Fallout Equestria: Desperados

FoE: Desperados, Ch52, Jailbird.

Jailbird, Part 1

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"In spite of all the things Star Charter had told me about the city ship Blackwater, I actually wanted to know what good things came from it. Like its food, its art, its customs, and even its clothing styles.

Music, she told me, and how they had a song for every time and everything. Then shared a few examples herself, singing several songs filled with deep emotion." ~ Azure Dice

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Life for me was one long chain of getting fucked over by those who saw themselves as my betters. Every goddesses-damn time, from the moment I was born, there was always somepony getting into my business. But this was different—they fucking killed Hardballer and messed with my friends. I wasn't just going to lie down and take it this time.

I needed to see my sweet Bridget, to hold her… only then would things be okay.

"Star, you okay?" Harp asked as she placed her hoof on mine.

I gently pulled my hoof away. It had become hard to hide my agitation lately. The constant hunger only made it worse. The food had barely been sustaining me as it was. "No, I’m not," I told her as Slowtrot came near us. "But don’t worry about it. I’ll survive."

We shared a portion of our own food with him, hoping it would help. The poor stallion had not only been forced to skip dinner, but also given fifteen deep lashes for just getting on the Warden's bad side. They didn’t even treat him afterwards—just let him bleed in his cell. It was sheer luck he didn’t bleed to death overnight. That stallion was crazy durable, despite how weak he looked.

Still, because he was never given a healing potion, he was going to be left with scars. I hoped his fur would grow over them, but the lashes were quite deep. At least he was alive—for now, anyway.

I looked over at Spritz Cookie who didn’t show any care for what happened to Slowtrot. She only demanded her cut of food. The guards didn't do anything, either. Only the yak Amralt, who sneaked some food and water to him, seemed to care. He, at least, I could count among the few I would spare once I'd gotten out of this shithole.

Once breakfast was over, it was time for our one hour of doing nothing. We made sure Slowtrot had a place where he could rest a while longer and let his back heal a bit more before our twelve hours of work started.

Harp kept studying the prison. Her eyes went from one building to the next, then looking at her PipBuck.

"So, how's it going?" I asked, trying to not say anything related to a prison break.

"Still working on it," she said with a frown. "This is not an easy puzzle to crack."

A glint hit my eye. I looked over at one of the guard towers. One of the NCR guards looked down at me through his rifle scope. "Yeah, and this puzzle has eyes to boot," I said before blowing a kiss at the guard.

Harp looked over through the fence and off into the distance. "That there is our main problem."

"Could be worse," I figured as I looked out at the horizon. "We could be out at sea. The only way to get away then would be to take over the boat or die trying."

The unending desert was only broken up by the casual hill and the odd mesa. There would be no places to hide out there, so whatever plan Harp came up with also needed a way for us to move fast. Slowtrot was already in no shape for a miles-long trek. He'd only get worse if the Warden made an example of him again.

Sitting back, I watched as a crowd of inmates gathered around Spritz Cookie. The large mare stood a good head taller than most of them. Her voice was loud enough that I couldn't ignore it. I was starting to think it was some sort of ritual for them, much like the old preachers from my home.

"Look at where you are, changed, chained, forced to work!" Spritz Cookie bellowed out, her voice filled with authority and hatred. "The NCR talks about how they are bringing back the values of old Equestria and how the virtues of friendship will bring ponies together. Yet what we see is but another slave empire rising from the ashes of the last. Trust me when I say this, Red Eye was not the first, and the NCR will not be the last."

She walked through the crowd, her gait having the swagger of a pony who knows they're right, even if they're delusional. "We all know it’s true. Just look at us. Look at where we are going. The NCR hides behind the Lightbinger, a pony who has full control of our weather… but they can't bring the rains back! They boast over having the light of Celestia herself as a weapon to burn their enemies with, but have the raiders vanished? No! Just like everything they do, they fail and drag all of us down with them!"

Spritz Cookie stopped, a grin on her face. "You've all seen it: the dying fields of crops, the wells running dry, and the explosion of the chem trade. Don’t deny it! This is why you're all here. The victims of the NCR’s incompetence who is enslaved to make up for their own losses. All your work, just to feed a rusted, wobbling machine, destined to go up in flames. Everything the NCR touches turns to shit. Anything good that was in their hooves is now nothing more than rusted trash. You all stand as examples of their failures... and your reward for the work you do is to die knowing you kept them living a little longer."

Spritz Cookie stomped. Her hoof shook the ground hard enough to break bones. "And now the NCR calls themselves the successors to old Equestria and claims that the old tech of the ministries belongs to them. Led by Gwadina Grimfeathers, I should add, who was a griffon that was once a raider leader herself. It has a military full of mercenaries who once fought for Red Eye. They're supported by traitors who swore to keep the old tech out of the hooves of those who would abuse it. Who instead gave it to the NCR, to those who barely understand how to even start a fire!"

She eyed the crowd of prisoners, all now enthralled by her speech. "So I ask you this: Will you accept the NCR let them write themselves as history's heroes, let them take all they can get their hooves on and ruin everything? How long will it be until they have megaspells? And how long will it be until they use them? And how long until they finish the job that the Zebras failed to do: Destroy Eq—"

*BANG!*

A rifle shot cut Spritz Cookie off and caused the other prisoners to scatter. Spritz, on the other hoof, stood firm as she looked up at the shooter. Warden Dynamite sat on his balcony, holding a well-maintained hunting rifle, smoke drifting from the barrel.

"Break that shit up!" he shouted through his megaphone.

With a grin, Spritz muttered just loud enough so that we prisoners could hear her. "Their only power is violence." She trotted off and Dynamite put his rifle down.

A sigh came from Harp again as she commented. "Apricot Biscuit was right, Spritz really is crazy."

"Apricot Biscuit?" I asked. "You mean the saloon owner back in New Appaloosa?"

"Yeah. It turns out Apricot was a Steel Ranger 'scribe', whatever that is," Harp said, making air quotes with her hooves. "She was in the group that Spritz was in charge of. Said that Spritz was a more extreme case among the Rangers who caused her own group to turn on each other. That's all I know."

So Apricot was a tin can, I thought. That explains why we never got along. "Crazy or not, I can't see the flaws in her speech," I commented.

"Well, she's clearly not talking to the brightest of ponies. They don’t need much convincing." Harp said as she looked at me, "No offense."

I rolled my eyes. "Whatever. Tell me how she's wrong. I mean, we're practically slaves right now."

Harp took a deep breath before responding. "It’s simple, really. The NCR does not have the strength to take the high ground. My own family history is filled with this problem—even my mother has had her highs and lows with power. Whenever a queendom is weak, it does not have the luxury to take its time to do things right or be benevolent and kind. When you're weak, you must be cunning and cruel, taking what shortcuts you can to gain what power you can find. That’s what I think is happening with the NCR."

That was more than I had asked for and hard to follow. "Can you say it simpler?"

She sighed. "Yes. Yes I can. A strong civilization has the power to be kind while a weak civilization must be cruel to survive."

"Oh, now I get it!" I said as I remembered how life was on the Blackwater and out here in the wasteland itself. "It’s like when you have all the guns, you can trust a stranger to be too scared to try and fight you. But if you have almost no guns, it’s safer to just kill a stranger in case they might kill you."

Harp looked unsure of what I said, but then gave me an awkward smile. "Yeah. You can be kind when you know that the other party can’t just kill you."

I nodded and asked. "So how does that involve the NCR again?"

She facehoofed. "All Spritz has done is point out the flaws of a young civilization by calling out all the mistakes it makes. More than likely, if the NCR did everything right, it would have fallen apart."

She took another deep breath before further explaining. "Put it this way, Star: From my own family history, we’ve had to make deals we hated just to make sure we ended up the rulers of our end of the metro. I’ve had a lot of my ancestors married off to some disgusting ponies just to ensure support or kill off a non-hostile station to get an alliance of ponies who would fight for us. Only once we were in charge, could we make deals that didn’t leave a putrid taste in our mouths, but that was only so long as we held onto that power."

Harp then gave a sad smile. "As the old saying goes, you can't make an omelet without breaking a few eggs."

I just looked over at Slowtrot. He had fallen asleep. His scares peeked out from under his shirt. "And is he one of those eggs?"

"Unfortunately, we all are," she said in a defeated tone.

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Soon, we were taken to the quarry. Fortunately, Slowtrot was left behind, though not without an argument between the Warden and the NCR Lieutenant Ginger. Supposedly, nearly killing a prisoner with fifteen lashes for no good reason was fine, but forcing them to work the next day was a hoof step too far. Still, I was glad Slowtrot was being allowed to recover—he needed it.

Though NCR Mare Ginger was an uptight bitch, at least I could keep her off my shit list… for now.

The rattling of chains pulled me out of my own head as our team began preparing the powder charges for cracking the quarry walls. It was nothing complex. We just attached the right length of fuse and made sure they were all connected in a way that they would go off nearly at the same time. It was better than lifting rocks all day, a job that had already chipped Harp's hooves.

I'd asked her yesterday why she didn’t use her PipBuck for the rock work in order to levitate the rocks like a unicorn. She'd said she simply wanted to keep as few eyes on her as possible. Make sense I guess.

One of our chain gang companions then whistled, the unicorn mare looking over at Tire Fire as he tried, and failed, to break a large limestone chunk.

"He’s a fine piece of meat… Got the right amount of muscle. Maybe I should try and get some alone time with him," the thirsty mare said with a hungry grin.

A second mare, the earth pony by the name of Railway Spike, groaned at the first mare. "Shut the fuck up, Cherry. Nopony wants to hear about you wanting to fuck another stallion."

Placing a few sticks of powder charges back into a box, Cherry Knot growled at the other mare. "A mare has needs, bitch, and I gotta work it myself since that other bitch took over. Why did she have to kill the boss?" She sighed. "We had such a good thing going."

A sigh came from the third member of our gang, a zebra by the name of Bitter Tea. She lazily and effortlessly finished her line of powder charge sticks then threw it over her head and into a box. "Prostituting yourself out to the guards is not a good thing, pony slut."

From the little amount of time we spent together, we learned that they were the underlings of the late prison bosses that Slowtrot said Spritz killed. Railway Spike was a ganger who got caught shaking down NCR caravans. Cherry Knot was from a wasteland brothel that robbed their clients until it was shut down by the NCR. As for Bitter Tea, she didn’t say much about herself other than that she could gut me with a rock if I didn't mind my own business.

A huff came from Harp, "Before being thrown here, two of the guards said something about that, how Spritz changed how things worked."

I raised an eyebrow before remembering two of the Ruffled Feathers’ regulars. "Right. You talked with Rock Thrower and Stone Spear."

Cherry Knot’s ears perked up. "Oh! You know Rocky? He’s a sweetie."

Bitter Tea spat on the ground. "Asshole still owes me a pack of smo—"

The two other mares looked at the zebra with mischievous grins.

Railway then gave the Zebra a playful jab before quickly putting her chain of powder charges away. "How is the prude getting anything at all?"

Bitter avoided eye contact as she continued to work. "Spritz is a tin can, ass hat. She doesn't care where us zebras go. Figured I might as well get in on an empty market… But now the asshole's refusing to pay up."

Cherry chuckled. "Yeah. That happens if you don’t got somepony watching out for ya."

The three then sighed as they mumbled "Fuck Spritz."

It was good to know not all the prisoners here were Spitz's followers, So, as I finished my chain of powder charges, I decided to try and get in on the conversation. Not like we had anything better to do than talk as we worked.

"I get that. If anypony skipped out on paying the brothel mares back where I worked, the boss would send me to, uh… remind them of their obligations. Always fun when they resisted," I said in the cheeriest tone I could muster.

Cherry was first to respond. "Oh? What place did you work?"

"Ruffled Feathers. It's a tavern in New Appaloosa. If you three ever get out of here, I’m sure the boss there can give you some work," I told them.

"Like what? As a whore?" Railway said in a mocking tone.

"Yes. I am no whore," Bitter added. The other two looked at her with raised eyebrows. "It was one time! One! Time!"

I laughed at that. "Actually, it’s all up to you. The boss, Waterspout, sleazeball though he is, likes having happy, healthy mares working for him. You'll only sell your body if you want to. Otherwise, just make yourself useful to him in other ways."

I felt my eyes water. It's the limestone dust in the air, I told myself as I wiped my eyes.

We continued chatting away as I regained my composure. Harp even joined in, though it was awkward at first. Eventually, she became interested in what they knew.

It was hard to follow everything, but the three mares were a great wealth of information for Harp. They told us about the goings-on of the prison and about the guards. Some of the information was just more of what Harp had already figured out, but in better detail. A few things were more interesting, such as a few truly private places in the prison and how to get on the cleaning crew.

With so little time to do anything after breakfast and dinner, it was amazing how much went on in the prison from what the three mares told us. The old showers were a place for the prisoners to gamble, settle private disputes, use whatever chems a guard managed to smuggle in. They told us about everything except how to take a shower. There was a sealed off room that had once been for visitors. It was now a whorehouse where a prisoner could trade sex for favors with the guards. Then there was the storage room for sheets and shirts which provided a good hiding spot for most of the contraband in the prison that was under the control of Cattle Prod.

As we finished tying together all our powder charges for the day, Bitter Tea mentioned a place that really caught my interest: The black powder room.

All these powder charges had come from somewhere, and that somewhere was a room filled with barrels of black powder and other explosive materials. From the black powder room, several boxes filled with powder charges would be stored on Daisy Chain for transportation to the quarry. Only a few prisoners were ever allowed in for the purpose of turning the black powder into sticks of powder charges.

As Bitter further explained, her old boss was one of the ponies—zebras, actually—who made the explosives. He also managed to sneak a bit of it out to make into a chem, which he would then trade for favors among other prisoners. Now, Spritz Cookie's followers were in control of that room, forcing the other prisoners, like Bitter, to work out here in the quarry.

I could see the look in Harp's eyes. The gears in her head were moving. Unfortunately, there was no way she could tell me what was on her mind with everypony else around.

Time passed and we all kept baking under the hot sun. We had to move rocks nonstop with only a short moment of rest and little water to drink. I was sure our jailors had been keeping it in a rusty barrel, but it was water and that was good enough for me. However, resting had allowed hunger to rear its ugly head.

"How're you holding up, Star?" Harp asked.

"I'll be fine," I said and smiled back at her. She knew some things about my condition. She'd learned some parts from my old gang at her home, and I'd told her what I knew as well. She knew that I needed to eat a little more than the average pony, but not much more when things were good… But things weren't good.

Between being beat up by the deputies and the hard labor, my regeneration was starting to eat away at me. It wasn't a huge problem for now. I'd be fine as long as I was careful. But, if I got into any more fights, took another hit from Spritz, or found myself in Slowtrot's position, I'd probably wind up devouring somepony in a fit of madness. What little food we were given barely kept my body from eating itself. I needed to stay focused and not think of the hunger.

My stomach grumbled for food as I swallowed the last bit of water I was given. Unfortunately, I have to wait until later to quell my hunger. "So anything on your mind, Harp?" I asked, hoping for a distraction before we had to get back to work.

She frowned. "Too much... I miss Cloudy Sunrise."

I pulled my friend into a hug. "By the goddesses, I know how you feel. I know it too damn well."

Harp sighed. "Does it make me a bad pony that I only think about what I want? I only knew Hardballer for a short time, but you, your daughter and mother, and your friends…"

I patted her on the back, I was too tired and hungry to let myself crack. I couldn't let myself fall apart right now. "No, it just makes you a pony, just like the rest of us. Mom would tell me that bad ponies don’t ask if they're bad. I guess that means that at least good ponies ask themselves that question. Not sure why, though."

A weak smile formed on Harp's face. "It’s called self-reflection. Bad ponies, whether they know what they're doing is bad or not, tend to not self-reflect. A good pony will stop to think about what they're doing and make sure that they're actually doing good, or if they need to stop."

I thought it was something like that, but I was not convinced that that was the only thing Mom meant by it. What if the answer was yes, and I was a bad pony, but I still didn’t want to be bad?

The whistle to return to work sounded, thus jolting me away from my thoughts. At least I wish it did. Despite the pain and anger, no matter how hard I tried to push it down, I wanted to see my sweet Bridget. To know that she was okay and that she wasn't worried, scared, or lost. If Harp could get us out of this shit situation, I would follow her until the end of the world just to see Bridget again. I tried again to shove the thought down and harden myself, but I just couldn't find the strength.

As we worked, the other inmates hummed a song as a way to distract themselves. It felt familiar, yet so different. The humming helped me clear my mind, if only for a time. But I needed a song to help get me through this, an old song from home.

So I began to sing.

There is a city built at sea, it’s name given, the Blackwater.

Winds may blow and waves may crash, but the Blackwater will forever last!

Oh! Way hay!