “What did you think we were going to do with your talents?  Make you hunt little bunnies?  Ha.  No I think inside of you, you knew that you would now be shooting at things that had feelings and can communicate with you.  You also don’t have option of backing out now.  If you do, I won’t hesitate to kill you and label you as a “training accident”.  Think about that when you start feeling that you weren’t cut out for this.”

“What does Windstorm think of this?  He knows right?” I asked.  I guessed he was right.  I figured I would be shooting at ponies, but when the thought was actually voiced I found it repugnant.

“Oh thank you for bringing up that point,” said Dead Eye.  “You can’t bring this up to either of your friends.  Windstorm doesn’t know and just thinks I’m training you out here because I don’t like people.  That’s actually partly true.  I don’t trust anyone.  Windstorm is too honorable and wouldn’t stand the thought of killing an enemy in their sleep.  I don’t trust those kind-hearted ponies not to spread rumors of a force such as ours so don’t tell that mare either.  Enough chit chat. Are you ready to train or are you not capable of handling this?”

“I’m in,” I said, trying to convince myself that what I was doing was right and not just murder.

Dead Eye started training me with melee weapons as they were my weak point.  Dead Eye began showing me how to properly hold each weapon.  He stuck to the smaller weapons because I would have a greater chance of carrying them with me.  The knife was my strongest weapon.  Dead Eye spent a few hours teaching me how to keep my balance when using weapons.  It took me longer than he expected and caused both of us a great bit of frustration.  When I was able to actually use the knife without falling flat on my face, Dead Eye began getting in skirmishes with me.  He started by defending himself against me with a knife.  Dead Eye had no weapon, but he quickly showed me that he was still far from disarmed.  After I rushed in to take a stab with my dulled knife, Dead Eye grabbed my hoof with one hoof and punched me square in the face with his other hoof.  Apparently he knocked me out with that move and was disappointed with my performance.  We continued our skirmishes but I learned that it was in my best interest to not overextend.  I lost every single practice fight against Dead Eye and was completely covered in bruises.  According to Dead Eye, I was lucky that I had black coat.  The bruises wouldn’t show and so I wouldn’t have to make excuses about them to my friends.

We still had a few hours of light left when we began using short swords.  Because of the weight of the sword, it was easier for me to counter-balance myself and I could actually swing the weapon.  We practiced for a while with evenly matched short swords and I was beginning to feel that I wouldn’t be completely hopeless.  That is until, in one fight, I ran towards dead eye with my sword raised after I had disarmed him (somehow a chink in his sword had gotten caught in mine and I was able to rip it out of this hoofs.  Dead Eye, seeing that I would most likely get my first hit on him that day, pushed himself off of the tree that was beside him.  He leaped over my head as I charged passed him.  I attempted to stop but was carried forward by my charge.  Dead Eye landed a kick in my flank and I went sprawling face first in the dust.  My short sword had landed underneath me and cut a small chunk of my skin off.  I was scared.  I had never seen so much blood coming out of my own body before.  I looked over to Dead Eye for some assistance.

“You’re going to get hurt kid,” He said as I looked over at him.  “You might be thinking that you’re going to die from that wound but it’s not that deep.  This is something you’re going to need to learn.  You’re probably going to be on your own after you get in a fight and you’re going to need to know how to repair your body.  I’ll teach you the basic stuff, you’re going to need some alm leaves to numb the pain and then you can use some of those large leaves over there to tie the wound closed,” he said pointing.  “Though normally when you get hurt, it should be from somebody else’s weapon, not your own.”

I hurried to comply with what he told me to do.  He showed me which plants the alm leaves were and showed me how to properly tie a wound together.  I had to admit, the blood had looked scary at first, but when I knew what to do, it wasn’t actually that bad.  The wound had felt as though it was extremely deep because the dull blade had been pulling my coat off of the muscle and not cleanly cutting.  That meant that the wound would take a long time to heal, but it hadn’t cut too deep to do any serious damage.

I was ready to head back home when Dead Eye threw me a short bow.  I caught it instinctively and was confused.  “Why aren’t we going back to camp.  I’m hurt and it’s going to be dark soon.”  Really I was kind of disheartened by the wound and didn’t want to get hurt any more.  I didn’t really want to get into a fight with bows either for that matter.  We were both good at shooting and someone was going to have to walk back to camp impaled on an arrow.

“We aren’t going back any time soon.  We’re going to be out here every night until it’s time for you to go to bed. We’re probably going to be assaulting Bastion soon after we get back from getting reinforcements.  Reinforcements mean more food needed for everypony and ponies getting bored.  We can’t afford to keep them here long.  This affects you because we are probably going to send you in when we get back.  That means that we don’t have the luxury of time training you.  A month isn’t enough time to properly train you to like the other sharpshooters.  I’m going to focus this first week on getting a basic grasp on melee weapons and then we are going to be focusing heavily on ranged weapons and stealth.  We have to practice at night because you have natural camouflage.  The night is your friend, Surefire.  You may have been afraid of it you’re entire life, but oh boy, you’re going to learn to be one with it.  Does that answer your question son?”

“Yeah, I guess,” I replied, still sour that we were still going to be practicing.  Luckily, however, it seemed that we weren’t going to be fighting with each other.  Rather we began practicing different positions that I could possibly find myself in.  Dead Eye gave me some tips on how I could improve my form with the bow and I lapped up his instructions.  After my initial reluctance to practice, I took to it with great ferocity.  Dead Eye finally began to look pleased with what he saw.  After about two hours of training with the short bow, we were finally finished.  Both of us were tired and hungry by this time and Dead Eye began leading me home.

“Okay now son.  This is what you are going to tell your friends when we get back to camp...”  Dead Eye told me that I how to explain my time in the woods to my friends and made me swear not to tell anypony about this group of sharpshooters.  “You don’t even tell Windstorm if he commands you to understand.  Lie.  And also don’t show off your talents.  You did enough of that already yesterday at the shooting range.  We don’t want the enemy to know that you are the real pony they should be worried about.  We might even have to stage you breaking your shooting hoof sometime to make you seem useless.”

“Wait we’re actually going to break my leg?” I said alarmed.

“No, no.  Maybe I might sprain it for you but it should just be pretend,” said Dead Eye.  We were beginning to get close to the camp.  I was beginning to see light in the distance and was eager to see my friends, even though I was going to have to lie to them.  “One last thing,” said Dead Eye, stopping me.  “When we leave for the Sunfire Desert, You are going to also be taking lessons with nurse Night.  It is greatly beneficial to assassins.”

“Wait,” I said confused, “how is it beneficial to killing to know how to heal ponies?”    ‘What? Am I going to shoot Smoothtounge and then heal her and hold her hostage?’ I thought.

“Remember this,” Dead Eye said.  “What heals can be countered and can also kill in high enough concentrations.  I also thought you might enjoy spending some time with that beautiful mare friend that you have.  I guess you don’t…”

“No, no,” I said hurriedly. “I definitely appreciate the opportunity.”

“Okay, we’ll talk about it more tomorrow,” said Dead Eye.  “Go on now, you can spend the rest of the evening anyway you want.”  With that I ran off to camp to go and see my friends.

Chapter Eleven - Trick of the Trade

Chapter Eleven – The Trick of the Trade

“Tranquil as a forest, but on fire within.  Once you find your center, you are sure to win…-Mulan“

The next morning Dead Eye awoke me.  I was sore and bruised from the previous day’s exertions.  I looked around the tent that we were staying in and found it devoid of life.  I guess that’s what happens when you work hard and don’t have any previous experience.  Dead Eye again took me out to our training grounds and we began practice with the knives and short swords from yesterday.  I was feeling more confident today and was actually able to keep toe to toe with him.  I knew he was going easy on me, but it still felt good to see that leap of improvement.  After Dead Eye felt confident that I understood the basics of the two weapons, we began working with a mace.  Dead Eye informed me that we weren’t going to be training with any other melee weapons other than these three.  When I asked why, he told me that those were probably the only ones I would be able to take with me and I would have a better chance to master three weapons than an entire onslaught of them.  It made sense and would give us more time to focus on ranged weapons and stealth.  I was about as good with maces as I was with short swords and Dead Eye was pleased that we wouldn’t have to spend more time than was necessary on it.

“Okay son,” Dead Eye said, “you seem to understand the basics of fighting with weapons.  That’s good.  The knife, however, isn’t only a weapon brought out it close range.  From what you’ve told me about your fight against the hood ponies, I guess you know that the knife is also a weapon of surprise.  The knife is extremely versatile and easy to conceal.  If you can get close to somebody with a knife, chances are that you have a very good chance of killing them before they even know they are in danger.  Another benefit of a knife is that you can carry more than one.  Keeping this in mind, you can have multiple knives for multiple occasions.  Knives can be poisoned in different ways and every poison is useful in some situation.  This is also why you are going to be studying with nurse Night.  She will probably explain how plants can be used to heal people and tell you how much is needed in certain instances.  She will also tell you and Pearl what amount of the medicine will kill someone.  When you’re learning with her this is what I want you to pay attention to.  We will be practicing poisoning your arrows and bolts to make sure you get kills.”

“Okay,” I said.  “What are we going to work on now?  More work with the knife or some other ranged weapon?”

“We’re going to be working on concealing your knives and your ability to pull them out without a second thought,” Dead Eye said.  With a flick of his foot, a knife appeared out of thin air and was at my throat in an instant.  “Dead,” said Dead Eye calmly.

“Where the…” I started.  “I guess you won’t tell me all of your secrets.  I guess I’m going to have to learn how to do that on my own.”

Dead Eye laughed and threw me his knife with a practiced ease.  I caught it out of the air even though I was nervous that I would catch the wrong side.  Dead Eye then pulled out my cloak and told me to put it on.

“Cloaks are amazing things.  You can hide so many things behind a cloak that you practically become your own mobile army,” said Dead Eye, pulling out three more knives.  He began to casually juggle them to make his point.

“Some of the other sharpshooters have been learning to sew so that they can add more pockets to the insides of their cloaks.  Some of them have also been able to excel in the art of making cloaks that mimic their surroundings.  I can’t tell you how invaluable these cloaks have been for our hunters.  It’s actually an unfair advantage.  The animals don’t even know what hit them,” said Dead Eye.  “I would recommend that you learn how to make capes, but you don’t have the time to learn that art.”

“That sounds like something Pearl would be good at,” I said, thinking out loud.  “She made an amazing outfit for Windstorm when we were in the Drudge.”

“Well that is interesting,” said Dead Eye.  “I might have to see about bringing one of the tailor ponies to help keep her occupied.  If she could make you a cloak while we are traveling, you could have an even better protection against the dark.”

“If she made a tight fitting outfit to go underneath the cloak, wouldn’t that also help to keep me warm at night and possibly provide some extra protection?” I asked Dead Eye.

“That is an interesting idea son.  I would probably prioritize the cloak, but if we have enough time that would be a good idea to try out,” said Dead Eye, seriously considering trying out my idea.  “Anyway, we need to keep training.  Any wasted time could mean your death and we wouldn’t want that.”

So back to training it was.  It was another hard day of training, buy my desire to help the Resistance drove me onward.  This was finally my chance to strike back at those who did things only for themselves and left others to suffer needlessly.  I had lost any sympathy for Smoothtounge when she slaughtered all of those innocents in front of a crowd.  How was that even supposed to help public relations?  I guess it did deter people from trying to do what I was planning to do, usurp the usurper.  Her life had lost its value, in my mind, when she had taken the lives of the other ponies.  There was no excuse, other than protecting your own life, to take another ponies life.  I abhorred thinking that I had been the pony that had extinguished the lives of those hood ponies, but I justified it in protecting the life of another.  Those ponies had forfeited there right to live by taking the life, or at least trying to, of another.

By the end of the day I was so sore that I was having trouble moving my legs properly.  My hooves ached and it felt as though I had been running for days without a single break.  By the time me and Dead Eye headed back to camp, I was ready to sleep.  I probably would have gone straight to bed if it hadn’t been for Pearl and Windstorm.  I wanted to stay up and talk to them for a while.  After all, I spent all day with Dead Eye, and let’s face it; he wasn’t the most entertaining pony.  He was good at what he did, but he could only talk about killing things.  Sometimes, it’s nice to be able to talk about something else and I could do that with Pearl and Windstorm.  Pearl was enjoying her lessons with nurse Night and Windstorm had been going out during the day and flying around.  He was restless as we got closer to the date that we would finally leave for the Sunfire Desert.  I got to tell my usual lies about the extent of my training and after telling a few jokes around the campfire, we set off to bed.

Again, I woke up late and was awoken by Dead Eye.  I got ready as quickly as I could although my muscles complained every step of the way.  When Dead Eye saw how my muscles were cramping up, he took on a worried expression.  “How are we going to be able to practice with you limping around like an old grandpa?  You’ve got to get used to the uncomfortable feeling because it’s never going to go away now.  It only gets worse as you get older.  You’re just going to keep working and working until one day you find out that you can’t work anymore and then you’re dead and that’s that.  You’ve got a ways to go there kid so you better get used to it.  Don’t want to then quit.  Though I wouldn’t recommend that as you know what happens to the quitters.” Dead Eye sighed.  “Work your legs out on the walk.  We’re learning something new today.”  With that Dead Eye left the tent.  I would enjoy being taught a lot more if I had a teacher that would let up sometimes.  I ran out of the tent after Dead Eye and we walked deep into the Haunted Hollows to ply our trade in the secret of the forest.

“So what are we going to work on today?”  I asked.  “Are we going to work on your favorite, the long bow, or maybe throwing knives?”

“No weapons today son.  Today we’re going to learn how to move,” Dead Eye said.

“Um… what?” I asked, confused.  What’s Dead Eye talking about.  My muscles are sore but not completely destroyed

“I borrowed one of those cloaks that I was telling you about yesterday,” said Dead Eye, pulling out a cloak that looked as though it was made out of green patches.  “This is the type of clothing that the hunters use in the woods nowadays.  It works better than those brown suits you used while hunting at the guild.  The material shifts in the wind and is extremely hard to spot unless you are looking for someone with one of these cloaks on.  It’s still pretty hard to spot them though.”

“So why would Pearl need to make a cloak for me if we already have cloaks?” I asked.  Seemed like a waste of time making something for me if we already had it.

“Because we don’t have one for the dark,” Dead Eye replied.  “Your dark coat would stand out in the places that the cloak can’t cover.  Also, you won’t be in the woods when you’re trying to assassinate somebody but probably in some dark corner of a stone building.  So that’s why we need close for your wet work.  Also having a suit specifically tailored to your own size will help you be more mobile than you otherwise would have been.  Picture it like this son.  The nurses have their coats that make them stand out as nurses.  You have your cloak and wet work clothes and they are the clothes of your trade.  A nurse has syringes and you have knives and bolts.  Both are tools suited for their purpose.”

“Okay,” I said, figuring it was better not to question him.  “What are we going to be working on with this cloak you brought?  Are we going hunting?”

“No, we are going to be practicing the magical act of disappearing without magic.  This would have been so much simpler if you had been a unicorn, but I guess beggars can’t be choosers.”  Dead Eye threw the cloak at me and I put it on.  He also pulled out one that looked to be his own personal cloak.  When he put it on, the cloak seemed to blend in with the woods around him.  He ran off into the woods and called, “Try and find me before I catch you.”

Simple enough.  Once I had clasped the pin of my cloak together I took off in the direction I had seen Dead Eye take.  I followed his hoof tracks on the ground and thought that they would for sure lead me to him.  There was no way that he would have been able to create false tracks.  I appeared to be wrong.  After a few dozen yards, the tracks abruptly ended in a leafy field and there was no Dead Eye to be seen.  There were no trees that he could have jumped up nearby, so I assumed he had walked through the patch of leaves without leaving any trace.  I ran across the patch, and just to check I looked behind me.  My tracks were clearly visible and were denoted by broken twigs and numerous wet leaves left behind.  If Dead Eye had crossed, how had he been able to walk across them without upsetting anything?  I ran back to look at the tracks that I knew belonged to Dead Eye.  They were extremely light and looked as though he had glided over the ground instead of galloping.  My tracks looked as though I had purposely been trying to dig out the ground as I had run after him.  I guessed that was one lesson that I was going to have to learn

I continued past the patch of leaves and looked for any sign of which direction Dead Eye had taken.  After some careful inspection, I ran across what looked like the back end of a hoof print in some of the soggier dirt.  I guess that was what had done it.  It looked like Dead Eye had been sticking to the dryer more compact earth that hardly left any trace of him and was completely eradicated by the wind.  I began paying more attention to detail as I continued in the direction where I had found the print.  It looked to be a false lead until I saw something else out of the ordinary.  It appeared that a bit of bark had been recently chipped off a tree and was lying on the ground.

I guess that Dead Eye had taken to the trees to avoid leaving any unnecessary footprints on the ground.  I decided I would go up into the tree to have a look.  From the top of the tree I followed the branches that looked displaced or scuffed.  Because I had to focus on the clues that the trees provided, I was following Dead Eye at a slow place.  If he was moving quickly, there was no way that I was going to be able to find him.  I persevered and continued tracking the trail that Dead Eye had left.  Eventually I fell into a groove and was moving much faster through the branches.  I felt like I was close to catching my elusive teacher and I moved at full speed in the direction I thought he was.  I was jumping from branch to branch as fast as I could when I began falling.  I landed with my back first and my sight faded to black as I almost passed out from the impact. The wind had been forced out of my lungs and I tried to flip over as I tried to catch my breath.  I quickly realized that I couldn’t because something was holding my chest down.  I immediately thought of the manticore and began panicking.  My vision was slowly returning, but I was thrashing around as wildly as I could to try to throw the beast off.

Once my vision had partially returned, I was able to look at what held me down.  There, standing above me, was none other than Dead Eye.  He didn’t seem to be too pleased with me either.  He just looked down at me and began talking after I had finished my thrashing.  “You were doing so good tracking me with all those hints I left behind.  Then you just start rushing through the branches hardly looking at anything at all.  I could hear you all the way from where I was and all I had to do was throw you a false trail and wait.  I caught you by your cloak and if I had meant you harm, you would have been dead.”

“What did you want me to do?” I demanded.  “There would have been no chance of catching you if I kept going at the same pace that I was previously at.  I had a good idea of the direction you had been heading in and so I moved as fast as I could to catch up.”

“Well at least you’re thinking on the right level,” Dead Eye said.  “We definitely need to work on your movement.  Even a filly could follow the trail you left.  If you don’t get better at moving without being seen and heard, there’s no way that you’re going to be sneaking up on anyone.  I’m surprised that you never got caught when you were in that guild and beaten to death.  You have plenty of room for improvement son.”  Dead Eye took his hoof off of my chest and I was finally able to stand up and brush myself off.  Dead Eye began walking back to where I assumed we had come from. I followed him but did not talk to him.  I was still a bit sore about his brutal evaluation of my skills.

We arrived back at the training grounds and Dead Eye again began with the basics.  We took my cloak off so that we could practice basic sneaking.  Dead Eye showed me what to look for to avoid being seen.  “You have to look at places ponies never expect you to be.  Being small, you have the advantage of fitting inside of things other ponies can’t.  You also want to stick to the shadows or other places ponies try not to look at.  Ponies don’t look at the poorer areas in town because they don’t want to be associated with them.  Another good way of hiding is near something that commands attention, like a statue.  If people are looking at the statue, then they aren’t looking at you.  Go ahead, son, tell me some places that fit the criteria around here.”

I looked around and took note of things I instinctively began looking at and then focused on things that I had never noticed before.  The small outcropping we used for resting seemed to be where my eyes strayed to the most (whether out of want of rest or the contrast between the shade and the sun I could not tell.)  I decided that I would want a hiding spot that stayed well out of the view from the outcropping.  Looking around for something I had never noticed before, I saw a dying tree whose leaves had begun losing their color.  I guess I had been avoiding looking at it because I would rather have looked at the other lush life around me.  So this is what Dead Eye meant, people want to look at pretty things, not ugly ones.  “If I were to hide somewhere around here,” I said, “I would hide in that tree over there.”  I indicated the tree I had only now noticed.  “It’s a decent distance from these training grounds and I would avoid looking at it.  I would rather be looking at the rest of the lush forest around here than at that decrepit thing.  It also provides a nice cover for a pony of my size and could hide me from sight even if somepony looked over there.”

“That’s where I would have hidden too,” said Dead Eye, seemingly pleased.  “However, keep in mind what I told you about hiding places.  It’s always a good idea to practice, even if we aren’t training together.  Look for good places to hide when we are back at camp tonight and when we go traveling to the Sunfire Desert.  You need to be able to find the best hiding place possible in a completely new area without thinking.  If you can do it instinctively, then you can focus more on your target or your pursuers, depending on your situation.  Now then, we’re moving on.”

Dead Eye began showing me how to move without leaving obvious traces of where I had been on the ground.  He confirmed my suspicions about sticking to dry patches of earth. Apparently it also helped to reduce the sound your hoof made on the ground by not causing a squish like mud does.  Another strategy that Dead Eye showed me involved constant awareness of my surroundings.  It was more of a strategy of moving through an area quickly though than without leaving traces.  If you are moving uphill, you always want to step to an area that is near the same level you are at.  If you just go anywhere, you usually end up climbing twice as much because you have to continually move up and down to get to your destination.

Our next lesson was moving through trees.  According to Dead Eye, I was going about tree climbing all wrong.  “You can’t just hop from branch to branch. There’s an entire science behind it.  You want to start on thick branches and move on those thick branches.  They produce less sway when you put your weight on them and it sounds more like the rush of wind if they do move.  When you were running after me earlier, you weren’t very specific with which branches you chose and it was extremely easy to tell that something was moving through there.  It’s much harder to stop people from seeing your markings in the tree, but hopefully you were good enough covering your tracks on the ground that that isn’t too much of a problem.”

We practiced moving through the trees a lot. Dead Eye wasn’t going to let up on me until I could prove to him that I could actually move around on the branches without attracting attention.  I had trouble mastering the new way of moving around because I had gotten used to my usual way of moving through the trees while hunting.  I was a bit resentful that I was being forced to change something that I had never viewed as broken.  I had to admit though, once I began getting a hang of moving from branch to branch properly, I was able to move pretty fast.  Weaker branches had always caused me to move a bit slower to avoid falling off of them and now I could basically dash through the trees while still being quite.  It took me at least four hours to learn what branches I would be good for my weight and, from there, it had been easy going learning to move fast through the trees.

Dead Eye never seemed to be extremely pleased with my performance, but always gave me a word of encouragement whenever I finally conquered some obstacle that I had been unable to before.  He never really got angry whenever I failed, although he would often give me a disappointed shake of his head.  I wanted his approval of my skills so those shakes motivated me to work harder to master whatever skill I was working on at the time.

We spent some time learning how to move quietly.  Dead Eye said that some of the other sharpshooters liked to wear little leather slippers over their feet to dampen the sounds of their feet.  Unicorns were able to use their magic to greatly reduce the sound their feet made, but unfortunately I was just an earth pony.  According to Dead Eye, unicorns made the best assassins because they could do so much with their powers.  He also said that he did not like unicorn assassins because they usually became too confident in their abilities that it caused them to make rudimentary mistakes.  “Although a unicorn can be extremely good at being sneaky, lots of practice can make you even better than them by being able to outsmart them.  I don’t know of any spells that can make a unicorn smart.  Vigilance makes you smart.  If you can spot the assassin before he spots, you win.”

It was beginning to turn dark on our final training session before heading out for the Sunfire Desert.  “Grab your cloak son,” Dead Eye said, “We’re going to try to get you to use your cloak to its maximum potential.”  I began putting on the woodland cloak that I had been given earlier today.  “No, not that one.  You’re going to be using that other cloak you have, the back one.”  Dead Eye said taking the woodland cloak away from me.  I put on my black cape that I had taken from the hood ponies and we began our training with the cloak.

“You’re cloak is like a portable hiding place.  If used at the right time, you can render yourself nearly invisible to everypony.  When you hide yourself behind the cloak, you have to stay perfectly still or else people will notice the strange way that the patch of darkness moved.  On close inspection, your disguise becomes exactly that, a disguise and your cover has been blown.  Also when you attempt to hide yourself, make sure that anypony that looks in your direction will have trouble differentiating the color of your cloak from the scenery behind you.  If they don’t expect you to be there, chances are that they will move on without a second thought.”  Dead Eye showed me through an example.  He covered himself beneath his cloak while standing close to the face of a cliff.  I knew where he was but the natural swaying of the cloak made it extremely difficult for me to find a clear outline of his frame.  If I hadn’t been intently staring at where I had last seen Dead Eye, I doubt I would have noticed him.  I never knew that a ponies clothing could do that.  Dead Eye moved out from underneath the cloak and told me to attempt doing the same thing.  I went over to the face of the cliff and just pulled my cloak over my body.  I assumed that was all I had to do because that was all I had seen Dead Eye do.  Dead Eye walked over to me and sighed.  “See you have the principle right.  It’s basically covering yourself with a piece of cloth, but you’re doing it wrong.  First off, like a little tent sticking out against the rock face.  You should give the cloak a little leeway so that it can sway in the wind a bit and give it a more natural look.  Second, you have to stay completely still.  I could see your legs quivering a bit in the darkness and that attracted my attention.  Another good thing to do while hiding under the cloak is to have a way to look out from underneath it.  While it’s pretty hard to do with your standard cloak, I think it’s something we should add to the cloak that your friend makes.  Then you’ll be able to know when it’s safe to move on or its time to bail.”

Dead Eye told me that it was best to try to get into the most comfortable position I could find as quickly as possible so that it would be easier to stay still for extended periods of time.  According to Dead Eye, it was never possible to get into a position that would stay comfortable but there were better positions to stay in than others.  It didn’t take me very long to learn to hide beneath my cloak properly, but I couldn’t stay still for really long amounts of time and there was no way that I was going to learn to be able to move while underneath it today.

“Well I think that’s good enough for today son.  We have to leave early tomorrow and if you keep on wake up like you did today, you’re going to make everyone late.  I was glad to hear that.  Training was fun but extremely tiring.  I would probably just talk to my friends for a short while and slip off to bed so that we could set off early tomorrow.  After all, I was going to be seeing a kingdom that most of the ponies in my guild had once considered to be fairy tales.

“Thank you,” I said earnestly. “I’ll be sure to wake you up tomorrow when everybody is waiting for you.”

Dead Eye laughed. ‘Wait what? He’s capable of that?  I thought he was limited to grim speeches about killing ponies and giving me pointers.’ Dead Eye looked at me with a glimmer in his eye.  “Kid, I wouldn’t be late tomorrow for anything.  I’ve wanted to see the Sunfire Desert for years.  I had a friend that went out there once and told me about all of the buildings made of some kind of stone that appeared to be like condensed sand.  It will be great to get out of here and get some reprieve.

Chapter Twelve - A Failed Attempt

Chapter Twelve – A Failed Attempt

“Cause you had a bad day, You're taking one down, You sing a sad song just to turn it around…-Daniel Powter“

As Dead Eye promised, he was up early and appeared to actually be awake this morning.  He wasn’t groggy and I could tell that he was honestly looking forward to our journey.  I kind of assumed that the sand buildings weren’t the only reasons he was excited about going there, but I wasn’t going to try and force anything out of him.  Windstorm was also up bright and early and was eager to get away from the camp.  I would be too if they kept me cooped up here, always protected by guards.  Pearl was up at her usual time and seemed to reflect the happy mood that everypony was in.  I was grateful for the time we would spend going to the Sunfire Desert, which by Windstorm’s account, was approximately a good week’s walk away.  Since we would be continually traveling during the day, Dead Eye and I wouldn’t have as much time to train alone as we wanted.  Instead of learning how to use weapons and sneak around, I would be learning with Pearl and watch how my cloak was made.  Dead Eye hoped that I would be able to learn enough form nurse Night to be able to make some of my own poisons and that there would be enough time for Pearl to finish my cloak and a suit where I could store my multitude of weapons.  I was just glad for the opportunity to relax a bit and actually spend some quality time with my friends and learn a bit more about Windstorm.

Our caravan of carts was off about an hour after sundown.  We had six carts in total.  We had one cart of our trio and our teachers, one cart for each of the teachers training materials (one for weapons, one for medical supplies, and one for the tailor that we had brought along).  The other two carts were for the guards that had accompanied us and one was for the cooks that would be preparing the food.  The commander had come to wish us farewell and a safe journey to the Sunfire Desert.  I had a chance to look at her cutie mark and saw that it was an iron fist.  Even her cutie mark marked her as a pony that would never back down.  I guess one doesn’t come into command if they don’t have a strong will but I differ.  We headed off toward the west in hopes of eventually returning and restoring the monarchy to the way it was before things became corrupted.  I didn’t know whether things could ever return back to the way they had been before, but I knew that things were only going to get worse if they were left in their current state.

Windstorm, Pearl, and I were sitting in our cart.  We had the cloth roofing that covered the cart pulled off.  The beauty of the forest passing was interesting to all of us and we would make comments about things that we thought were interesting.

Windstorm would say something like, “Would you look at that tree?  We could fit all of the Resistance beneath its branches!”

Pearl would look around in wonder and make small comments like, “Isn’t that waterfall simply gorgeous?  I wish that more ponies could see beauty like this instead of spending all of their time in the city.”

Me?  I was too busy practicing what Dead Eye had told me about finding hiding places.  I would always be sure to look at whatever Pearl and Windstorm were talking about and give a small nod of my head or a grunt to acknowledge the truth of their statements.  I began so see dark underbrush on the side of the road before I would notice the large magnificent trees that everypony seemed to be unable to look away from.  I guess this is what Dead Eye meant by being able to unconsciously locate places that would be good for ambushes or just hiding from unwanted attention.  I figured that Dead Eye would probably ask me whether I had been paying attention later tonight and I did not want to disappoint him.

Around midday, our teachers all joined us on our cart and told us how our lessons would be split up.  Apparently, they had agreed that we would all take our lessons together and learn the basics of all three subjects.  We would have lessons with basic weapons with Dead Eye when we stopped for lunch and the guards would take their well-deserved breaks from pulling the carts.  Then, when we heading west again, nurse Night would give us instructions in medicine.  Lastly, we would all watch the tailor as he taught Pearl and we would help her by being her test subjects.  I was excited that Pearl was going to make me a cloak, but I hoped she was careful while fitting me and Windstorm for our clothes.  Needles made me a bit nervous.  I had seen the body of a pony that had been pricked to death by some of the hood ponies one night.  It’s hard to get messed up images like that out of your head.

After our teachers told us our schedules, we were ready to have lunch.  The cooks brought us all our own personal apple pies and told us that they would bring desert out once we were finished.  I was famished; I guess I was still catching up on food from the previous three days of training.  I finished my pie in record time and was ready for desert while the other two were still beginning their food.  Pearl was taking small careful bites out of her pie while Windstorm ate a bit and then stopped.  “My goodness, these cooks undercooked my pie.  It’s still cold in the middle.  Do they not know that they are serving food to their leader?”

I reached over and pulled the pie before me.  I took a bite out of it and found that it was the same as mine.  “What are you talking about Windstorm this pie is fine?  If you don’t like this, then how did you live with the food that we had back in the guild?”

“Well I had no other options then, now these cooks should know that I like my apple pies to be cooked longer but not burnt,” Windstorm said as he nodded at me to finish the rest of the pie.  I happily obliged.

“It’s just an honest mistake that the cooks made,” said Pearl.  “You can tell them that you like it cooked a bit more and I’m sure that they will make it that way.”

“But they should know what I like, I am their ruler after all,” Windstorm snapped.  “If they can’t even make my food how I like it, how am I supposed to know that they will follow my instructions correctly when I’m in power?”

I finished Windstorm’s pie and looked over at him, “Don’t you think you’re taking this a bit too far, I mean you always seemed fine with what you had when we knew you back at the guild.”

Windstorm finally seemed to be calming down, “Oh, I suppose you’re right.  It really irks me when they get it wrong though…”

At this point, one of the cooks came back and looked to be carrying a large covered dish.  I was delighted that it was finally time for desert.  The cook set down the tray on the table and began talking, “We heard you complaining about the quality of the apple pies we brought you earlier, good sir.  I’ve brought this dish to satiate your hunger before we bring out the special desert that we’ve made.”  Dang it, not more food for me.

“See I told you it was an honest mistake,” said Pearl.  “Look, now they are even making up for it.”

I was a bit sour that they weren’t bringing any more food for me when I noticed that something seemed a bit off about this cook.  I hadn’t seen this mare when the cooks came around earlier and I could have sworn I hadn’t seen her earlier when I had been snooping around the cook’s tent earlier (I got a bit hungry earlier today. Okay?).  I took a more careful reevaluation of her as she went to reveal what she had brought for Windstorm.  I noticed that her cooking apron had  a small bloodstain in the bottom left, which normally would have been normal for a cook’s apron, but I also noticed that the knife she held had blood on it.  It wasn’t a normal knife either, it looked like a knife that Dead Eye would have been training me with and not a knife you would cut up meat with.

All my alarms were going off in my head and I jumped out of my seat to apprehend her.  The cook had finally opened the dish to reveal a primed crossbow on the platter.  I jumped in front of Windstorm as the cook quickly aimed and fired the bolt.  I managed to stop the bolt from hitting Windstorm, but unfortunately, I had been hit.  The bold was firmly implanted into my right fore hoof where the bolt had hit me.  I looked up to see where the cook had gone and saw that she was pinned to the ground by two guards and there was a knife sticking out of her hind leg.  It was Dead Eye’s knife and I saw him approach to retrieve it.  Pearl was freaking out and was looking at the bolt that was inside of my fore hoof.  Nurse Night quickly came over to us and looked at the bolt.  She let out a low whistle and beckoned Dead Eye over.  She talked to Dead Eye in a hushed tone to prevent me from hearing.  Apparently, there was something wrong and they weren’t just going to pull the bolt out and wrap it up.

“Kid, that’s bolt has a barb on it.  We can’t pull it out or it will cause more damage than it did going in.  Nurse Night is going to kindly cut it out of your fore hoof.  You won’t be able to use it for a few days and it will be pretty sore for a good while after that,” Dead Eye said.

“Dead Eye!” exclaimed Nurse Night.  “You were supposed to break it to him softly.  Why did I think you would be sensitive to your own student?”

“What?” asked Dead Eye.  “I told him everything you told me to tell him.  I just did it in a time efficient manner.”  Dead Eye looked over at me.  “Son, you’ll be good as new in a few days and we can start seriously practicing again.  I’ve known Miss Night here for a good long time.  She’s the best we have.  You’ll be fine.”

Nurse Night got Dead Eye and a guard to carry me to her medicine cart and she began gathering all the supplies she would need to get the bolt out of my fore hoof.

Windstorm walked up to the edge of the tent and asked, “What about me.  Did everybody just forget that somebody just tried to KILL me?”

“Kid,” said Dead Eye in a disdainful voice.  “You’re friend just saved your life and the culprit has been captured, what more do you want?”

“Who was that, why did they try to kill me, and how did she get into the camp?  I thought this place was secure, but apparently my guards are a bit lacking,” Windstorm said, happy that somebody was listening to him.

“Don’t blame your guards, kid.  The assassin got in by killing one of the cooks.  The guards wouldn’t have known that she wasn’t actually a cook.  Any one of those ponies would have done what Surefire here did without a second thought.  I hope you think about that before you start calling them ‘lacking’.”  Dead Eye said with a hint of venom in his voice.

“Stop calling me kid.  I’ll have you know that I’m the one that can save Bastion by restoring the monarchy,” Windstorm said.  He was obviously put off by Dead Eye’s lack of reverence.

I couldn’t take it anymore.  “When did you turn into a little shit?” I asked.  “Is this how you treat everypony when you’re not around us or are you just on a period today?”  Windstorm was being a little bitch today.  He’s never acted this way before, or at least not around me.

“What did you say to me Surefire?” Windstorm asked, obviously agitated.

“You need to stop acting like this.  You ask me and Pearl to treat you normally, but yet you treat everyone else as though they are dirt beneath your feet.  Everypony makes mistakes sometimes, even you,” I said through gritted teeth.  Nurse Night was pouring something into my wound to disinfect it and numb it.  “Now please just leave me alone and go figure out why that pony was trying to kill you.”

Windstorm was finally calming down and decided it would be best if he followed my advice.  Pearl stayed behind with me to watch the nurse work on my fore hoof and learn.  She stayed close to me and gave me reassuring pats as nurse Night began her work.  Dead Eye remained within close to the medicine cart and sent dirty glances at Windstorm.

Nurse Night seemed not to notice anything besides the work that she was preforming on the inside of my fore hoof.  The preparation for taking out the bolt took around ten minutes of frenzied activity while she rummaged through all of her supplies to look for the things that she would need.  Once she was satisfied that she had a sterile environment, she called Dead Eye and another guard over to hold me down as she cut the bolt out.  I had promised her that I would keep still, but as soon as she began, I started screaming like a little filly.  Even though the wound and been numbed, I could still feel the pain from the sharp knife nurse Night was using to cut out the bolt.  I began yelling obscenities and banging my head, the only part of my body that wasn’t being held down, onto the table.  I could have handled it if she had been able to quickly remove the bolt.  That was just a lot of momentary pain that began to recede pretty quickly after the removal of the bolt.  Nurse Night was taking a much safer approach.  She was using her knife to carefully cut around the bolt so as to remove as little of my tissue as possible.  This meant that I had to feel like I was getting stabbed for around five minutes while she went about her work.  After she was satisfied that she could remove the bolt without doing any further damage to me she easily pulled it out and quickly began bandaging the wound and warped a poultice around it to help the wound heal more quickly.  After she was done, the two ponies released me and I was able to wipe the sweat from my body.  I found that I could still move my right fore hoof, but it caused me great pain.  ‘Looks like I’m not going to be exerting myself too much for the next couple of days,’ I thought.  With help from Dead Eye and Pearl, I was able to hobble over to the cart that was assigned to us.  I curled up on the floor of the cart and asked that I be left alone for a while so that I could take a nap.  The past hour had taxed me severely and I felt that all I needed now was some rest.  Dead Eye left to go see what had become of the would-be assassin and Pearl decided that she would stay close to me and also take a nap.  I was fine with that and quickly fell asleep.

When I awoke, Pearl and Windstorm were in the cart with me and the cart was moving.  I took a look at the sun and realized that I had taken a nap for almost six hours.  It was getting close to sundown and we would be making camp for the night pretty soon.

“Look who finally decided to wake up,” said Pearl teasingly.  “We were going to leave you back there because you haven’t moved for so long.  We thought you were dead.”

“Glad to see that you decided to give me a second chance on this whole living thing then,” I said, smiling.  I tried to move closer to the two of them, but the pain in my right fore hoof was just too much for me.  I stopped trying to move and just began looking around, trying to get a feel for our current surroundings.

“I’m sorry Surefire,” Windstorm said.  He appeared to be holding his head down in shame.  “I guess I’ve gotten used to being treated like royalty these past few days back at the Resistance.  I was getting used to all of the attention people were giving me, attention that I had been deprived from when we were back at the guild.  When that pony tried to kill me and you saved me, I was still thinking about the pie.  I didn’t like it when everypony started giving all their attention to you, and I felt like I was being ignored.  I felt like people should have been giving me attention, after all, somepony had just tried to kill me.”  Windstorm sighed, “All in all, I’ve acted like one of the stuck-up, rich ponies back in Bastion.  Forgive me?”

“Of course I forgive you.  I know you aren’t perfect and I don’t expect you to be.  I just hope that you learned your lesson today,” I said.  “Ponies follow you and look up to you. Most of them would give their lives for you to preserve the Resistance’s cause.  When you act like a snob, you make ponies question whether you would truly be better than the ones that run the Bastion right now.  You’re in a position of importance and you have to act like you’re always happy about things even if you have to fake it sometimes.  An unhappy leader makes unhappy followers.”

“I’m really sorry Surefire.  I should have stayed with you while they took that bolt out of you.  It seems that I would again owe you my life,” Windstorm said.  “I can’t believe that I was jealous of you right after you had just taken a bolt for me.”

“Well try not making a habit of having me there to save your life.  It’s not that pleasant for me and you’re going to pay for it if I fail,” I said with a smile.

“Thank you Surefire,” said Windstorm.  With that he fell silent and seemed to me to be thinking deeply.

“So Windstorm,” Pearl chimed in, trying to brighten the mood, “What did you find out about the assassin.  I stayed here with Surefire and haven’t heard anything about it.”

“Yeah, did they ever find out how the assassin got in here and who the assassin was?” I asked.

“They wouldn’t even let me close to her and they got a couple of guards to take me to the guard cart until they were sure that there weren’t going to be any more attempts.  Sadly I’m in the dark as much as you two are.  They let me come back here after a few hours, but Pearl told me to stay quiet while you were resting so we wouldn’t wake you. Hopefully Dead Eye will be able to fill us in on the details when we stop for the night.”

Almost as soon as he said that, our caravan of wagons pulled to a halt and I could see some of the guards bringing out some of the firewood we had brought with us to make a fire in the middle of the six carts which were arranged in a circular formation.  I could see our three teachers approaching: Dead Eye, Night Gale, and the tailor whom I had never seen before.  All three of them walked over to our cart and Dead Eye initiated the conversation.

“This here is Needler, the tailor pony.  We will start weapons practice tomorrow at lunch since we missed today’s lesson.  Tonight Miss Night and Needler will be teaching y’all.”

Windstorm spoke up.  “What of the assassin?  None of us have heard anything about it.  Please tell us Dead Eye.”

“Well I guess y’all deserve to hear what happened.  It wasn’t much.  Before we could interrogate the mare, she swallowed a poison pill and died before we knew what was going on.  We did figure out how she got into the camp though.  We did a quick search around the camp and came upon one of our actual cooks.  Her throat had been slit and her cooking aprons were missing.  The guards had let her out after they served your food and then they didn’t notice that it was a different mare that had come back in.”

We were all a bit disappointed.  We all wanted to know who the assassin was and who had sent him, but dead ponies don’t talk.  Apparently they had thrown the corpse into a small hole in the ground and moved on.

Our lessons with the nurse Night and Needler were much more relaxed than my lessons with Dead Eye.  Nurse night went and picked some herbs that were located close to where we had made camp and explained how each one could be used and in what doses.  She picked some of the plants that we should never use for medical purposes.

“Now these plants look like some of the other ones I’ve shown you today that can help ponies.  Be careful, these plants are actually poisonous if you look here – she said indicating some of the minor differences- these indicate that this plant is from the poisonous variety.”  If aid careful attention to these plants and made sure that I could differentiate between all of them.  After about thirty minutes of learning about the different plants, we moved on to tailoring.

Needler was a stallion with a pin cushion for a cutie mark.  He was very friendly and was great at explaining what he was doing.  I felt that if I had been the one he was teaching, instead of the one being taught upon, I could have easily picked up this whole tailoring thing.  Needler set up a few practice stations for Pearl and she began working her way through the different types of sewing methods.  Pearl worked diligently at her tasks while Windstorm and I watched.  I was glad to be in the company of my two friends and able to just sit and watch them.  I was slightly worried about how the wound would affect my shooting ability, but I was assured by Dead Eye’s promise that I would be fine in a few days.  Dead Eye wasn’t one to give ponies false hopes; he was much better at giving harsh truths.

After Pearl had finished her lesson, Windstorm retired to the cart while Pearl and I went to talk to our teachers personally.  Nurse Night had found a stretcher that the guards were using to lift me around until my fore hoof had a few days to heal.  I was taken to the weapons tent where Dead Eye was staying.  When I saw the inside of the tent I was impressed.  Dead Eye seemed to have procured enough weapons to outfit an entire army.  His tent was outlined with weapon racks which all seemed to contain different variations of every weapon.  Laid out in the back of his cart were a few books that appeared to be military strategy guides.  One looked to be open to a page depicting a scene where one battalion was being forced to fight on two fronts and appeared to be losing.

“Well kid, I hate to say it but this is kind of a good thing,” Dead Eye said.  “I’m sure there’s at least one spy in this camp and they know you’re injured.  The next time you shoot you have to pretend to be off.  You need to blame your shooting on your injury and nopony will expect that you are actually a viable threat to Smoothtongue.  All they will see is a broken pony who appears to have lost their special talent to an unfortunate incident.”

“Fine I’ll play along with your little scheme,” I said.  “So what are we doing tonight?  I don’t know what I can do without hurting my fore hoof.”

“We can talk about the future,” said Dead Eye.  “When we get to the Sunfire Desert and you get better, I will be introducing you to their local assassin’s guild.  There we are going to put in as much training time as we possibly can with their most experienced assassins.  That’s another reason I’ve been excited to get out here.  I was hoping I could pick up a few tips while I’m here.  These assassins are the best at camouflage and hiding.  Hopefully, training with the experts will rub off on you because, at the moment, you’re pretty hopeless at the whole moving without being seen thing.  You’ve gotten the hiding part down, just not moving and you’ll need to be able to do that if you’re even going to have a remote chance of killing Smoothtongue.”

“I knew you weren’t just interested in the architecture!  You seemed too excited about this trip,” I said.  “It’s always about killing and training for you isn’t it?”

“Of course, I thought you would have figured that out by now,” said Dead Eye.  He lifted up his cloak that he always wore to show me his cutie mark.  It was a chain of pony ears strung in a necklace.  “This is just another reason for me to wear the cloak.  It freaks ponies out too much and also gives away my less than harmless intent.  I’ll spare you the story of how I came to have this, but I can say one thing.  You’re going to have to start wearing a cloak.  I’ll ask Needler to rush teaching Pearl to make a cloak.  You’re cutie mark can only mean one of two things.  You’re either an amazing hunter or you’re an assassin.  Simple as that.  If you wear a cloak, ponies won’t know what you’re good at and be less suspicious when you disappear.”  It did make sense that I wouldn’t want my enemies to identify me for what I really was and showing off my cutie mark wasn’t the best way to accomplish that goal.

Dead Eye continued, “I want you to suggest some things that you think would help you with the cloak.  The suit will have to come second to the cloak though.  Well I think that’s enough for tonight.  Get some rest kid.  Heal up quick, because we have work to do and we can’t have this injury stopping us.”  With that, Dead Eye called another guard and they lifted me back to the tent where Windstorm was waiting.  He seemed to have already dozed off and I decided to do the same.  This had been the start of an interesting week of travel.  An assassination attempt on the first day of our travel and I was also already injured.  I hoped tomorrow would be a more relaxing journey.

Chapter Thirteen - Caves of Confusion

Chapter Thirteen – Caves of Confusion

“This ride that takes me through life, leads me into darkness but emerges into light…-Avenged Sevenfold“

Our caravan finally arrived at the foot of the mountains that were the only thing separating us from the Sunfire Desert.  It had been nine days since we had set off and I had recovered from my wound.  I was still a bit sore, but I felt that I had made a surprisingly fast recovery due to Nurse Night’s superior knowledge of medicine and Pearl’s constant care.  I was able to walk only four days after my injury and was now able to run again with only minor amounts of pain.  Nurse Night had begun teaching us how different medicines were to be prepared.  I began paying more attention to these things because I saw how interested Pearl was in such things and it made it much easier to begin conversations.  I figured that if I ever got hurt or sick while I was on a job, this knowledge just might save me. ‘How quickly have I transformed that I don’t even have a qualm about killing ponies anymore.  I’m not sure I like how Dead Eye has rubbed off on me.’ I thought.

Pearl had made great progress on my cloak over the past couple of days.  Our sense of wonder at the passing trees had passed and we now looked for new ways to keep ourselves entertained.  Pearl continually worked on my cloak and read some of the books about medicine that Nurse Night had given her and I read some of the war books that Dead Eye had brought along with him.  They were supposed to help me know what my enemies were doing if I was sent to spy and they were amassing an army.  Windstorm would often fly above us during the day to stretch his wings.  He was acting considerably nicer towards everypony in the camp after his little fit and I hoped that he kept it that way.

I had never seen mountains before in my life.  Considering I had never really left Bastion this wasn’t saying much, but I was completely astounded by the sheer magnitude of the rocks.  They towered above the forest and appeared to reach to the heavens.  The peaks were impossible to see as they were hidden from view by the sky.  We were going to pass through the mountain range by means of a cave that cut through two of the taller mountains.  The ponies from the Sunfire Desert that had visited the Resistance earlier had told them of the pass and that it had been wide enough for carts to pass through one at a time.  I was used to tight places after working as a thief in a guild for so long, but some of the pegasi seemed to be nervous about heading into a cave where they couldn’t see the sky overhead.  Windstorm decided to take a quick flight before we went into the cave for the rest of the day.  Pearl was wrapped up in one of the books that nurse Night had given her.  I decided to go for a quick run to stretch out my recovering fore hoof.  I ran through the forest and made sure to pay attention to hiding places.  After the assassination attempt, I realized that practicing the skills that Dead Eye had been pounding into my head could mean saving my life.  My fore hoof was feeling much better and I could run fine again.  I was feeling a bit nervous at the prospect of going into the cave.  I had never stayed inside during the day and it would be extremely unnerving for me to go an entire day without seeing the sun.  Darkness also made me nervous because that usually meant that it was time for the hood ponies to come out and rule the night.  I had been getting more used to the dark while training with Dead Eye, but the darkness still held plenty of surprises.  I arrived back at our caravan of carts about the same time that Windstorm did and we started our pass through the cave.

We had three unicorns leading us with their horns glowing.  The carts were arranged in a single file line with our cart located second only to the guard cart.  Everypony sat in a nervous silence as the last ray of natural light slipped behind a twist in the cave.

“So,’ Pearl said, breaking the silence, “What’s the plan once we reach the Sunfire Desert?”

“I will be going to see their king, Sandstorm” said Windstorm. “The king asked that I attend him alone so you two may do whatever you wish until I convince him to give us some troops to take with us.”

“I think that Dead Eye had some things that he wanted to show me when we arrived,” I said.  “So that leaves only you without something to do when we get there,” I said to Pearl.

I’ll see if I can get nurse Night to go with me to learn from one of the hospitals there,” said Pearl.  “I’ll also continue working on Surefire’s cloak.  Why do you need a cloak with all these pockets and dark colors anyway?” she asked.

“Umm… well Dead Eye says that I can keep more bolts in the pockets and have spare parts in case any of my weapons break,” I said, feeling like that was close enough to the truth but didn’t reveal anything about the Resistance’s Sharpshooters.

“But why do you need the cloak to be made of such a dark material?” she asked.

Before I had to make up another answer on the spot, a bump jolted our cart and we looked up at our surroundings.  To our surprise, the cave had greatly opened up from the narrow hallways we had been traversing.  The cave seemed to reach up hundreds of feet and there were massive stalagmites and stalactites that could have passed for small hills.  We were all shocked into awe at these unfamiliar formations and spent some time gawking at how massive this room was.  Near the middle of the cavern, the light from the unicorn’s horns weren’t enough to penetrate to the ceiling and gave me the impression that we were actually looking up at the dark night sky.  When we arrived at the opposite side of the cavern, we were all surprised to see that there was more than one possible exit from this cavern.  The guards had stopped in confusion and were now arguing over which path to take.  The ponies that had told us of this path had never mentioned these intersections.  We decided to look around the rest of the cavern to see if there was any scribbling on the wall that would tell us where we needed to go.  As we continued around the room, we began noticing more and more offshoots from this cavern.  Everypony decided it would be a good idea if we went back to the narrow tunnels that we had come from and take the offshoot directly opposite.  It made sense right?  If you’re travelling in the right direction, just keep heading in that direction and you’ll reach where you’re trying to go.  There was only a slight flaw in our plan.  When we headed back around, we could no longer tell which cave was the one that we had exited from.  Everything was beginning to look the same and nopony was certain where we had come from.  Safe to say, that everypony was beginning to be afraid.  We no longer had a plan for escaping our current predicament and no place to retreat to.  It’s unnerving to say the least and I could hear somepony in our caravan whimpering.

“Okay,” said nurse Night, taking control of the situation.  “Everypony calmly begin suggesting ideas of how we can get out of here.”

“Well we could go through one of the tunnels at random,” Dead Eye suggested.  “It would get us somewhere at least.”

“What if we get lost in that tunnel too?  We’re going to die here if we don’t get out and taking all of these tunnels is just going to waste all of our food.  There has to be a better way of going about this than just randomly walking through tunnels,” one of the guards said.

“We could mark off the tunnels that we have already been too,” I suggested.  “That way we don’t keep going in circles.  I honestly wouldn’t even mind going back from where we came as long as it meant that we would come back through prepared.”  A few ponies grunted in agreement with my statement and we felt like that would be a good idea no matter what we eventually decided to do.

“Why don’t we split up and everypony heads down a different tunnel,” Windstorm suggested.  “That way, we could cover more ground than if we all went down one tunnel.”

“Unfortunately,” said Dead Eye, “We can’t leave any pony alone.  What would we do if we lost somepony?  We would be in even more trouble than we are in know.”

Windstorm

“I have an idea,” Pearl said in a soft voice, obviously a bit nervous to be talking in front of so large a crowd.  What if we combined all of our ideas?  I mean Dead Eye’s idea is a bit wasteful but our best bet at the moment.  Windstorm’s idea is a spinoff of Dead Eye’s but much more risky.  Surefire had a good idea to mark off the tunnels that we passed through.  My suggestion is that we send four groups of three guards down each tunnel.  We would all wait here and they would report to us once they found something.  To make this less dangerous and more efficient, I suggest that we give each of the groups some rope that we can keep tied back here.  That way, they can easily find their way back or signal for help by tugging on their ropes.  That way we could also find them and it’s our best chance of finding our way out.”  After her explanation, she quickly fell silent and backed away from the center of the group where she had been standing.  She moved over to me and I gave her a reassuring hug to tell her that she had done well.

“Well I think we have a winner,” said nurse Night.  “Does anypony have a better suggestion or are we going to start working on getting ourselves out of here?”  When nopony said anything further, we began working on Pearl’s idea.

Everypony was soon in motion getting everything together that we would need to find our way out.  We got the ropes from the cooks that had been using it to string up any meat they were cooking.  The guards split themselves into groups and we were ready to begin.  Each of the three packs of guards would take one of the unicorns to light their way through the cave.  That meant that our camp would be left to wait upon them only by the light of a fire.  The only thing we had trouble in finding was a way to mark the caves that had already been traveled.  We had no chalk with us and so we began experimenting with different materials.  We could not find anything better than using a rock to make some scratches at the entrances to the paths.  The problem with this approach was that there were so many irregularities already in the cavern and it would be near impossible to determine if we had made the markings or if they had already been there or if we had made them.  Nurse Night came up with a solution to our problem by making some makeshift paint out of some of the berries that she had collected before we had reached the cave.

The guards set off into the tunnels with the ropes that we had attached to the spokes of one of the wagon wheels.  Everypony watched as the ropes bounced back and forth as the groups walked away from our camp.  An eerie silence passed over the camp and we watched for the slightest clue that somepony was in trouble.  The ropes seemed to bounce around consistently for another thirty minutes and I hoped that the rope didn’t run out before the guards could find something that would indicate that they were heading in the right direction.  We saw  one of the ropes begin to loosen up.  Nopony knew what to do and whether we should send a group down the passage after them.  The rope continued to loosen and tighten.  Somepony finally realized that they were returning and picking up the slack in the rope as they went.  The group of guards arrived fifteen minutes later and announced that their passage had been a dead end and nurse Night quickly went and marked the tunnel off with an X.

“Was there anything down there that we should know about?” asked nurse Night.

“Nope, just rock,” said the guard.  “Have any of the other groups come back?” asked another of the trio.

“No, you are the first to return,” said nurse Night.

“Not for long,” said Pearl, indicating one of the other ropes that was going slack and getting tight again.

“We’ll just wait until they come back,” said one of the guards.  “No point in going if they found the right way to go.

The next group arrived and brought similar news.  They, however, had found a decent sized sapphire while they had been spelunking.  It was nice, but it still didn’t help us get out of here.  We gave the two groups some more water and sent them off into two new tunnels.  The groups came and went and ponies were beginning to lose hope.

“Now now,” said nurse Night, with a cheerful voice.  “We’ve been through about a tenth of these tunnels already.  It may take some time, but we’ll get out of here.”  It was true that we were making good progress, but from all the time we had spent waiting it felt like we had already been stuck in here for days.  In truth we had spent only about five hours waiting, but when all your time is spent focused on one thing, time seemed to move at a grueling pace.  A few ponies had gone to sleep to avoid waiting for the groups to return with good news, only to be disappointed.  I spent the time waiting with Windstorm and Pearl.  Pearl was constantly worried for the guard’s safety and so Windstorm and I tried to assuage her.  We all cuddled close together and told stories that we remembered from our past.  This seemed to relieve her worries a bit and we all felt a bit better.  Some of the other ponies heard the stories that we were telling and decided to do the same.  This chain continued and everypony decided that we should gather around the fire and take turns telling stories from our past.  We went about in a circle and we listened to all different types of stories.  Some ponies told stories of adventures they had had as fillies and some told sad stories of lost love.  Some of the stories made people laugh and others caused us all to feel a bit of the misery that some ponies had endured during their life.  I told a comical story of one of the ponies in my guild that had accidently stored his stolen goods in a pig sty and he had come back to find that everything he had stolen had been covered in mud.  We had found him sifting through the muck to find his things.  He looked even less clean than the pigs that were in the sty with him and we had called him Pigface after that.

Windstorm told the story of how I had saved him from the hood ponies and everypony gave me a bit more respect for saving their king from those savage beasts.  Dead Eye told us about a time he had gone hunting and ended up shooting someone else’s kill before he realized that it had been dead.  This story brought roars of laughter from our group who had never known Dead Eye to ever admit that he had made a mistake.  Nurse Night told us a story about a time when she had given birth to her daughter and how she had almost lost her to a disease that had been raging throughout the Resistance.  We had almost completely gone around the circle and now it was Pearl’s turn to finish the round.  She was reluctant and tried to excuse herself by saying that she couldn’t remember anything from her past and couldn’t tell a decent story anyway.  Windstorm and I continued pushing her until she finally relented and decided to tell everypony about her experiences in the woods before we had met up with the Resistance.

“I’ll start my story when Surefire and I entered the Haunted Hollows to search for Windstorm and how we eventually ended up joining the camp,” said Pearl.  Her voice was stuttering a bit but it grew in confidence as she continued.  “After Surefire came to where I was waiting in the forest and told me what had happened with Windstorm, we decided that nothing could be done that night.  We lay down to sleep and were forced to lie close together to preserve the warmth.  I hoped that Windstorm wouldn’t freeze to death and I was glad that I had Surefire close beside me so that I wouldn’t lose sight of him too.  If I lost both Windstorm and Surefire, I don’t know what I would do.  The two of them are the only links I had from this new world I had found myself in and I was scared of what would happen if I lost those links.”

She took a deep breath and continued.  “The next morning we both woke up early so that we would have more time to look for Windstorm.  I wanted to head out immediately and look for him.  All rational thought had left my mind by this point and all I wanted was to get my other friend back.  Surefire reasoned with me and got me to search out a cave for us to stay in once we had found Windstorm and he went off to get us some food to eat.  I have to admit, I was nervous about leaving Surefire but he convinced me that everything would be okay.  When I was out there looking for the cave, I wasn’t sure what I was looking for.  I spent about an hour wandering around until I stumbled upon a skeleton of some animal.  I broke into tears.  What if I found Surefire or Windstorm just like that; a pile of bones?  I got it together and assured myself that I was making myself worry more than I needed to.  I eventually found an outcropping and decided that that would provide us enough shelter for the night and so I went back to my meeting place with Surefire.  I knew I was early, but I hoped he would also come back early so that we could spend more time looking for Windstorm.  I waited and I waited, but Surefire never arrived.  After about two hours, I was in a state of frantic worry.  Should I go look for him or should I wait here?  Why was Surefire doing this to me?  He knew how much I was going to worry.  Surefire wandered back into the brush where we were meeting and I hit him across the face.  That wiped his stupid grin off of his face and began apologizing for being so late.  I was angry at him and refused to listen to him until I noticed that he was bloody.  I felt bad that I hadn’t even given him enough time to explain himself.  I patched him up and we went back to the alcove I found and he told me why he had been late, and then showed me how much food we now had.  I must have been acting like a complete freak, getting angry at him and then happy.  Anyway, after that we went hunting for Windstorm and came up with nothing we were both disappointed.  I spent the night thinking about what we would do if we didn’t find Windstorm, thoughts I really did not want to be thinking.  I fell into an uneasy sleep and was Surefire awoke me near Midnight and told me of a camp that he had found.  I thought that he was just pulling my leg and trying to cheer me up, but low and behold, he actually had found a camp, and with it, Windstorm.  I am so happy to have the two of them back.  Without them, where would I be right now?  Without Surefire I would probably be dead and Windstorm was always there to support me when I was recovering.  I hope we don’t get separated like that again.  It would be terrible to lose my two closest friends.” she concluded.

The other ponies all felt like they had just been one upped.  None of their stories had been quite so complex and exciting.  We were just deciding where who should start the next round of storytelling when we heard a group of guards come running back.  Everypony got ready just in case something nasty was following them.  We heard them hollering and it seemed that they were excited.  I guess we had finally gotten lucky and were going to get out of this cold damp place.  The guards came back yelling that they had done it.  They had seen the exit to the Sunfire Desert.  It was finally time to move on.  We got a couple of the stronger ponies to pull on the other two ropes to signal to the other groups to come back.  We saw the ropes begin to go slack and everypony began packing our things up and preparing to push forward.  Nurse Night used the last of her paint to mark the entrance to tunnel with lots of intricate designs and label the path “Desert”.  The other groups arrived a half hour later and we were ready to set off again, to brave the heat of the sun and hopefully turn the tides in the favor of the Resistance.

Chapter Fourteen - The Desert

Chapter Fourteen – The Desert

“I watch your every move, Study the things you do, And the pattern of your ways…-Iron Maiden“

Coming out of the cave and back into the bright sun was a bit jolting.  The sun beat down on our backs and we were forced to use the coverings we had brought for our carts.  I mean, there was nothing really to see in a desert anyway besides a lot of sand.  Luckily, we had found an oasis near the mouth of the tunnel and had refilled our stores of water.   According to the rough map we had (the traders that had come from there obviously hadn’t been artistic) we were now supposed to continue heading west but start moving slightly North.  I’m not really sure how the ponies that lived here found anything out here. Were there even any landmarks that you could use to tell where you were going?  To me, it just looked like piles and piles of sand with no obvious end.  If you got lost out here, you were going to die.  There was just no way a pony could survive in these conditions without shade and water.  My guess was that you would probably just shrivel up from the water deficiency and then be covered over by the sand.  Nopony would ever know what happened to you.

The guards had to change shifts frequently and we had to stop much more often because the guards needed breaks because they were either very thirsty or their eyes and mouth had practically been filled with sand.  Needler went to work cutting up some rags that didn’t look half bad and would be useful for keeping the sand away.  After he had managed to make enough rags for the guards pulling the carts, he got back to work helping Pearl make my cloak.  I wish there was something I could do besides sit and watch, even though it did allow me to be with my friends.  Windstorm decided to take a leave and fly above the sands and our caravan.  With Pearl occupied by Needler, I had nothing to do but sit and think.  I wondered what the assassins Dead Eye would be taking me to would be like.  I wondered what type of assassins they would be.  Would they be that ones that were impartial and take any opportunity that would pay or did they have some kind of code that they followed?

The heat of the desert during the day was a shocking contrast to the temperature of the night.  Once the sun had set upon the desert, the heat that had plagued us during the day evaporated and was replaced by a stinging cold.  Luckily, we brought blankets with us so that we could keep ourselves warm.  Still after getting used to the scorching heat, nighttime still felt extremely cold.  Pearl, Windstorm, and I lay close together near the fire that we had made from some of the wood we had taken with us from the Haunted Hollows.  We managed to get a fire going by using the covered carts as a buffer against the wind and sand, which had stopped blowing as harshly during the nighttime.  It was also chilling to look outside of our tightly packed tents and see no signs of civilization anyplace close to hear.  The light that was burning from our fire was the only light visible besides the dim glow that the moon gave off.  Our water supplies were dwindling quickly and weren’t going to last to much longer if we continued the same grueling pace during the day.  Some of the guards that had been pulling the wagons had developed some pretty serious burns throughout the course of the day and Nurse Night was busy applying salves to them.

“I had a look at the map earlier today while you two were working on that cloak and it appears that we should make it to the Sunfire Kingdom by tomorrow if we go as far as we managed to go today,” said Windstorm.

“That’s great.  We’ll all have a chance to get to see something that we had never seen before.  Windstorm will be going to the castle, nurse Night it taking me to their hospital and Surefire is going to… where exactly is Dead Eye taking you tomorrow Surefire?” Pearl asked.

“I don’t know,” I lied.  “Apparently it’s some sort of surprise.”

“Maybe I could go with you then, after I’ve finished looking around the hospital,” said Pearl.

“Well, um… yeah I’ll ask Dead Eye tomorrow,” I said, hoping that it would appease her.

“Oh please Surefire, you are a terrible liar.  What are you trying to hide that?  Do you want to get away from us?  If so, then you can just tell us and we’ll leave you alone.”

“No. I would never want to leave you two.  You two are my only friends in this place.  How could I possibly want to leave you?” I asked.

“So you don’t deny lying?  What are you trying to hide Surefire?” Windstorm said prying.

‘Okay okay calm down,’ I thought, ‘they don’t actually know about the assassins or the Sharpshooters so at least that’s good.  I wonder what lie they will buy?’  I remembered an old adage that I had heard referred to sarcastically back in the guild, but it seemed to fit my situation well.  ‘Oh what a tangled web we weave, when first we practice to deceive.’

“Are you going to tell us what you’ve been hiding for the past week or not Surefire?” asked Pearl gently.

“Yeah… you see… the truth is that I was going to practice with some of their weapon masters and I didn’t want you two knowing so that you wouldn’t come and watch.  I’m not that good with them and it makes me extremely nervous when I have people watching me.  I knew that you two would want to come if I told you about it so I’ve been trying to keep it a secret.  Obviously, I’m not a good of a liar as I thought I was,” I said, really hoping that they would buy this.

“It’s okay Surefire.  If you had just explained it like you did right now we would have respected your wishes and still will,” said Pearl. ‘All right! They bought it!' I thought.  Pearl continued.  “I hope you learn from this Surefire.  It’s never okay to lie to your friends.  It makes us feel like you don’t like us and want us around and makes us lose trust in you.  Hopefully you won’t lie to us like that again.”  I apologized for lying and we got into a group hug.  I kept a smile on my face for the rest of the night, but now I felt like a complete scumbag.  ‘She thinks you were being honest with that story.  I feel like I’m slipping away.  Is this cause worth the price I might have to pay in losing my friends?  If I go through with the assassination, then I lose Windstorm because it goes against everything he believes in and I’ll lose Pearl.  She loves life so much.  You can see it when she talks about medical stuff.  Everything she does is to preserve life and I now seem to be employed in the business of ending it.’

The rest of the night passed quickly and we set off a bit early so that we could move a bit faster while it still wasn’t hot.  Now that I thought about it, I wasn’t sure why we were travelling during the hottest part of the day and resting during the coolest.  I’m sure if we had gone as the sun was setting and as the sun was rising we would have gone the same distance.  I told Windstorm and Pearl of my idea and they felt stupid for not thinking of it earlier.  I was going to hop out of the cart and tell the guards.  When I poked my head out of the cart, I realized that it was too late to change our traveling method because in the distance I could see a gigantic building that I assumed to be the palace.  I tapped the shoulders of the guard that was tugging our cart and pointed at the city.  The guards kept their heads down when they were walking so that the sound wouldn’t blow in their eyes and it was hard work pulling carts through sand.  The guard gave an exclamatory shout and everypony was looking for what had caused his shout and saw the city.  Everypony began letting out excited cheers and we spent the next few hours watching the kingdom steadily grow larger as we approached.  The city seemed to have a high wall built around it made of some type of stone.  I assumed that the wall was to keep the sand out from the surrounding desert. Still it seemed that one side of the wall was a lot shorter because the sand had piled up over time on that side.

As we drew closer to the massive city, a group of guards came out a ways to escort us to the building where we would be staying.  They sent a messenger back to the king to tell them that we had arrived.  We reached the gates of the city and I had trouble comprehending just how massive they were.  The portcullis worked the same way it did in Bastion, but it was about three times taller and about two times wider.  ‘I’m so glad I don’t have to escape form this place,’ I thought. ‘I never would have made the jump off of this wall.’ The guards from the Sunfire kingdom continued escorting us through town.  I was impressed with the buildings and I decided to also go and talk to Dead Eye.  I hopped into his weapons cart and watched him as he gazed about the city.

“Is this everything you thought it would be?” I asked him.

“It’s amazing,” he said.  “I have an idea of where we can go to find our associates.  I’ll talk to you about it later though.  For now just look at the buildings around here and remember what I told you to work on.”  So obviously Dead Eye had a suspicion we were being overheard and was trying to be vague while telling me to be vigilant.  I looked around at the city like Dead Eye told me to and I found that instead of noticing the well-built structures, I was noticing some of the more shady ponies that seemed to be watching our cart while trying not to be noticed.  I wondered if they had guilds here too because those ponies looked like they would love to relieve us of anything we owned.  It appeared that the guards were leading us through the wealthier part of town which was to be expected if you are escorting somepony of royal blood through your kingdom for the first time.  I’m sure Smoothtounge would never show any ambassadors the Drudge while trying to enlist their help.

We arrived at a very tall building that was decorated on the outside with jewels of all varieties.  Above the entrance was an extravagant scene of an oasis in a desert.  The sand dunes were made of amber and the water in the center of the piece was made of sapphire.  The sun appeared to be setting and was portrayed by a large red ruby.  According to the guards, this building was called Oasis, a name that fit the art on the building.  They told us that this is where the wealthiest and most powerful ponies, besides the kind of course, stayed.  They had set aside the entire top floor for our own personal use while we stayed here in the Sunfire Kingdom.  Windstorm told them to send the king our thanks and a few of the ponies that ran the Oasis came and helped us take everything we needed to the top floor.  There was an opening in one of the walls that lead out onto a deck from where you could look over the grand market that the city had.  The deck appeared to be supported by some type of wood that was apparently much stronger than it looked.  Most of us earth ponies avoided the deck like the plague, but most of the pegasi were eager to venture out onto it and take a look over this foreign city.  Windstorm took a quick lap above the city and seemed to approve of what he saw.

“What a life,” he said.  “This place is so different from Bastion.  It’s strange but it’s beautiful in its own way.  I wouldn’t mind living here if it wasn’t for these extreme temperatures.”

“Good then get the king to send some troops with us and we can get out of here.  These buildings are freaking me out,” I said.  “How can anypony stand living in something like this?  Most of the buildings look like they would fall down if I kicked them.”

“I’m sure you’ll get used to it while we are staying here,” said Windstorm.  “Let’s go explore the city a bit today.  We don’t have appointments to keep until tomorrow.  This will be an opportunity for all of us to see what it’s like to actually go to a market and buy things.  I’m sure we’ll find something that will interest us.”

“That’s a great idea Windstorm!” said Pearl.  “It will be like a day off before we all get back to work.”  I just nodded.  I was kind of excited to finally see what the city looked like from the perspective of a privileged pony that had no worries about starvation or stealing.

Dead Eye walked over to me and pulled me aside.  “Don’t stay out there to long kid.  Have fun and look around but don’t stay out there too long.  We are going to do some practicing tonight while everypony else is asleep.  Also, while you’re out there, make sure to keep a lookout for the assassins.  They are out there and it would be better if we could find them before they found us.  Understand?”

I vigorously nodded my head and said yes.  With that said and done, he let me go back over with my friends and our journey was ready to begin.

“Would you look at how adorable this is,” exclaimed Pearl.  She showed us a blanket with a bunch of younger ponies playing beside an oasis.  “Can we get it guys?  Pretty please?”

“All right Pearl,” said Windstorm pulling out some of the money we had left.  Pearl had taken to shopping quickly and had found something that she thought we needed at every stand.  It was nice that we had found something that she really enjoyed doing but there was no way that we could afford to do this a lot.  Windstorm gave the money to an old mare that nodded to us and gave us a smile.  She continued her work making something else with outstanding speed.  There were vendors here that offered things that weren’t available in Bastion.  Also unlike Bastion, there was a much more cheerful attitude in the air.  There were bards everywhere that would sing anything for a little bit of money and there were also fortune tellers that would offer to tell you about your future for a small price.  I highly doubted that any of them could actually see the future but it was still interesting to watch how many ponies would give in and spend their money so foolishly.

After looking at everything in wonder for a few hours, it was beginning to get dark but nopony seemed to be packing up for the night.  I guess they didn’t have the same problem with hood ponies here and anypony could stay up as long as they wanted and continue shopping.  Since we had spent all of the money that we had brought with us, we began just wandering around the area and just looking at the spectacular architecture.  There was no chance of us getting lost because Windstorm could fly above us and easily point us in the direction of Oasis.  Pearl and Windstorm were focusing on the main attractions of the city and I was focusing on finding somepony that I suspected to be an assassin and looking for places that I could use to hide if need be.  ‘How exactly do you find an assassin?  It’s not like they just walk down the street in uniforms that scream ‘Look at me I’m an assassin!’  From what Dead Eye has taught me, I would bet that I could find one if I found somepony that had a concealed weapon and was trying to look completely natural in their surroundings.  Too natural,’ I continued pondering this and we made it to some sort of fountain that one of the locals had recommended that we check out.  While Pearl and Windstorm were running around it and looking at all the shiny things that others had thrown in, I noticed a pony that seemed to was selling things and passing out pamphlets to only some of his customers.  The only strange part of this was that they didn’t give the pamphlets to everyone that bought from them.  The ones ponies that were given the pamphlets seemed to be wearing clothing that obscured most of their body.  As one of those ponies was grabbing the goods, I saw the glimmer of steel attached to the inner part of their fore hoof.  I guess I had found something suspicious.  I told Pearl and Windstorm to wait for me, saying that I had to go find a restroom and would rejoin them shortly.  They agreed to continue looking at the area around the fountain and I ran off to the opposite direction of the suspicious pony.  After I was confident that I was out of their sight range, I began working my way closer and closer to the pony.  As I got closer I realized that it was a mare and she appeared to be selling an assortment of books.  I decided to pose as another customer and buy a book.  I talked to the mare and she seemed extremely friendly and I was going to purchase a book just to see if she would give me one of the pamphlets but then I realized that Windstorm had the rest of the money.  I continued browsing her inventory until I noticed that she had slipped one of the pamphlets to another pony and had cast a quick, nervous look at me before doing so.  I watched the pony with the pamphlet pass and I politely excused myself.  I began walking through the crowd and attempting to follow that pony.

I moved slowly and calmly throughout the crowd in an indirect path, but I never lost sight of that pony.  He appeared to be heading away from this fountain.  I lost sight of him around a corner and was forced to break away from the crowd and follow him around the corner.  I was surprised to see that there was nothing to be seen.  I noticed a piece of paper that appeared to be held down by a rock in the back of the alley.  When I went over to examine the paper, chills ran down my spine.  The paper read, “We know that you’ve been watching us.”  Underneath the words was a map of the city.  Highlighted in red were three fountains and in the center of it was a circle.  Beside this circle was written ‘We will meet tonight at the stroke of midnight’.  I guess I had found the assassins.  I just hoped that Dead Eye would be pleased with this sheet of paper.

“What took you so long Surefire?” Windstorm asked.

“I couldn’t find a decent place to use the restroom.  The closest place was a few blocks away and I don’t think my stomach agreed with all of that food we got at that snack bar.”  I gave a groan just to expound the point.

“I liked it,” said Pearl.  “I guess it just wasn’t for you.”

“Guess not,” I said.  “Anyway are you two planning to go anywhere else tonight?”

“We were going to just walk around for a couple more hours.  Are you going to join us?” Pearl asked.

“I think I better not.  My stomach isn’t feeling too good right now.  I think I’ll head back to the Oasis,” I said.  “I bet they have a good toilet there.  Can you fly up and point me back to there?”

“Sure thing Surefire,” he said.  With that, he jumped up into the sky and flew up high into the air.  He looked around and returned to the ground after doing a few flips.  “It’s over that way he said pointing to the street on the other side of the fountain.  “I guess we’ll see you tonight then.”

“Yeah, I’ll either be in the room or taking up one of the toilets.  See you later,” I said, beginning to quickly walk away.  I was pleased that this excuse would get me back to Dead Eye faster and also give them an excuse to not find me in our room when they returned from their explorations.

“Well this is… interesting,” said Dead Eye after looking at the paper I had given to him.  “This definitely wasn’t what I was expecting.  I thought I told you not to let them see you.”

“I swear I didn’t let them know that I was following or even interested.  The vendor wouldn’t have had time to tell that pony even if she had a suspicion about me.  And where did the pony that I was tailing go?  I looked around and I hadn’t seen anywhere that they could have gone,” I said.

“Probably some sort of tunnel system that they have going throughout the city.  I bet they had an entrance to their little subterranean system there and they just left you this note to spook you and also give you a meeting point with them.  Obviously you impressed them or otherwise they wouldn’t have given you this invitation,” he said.  “Still I don’t like it.  I like things being on my own terms.  It could also be a trap.  They don’t know who you’re working for and may assume you are spying on them for Windstorm.  In that case they may ambush you at the meeting tonight so we have to be prepared.  I’ll probably follow behind you until we figure out whether they are hostile or not so that we still have the element of surprise.” Dead Eye was pacing about the room, obviously thinking about the best way to attend the meeting.  Dead Eye sighed, “Well there’s no use postponing this any longer.  Go make a scene and go to the restroom.  I’ll try to make some sort of diversion.  Just be ready to go when you hear everypony yell or shout or something.  Just make sure to lock the door so nobody figures out that you aren’t actually here.  No use making your friends think you’re any more of a liar than they already do.”

Dead Eye moved away from me and I went over to mix in with the other ponies in the common room that we had been given.  After a while, I told one of the guards to tell my friends that I was in the restroom if they came back and I went off.  After a few minutes of sitting and waiting, I heard a couple ponies sneak and everypony begin to run off.  I took my cue and left the restroom and met up with Dead Eye on the now vacant balcony.

“What did you do to clear them out so fast?” I asked.

“Oh nothing special,” said Dead Eye.  “Just set the floor on fire with some of these chemicals that I got from nurse Night.  Turns out that they don’t actually burn things but they make a great illusion.  I’m pretty sure most of them ran for the stairs or flew off the balcony and down to the first floor to get help.  Now is our chance to escape.”

“How do you plan on doing that exactly?” I asked.  “If you haven’t noticed we are on the top story of a building and neither of us are pegasi.  I thought we would just take the stairs and then wait until everypony went back up.”

“Where’s the fun in that?” asked Dead Eye.  With that, he jumped over the corner of the balcony and yelled “Follow me!”  I peered out over the edge and saw that Dead Eye had actually grabbed onto some of the supports that held the balcony up and was shimmying closer to the building.  I nervously climbed over the edge and followed suit.  Dead Eye seemed to be pretty confident in his ability to scale the edges of this building, but I was less than confident.  I felt more secure when I reached the building but I still didn’t like the fact that if I screwed up, there wasn’t going to be a second chance.  Dead Eye told me to climb exactly where he was climbing so that I wouldn’t make a stupid mistake and slip.  If I fell, I would probably take him out too because he was directly below me but luckily that did not happen.

When we were close to the bottom of the Oasis, Dead Eye jumped across to another building’s rooftop.  I followed him and asked, “Why did we just risk our lives to get down here?  It would have been so much easier to get up here from down there on the street.”

“Because you need the practice kid,” said Dead Eye.  “What? Do you think that getting to Smoothtongue won’t require you to climb buildings in Bastion?  This gives us an opportunity to practice for Bastion without actually putting us in danger’s way and I have a feeling you have somepony from the guild tailing you.  If they can see that you are actually good at what you do, they may be more reluctant to try and kill us if it comes down to that.”

“Oh,” was the only response I could think of and we continued moving from rooftop to rooftop and got closer and closer to our meeting point.  I was looking all around me and still couldn’t see anypony following us, which I didn’t know if it was a good thing or a bad thing.  While I was doing a periodic check for anypony spying on me, I did happen to notice Pearl and Windstorm in the middle of a street and they appeared to be heading back to the Oasis.  I hoped this meeting wouldn’t take too long.  After all, how long was my ruse with the restroom going to work anyway?  It was only so long before somepony banged on the door and demanded to know if anypony was in there.  I pushed these thoughts out of my head and thought about the task at hand.  I was going to have to go in and talk to these ponies and I didn’t know whether they wanted me to join them or whether they wanted me dead.  Suddenly a thought came across my mind.

“Dead Eye,” I started, “I thought you said that you thought somepony was trailing me.  If that’s true, then they would have also seen you while we were climbing down the Oasis.  Doesn’t that kind of ruin the element of surprise that you were wanting?”

“Yes, but that was only a suspicion.  Who knows, maybe they aren’t as good as I thought they were and they haven’t sent anypony to follow you.  I’m still going to try and hide out while you do the talking,” said Dead Eye.  He shrugged, “It will still be better than going in together and if they aren’t hostile then I can just come out of hiding.”

“That sounds reasonable,” I said.

“Let’s hope they think the same thing,” he said.

I stood where the piece of paper indicated that I should meet the assassins.  It was slightly awkward to be standing alone in the center of an ally with nopony by my side.  It felt like I was just standing there like an idiot.  I knew that there were ponies watching me intently but I couldn’t see them and I wondered how many there were.  I was scared that they might decide I was unworthy of joining their cult and just leave me here like this and I would be disappointed.  Dead Eye was right.  I needed to practice in a city and what better way to practice than to learn from the experts.

Finally a pony in a black cloak seemed to come out from nowhere.  Actually I had seen where he had come from but I hadn’t seen him.  It had looked like a shadow had walked into the center of the alley and was standing there looking at me.

“Hi,” I said nervously after the pony had not said anything.  “My name is Surefire and I found this note that told me I was supposed to meet somepony here at midnight…”

“We know,” was all he said.  He strangely reminded of the Mistress from the guild with the hood of the cloak obscuring his face.

“So… What do you want me to do?” I asked.  This was a strange meeting but I guess every place you go there’s some sort of weird ritual if initiation.

“Follow me,” he said.  With that he abruptly turned around and walked back from the shadows he had come from.  I followed behind him and watched as he slid a hidden plate on the ground sideways to reveal the entrance to a tunnel.  I guess Dead Eye had been right.  I wasn’t sure whether to reveal if I had brought him along with me or not, but decided to remain silent because he had probably seen me go into the tunnel and would be able to follow.  I’m sure that if he wanted to he would have jumped down and also revealed his presence.  I continued following this pony into the depths of the tunnel and was surprised at how steeply we were going down.  I wondered where this would lead.  I hadn’t seen the tunnel branch off yet so I assumed we would be going to some sort of atrium that these assassins claimed as their base.  I wondered how large the atrium of this place was because we had gone a good hundred feet underground.  When we arrived in the room I was shocked.  It appeared to be a complete underground city.  There were at least fifty ponies that I could see when I entered into the main room.  There appeared to be large sections of chairs and tables that some ponies were seated at and just relaxing.  The hooded pony that I was following lead me behind this building to what I assumed was the center of the complex.  The walls were supported by the same type of wood that held up our balcony back at the oasis.  It formed a lattice across the top of this excavated area and above the framework of trees was the strange sandstone that all of the buildings were made out of.  It looked secure enough, but I was never going to get over the fact that everything here in the Sunfire kingdom looked like it could be knocked over by a good gust of wind.

In the center of this large area was a dark red crystal that was about 20 feet high and 7 feet across.  The crystal rested on a small area of dry land surrounded by a deep pool of black water.  There was a small boat that looked like it could hold two ponies and transport us across the pool.  Close to the boat, I recognized some of the plants as Nightshade, a poisonous plant that nurse Night had told us to stay away from.  I guess it made sense for these assassins to grow it.  After all, you never know when this stuff will come in handy. The hooded pony lead me inside of the small boat and he took a pole and pushed us across.

When we got off on the small dry slip of land where the crystal was, the hooded pony began talking.  "This crystal represents us.  We are the stone upon which this city relies to keep power.  Without assassins there would be wars over power.  You have experienced in your own country have you not?  We have watched you as you have watched us.  We have seen your skills and have deemed you worthy of entering our fold.  Understand that we are not simply contract killers, but a potent political force that serves none but the common good.  We have seen the corruption in society and have forfeited our lives to better the ones on the surface.  We have joined the darkness to become a force of justice.  We take only the lives of those ponies who have forfeited them because they have destroyed the lives of another.  Do you understand our mission?" asked the pony.  By this time he had taken off his cloak to reveal a black stallion with a pure white mane.  His cutie mark was a set of scales that were balanced.  The words Death and Life emblazoned on the opposite sides.

"I understand your goal," I said.  "What do I have to do to join?" This pony had been dead serious in his speech and I already agreed with most of the principles he laid down to join.  I felt that these ponies weren’t going to be as bad as I had thought they were going to be when Dead Eye first told me about them.  Where was he anyway? I was sure he would agree with the rules that this pony had laid out.  After all, hadn't I already thought that ponies like Smoothtongue had lost the right to live when they took another ponies life for personal gain?

The pony that had been leading me threw me an ornamental knife. "Climb to the top of the crystal and deposit some of your blood on the topmost tip.  If you do this, you will have passed the initiation for the Angels of the Night, as we prefer to be called.”

Times like these make me wish I were a pegasus.  It would be so simple to just fly up to the top, make a small cut in my fore hoof, and smear the blood on the top of the crystal.  Nope.  I had to do it the old fashioned way. I walked around the base of the crystal and looked for the best way to begin my assent.

The crystal was an irregular shape and reminded me of a flame the way it was formed.  The red murky interior of the crystal also seemed to whirl around and give the impression of fire. I found a small crevice near the bottom of the monstrous crystal and began my climb there.  It took me a few tries to finally reach this first foothold because of how slick the crystal was.  My hoofs would slide across the glasslike surface and cause me to fall off before I could get a good hoofhold.  I hoped I would be able to make the other jumps with greater ease because it would be a pretty long fall straight down if I missed a jump.  I took my time with the jumps and made sure to overcompensate so that I wouldn't fall short and have to try to find purchase on this smooth rock.  After about an hour of climbing had elapsed, I finally reached the top of the crystal.  I was using all of my limbs to hold onto the top and so I had to use my mouth to pry the knife out of a makeshift weapon sheath that I had in the side of my cloak.  Using a knife with my mouth was something Dead Eye and I had never covered, but I figured that it shouldn't be too hard hitting myself with it.  I cocked my head to one side and swung my head towards my right fore hoof.  The knife sunk in and tore throughout my flesh. 'Damn they keep that thing sharp.' Now that the blood was flowing down my fore hoof, all I had to do was wait until a drop of my blood dripped onto the spire and my initiation would be complete. I waited in pain as the blood gathered into a small drop and finally fell onto the crystal.  I was surprised to feel the crystal begin to glow a bright red and hum.

I began sliding down the side of the crystal as I slowly loosened my grip and let go.  I decided that I didn't want to be close to that crystal if it was doing something weird and decided that the safest way to get down was to jump from the top.  I pushed off of the crystal as I slid down and dove into the pool beside it.  I swam across the pool of black water to the opposite bank and walked over to the pony that had lead me here.  He turned to me with a smile.  "Welcome to the Angels of the Night, brother.  You have passed the test and now have joined our fold."

*Note: Unfinished. Published for NaPoWriMo* Chapter Fifteen - Angels of the Night

*Note: Unfinished. Published for NaPoWriMo* Chapter Fifteen - Angels of the Night

Chapter Fifteen – Angels of the Night

“Let him curse my name, On these blood stained pages of misery...-Blind Guardian“

“So now that I’m an ‘Angel of the Night’ what am I supposed to do?” I asked.

“Well, first off, I want you to tell me why you’ve had another pony following you and neglected to tell me about that,”  said the pony who still hadn’t told me his name.

“Dead Eye?” I asked.  “He was the pony that suggested that I come here in the first place and learn the ways of your creed.  He was staying behind me just in case you guys tried ambushing me back at the meeting place.”

“So why haven’t you told me about him?”  repeated the pony.

“Because I was trusting in his judgment,” I said, beginning to get a little bit irritated.  “He’s my mentor and I’m sure that he would agree to join this group just like I did.”

“I’m glad you answered honestly because we managed to get a story out of him while I was leading you down and he told our questioner much the same,” said the pony.  “I guess you two actually do have some interest in our cause.  Well then, I guess we should release him and get him to join.”

The pony directed me to some of the tables that I had seen other ponies lounging at earlier.  He had told me that I would be able to talk to Dead Eye after he had passed the same test I had gone through.  “More of a tradition than anything.” He had told me after I asked about the crystal initiation.  “Some believe that it’s some sort of binding contract with the Angels of the Night.  Me?  I think that it’s just some superficial magic trick made to scare newcomers into submission.  Either way, we stick to it and everypony stays happy.”  Good enough reason for me.

The pony told me he would talk to me and more formally introduce me to the group after Dead Eyes initiation.  He handed me a thick cloak for me to obscure my body from sight during the initiation.  A good looking pegasus came up to me once I was seated and waiting for Dead Eye to be released.

"Can I take your order?" she asked.

"I don't have any way to pay," I said. "I just passed the initiation anyway and I'm not really sure what I should be doing."

"Oh so you’re the newcomer from Bastion.  I've heard quite a bit about you," she said. “Tell you what. My shift ends in five minutes.  I'll pay for the drinks and you can pay me back by telling me your story.  I'll even give you a rundown of the place if we have some time before ol' Scaly comes back with your friend."

"Scaly?" I asked.

"That's just what we call that pony that lead you over here earlier.  He's always so melodramatic with the newcomers.  The entire silent act thing is just a bit too serious for my taste.  Anyway, I'll be back in ten with some drinks." She trotted off and returned ten minutes later, true to her word.

"Here you go," she said putting a margarita in front of me.  She had changed out of her workers uniform and now I could see that her cutie mark was slender knife.   She had a sky blue coat and a white mane.

"Thank you," I said.  "So I take it that you aren't just a waiter down here." I said indicating her cutie mark.

"Actually I mostly just do work the cafe down here.  I get enough fighting in my day job.  I like talking so working as a waiter is a pretty good job for me to get some extra money and get filled in with the gossip," she said.  Seeing my confused expression she explained.  "I work in the king's guard."

"That makes sense," I said. "I never did catch your name."

"Oh yeah, I'm Blade.  And your name is?" she asked me back.

"I'm Surefire," I replied.

"Well, Surefire, it seems you owe me a story for that drink," she said, obviously eager to be filled in on my story.  She scooted a bit closer to me so that she could better hear the tale I was about to tell.

I took a quick glance over in the direction of the crystal and saw that Dead Eye was still getting into the boat before the crystal.  I guess I would have enough time to give a decent recount of my past.  I started my story the day I found Pearl and continued at my own pace unless Blade interrupted me to ask a specific question.  She seemed to want to know a lot about how the city of Bastion was laid out and how our thieves guild was run.  Other than that, she was an attentive listener and she seemed to be engrossed in my story.  After I reached the part of the initiation, she scooted a bit closer to me.

"It's not often I get to spend dinner with a stallion so brave and handsome as you," she said.  I could feel my face grow hot as I began to blush but luckily my black coat didn't give me away too badly.  She pulled me over to some benches overlooking a small garden and pulled me close as she began to talk.

"Most of the other guys here are too serious for my liking and this place is just business for them," she said.  "Unlike them, you chose this path for the reasons the guild condones murder.  Most of them will just do whatever the guild tells them for the pay-offs.  What I wouldn't do to be that Pearl girl you have a thing for." She wrapped one of her blue wings around me.  "If you ever are interested in another mare, I'll probably be here.  Nopony round these parts is ever interested in a relationship."

"You're a beautiful mare," I said.  "Why would anypony not want to be in a relationship with you?" 'What is she talking about between me and Pearl?  I mean I definitely care for her and I guess I really like her... I guess I've just never thought of Pearl in that way.'

"Everypony is worried that if they get on my bad side during a relationship I'll tell the king how bad they have been and get them in trouble.  I don't really have that kind of power but I guess it scares people off," she said.  She pulled herself upright again and took on a more serious air.  "I guess I owe you an overview of the Angels of the Night then don't I.  Well a promise is a promise.  Get comfortable because this isn't an interesting story like yours."

Prologue

Ace in the Hole

By: jaysnotreal

Proofread by: Omgitsapally, (Special thanks to the The F8ful 1 for helping too)

Inspiration Provided by: Kkat, Brent Weeks, Omgitsapally, and Terry Goodkind

This is a work written for the National Pony Writing Month.  My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic is owned solely by Hasbro and all show characters are owned by Lauren Frost.  All of the original characters come directly from me, although inspiration may have come from other novels.  There is a bit of language, so watch out for that.  I hope whoever reads this enjoys it and doesn’t take anything too personally.

Word count begins after the colon:

Introduction

[b]

Introduction

Everypony in the Hammerhead household was awaiting the celebratory feast in honor of taking control of Equestria.  The Hammerheads had been one of the first pony families to jump on board with the rapid industrialization that had spread like wildfire over Equestria.  As a result, the Hammerhead’s had become insanely rich and left their friends behind to gain more power in the pony eat pony industry.  Those that were successful at consolidating their wealth also became enormously powerful.  Nopony was satisfied with having dominance of their cities.  They all wanted absolute control of all of Equestria.  In a moment of weakness, the monarchy was overthrown and all of the industrialized ponies vied for power and, in the end, the Hammerhead household had won out.

Smoothtongue eagerly awaited this night’s celebration for she was the guest of honor.  She had spied for Hammerhead during the power struggle and was crucial in his succession to power.  Smoothtongue walked into the grand chamber where the feast was being held. A beam of light fell upon her as she strode to take her place beside Hammerhead.  Before the feast had a chance to begin in earnest, Smoothtongue proposed a toast.

“Tonight we celebrate the victory of our magnanimous lord Hammerhead,” Smoothtongue began.  The crowd responded with a roaring cheer.

"The generous Hammerhead has seen fit to name us as his most trusted advisors for our continued support.  Now I toast to his health, and I swear to follow him for the rest of his life."  Everypony in attendance vowed their undying loyalty to Hammerhead and, as one, drank their cider.

The first to go was a sickly pony, Maggie; she fell from the table choking while the other ponies attempted to revive her. Smoothtongue used this diversion to slip away from the crowd and took Hammerhead's daughter, Blue Bell, to her room. Smoothtongue told her a reassuring lie. "Everything is going to be fine, Blue Bell. I'll come back to get you when the commotion dies down." Smoothtongue gave Blue Bell a kiss and backed out the door. The last thing Blue Bell heard that night was the soft click of her door locking.

In the meantime, other ponies began to fall, their throats constricting from the poisoned cider. Everypony was dead within minutes including Hammerhead. Smoothtongue strolled into the room to look at her handiwork. The dead pony’s blood and urine were spilled across the floor. Smoothtongue walked through it and took a sip from her unfinished cider.

"Well this has just been a great precedent to my coronation," Smoothtongue said, letting her cup of cider shatter on the floor to mix with the fluids of the dead.