Azure Moon couldn’t remember the last time she ate. Maybe…was it the rations she’d managed to get her hooves on two days ago? No, couldn’t have been. She must have found something since then...

She trotted through the burnt wasteland that had once been the Whitetail Woods, constantly having to remind herself to put one hoof in front of the other. Just keep trotting. That’s all she had to do, just keep trotting forward. If she stopped, the fatigue would fall over her like a blanket, and she might never start again. Too many ponies were counting on her for that, even with the little she could provide.

At long last, the burnt-out bases of the Manehattan skyscrapers appeared in her vision. A flurry of hope lit up in her chest and she shifted the sack over her shoulder, letting it rest on the PER armband she wore high up on her leg. That was the only purpose it served now: she doubted the PER still existed. Hell, she doubted Equestria as a nation still existed. Not if everywhere was like Manehattan.

Letting out a shuddering breath, she began the final leg of her journey. Last time, she’d actually run out into the wasteland, and came back huffing and puffing, this final walk seeming like an eternal walk through the desert. This time it felt a little better, but not much. If she conserved her energy, she knew she’d at least be able to remain on her hooves as she walked into the city, and still arrive before sundown.

That thought gave her pause. She kept trotting, but she looked up into the dark, heavy clouds covering the sky, turning the sun into a slightly-bright spot in a field of blank, featureless gray. A few days ago, some pegasi from the city had attempted to buck some of the clouds away, but they were too small in number to do much more than clear a few lights spots for a minute. Still, it gave her hope to see some ponies fighting to get back to normal…if they ever could get back to normal.

She left her thoughts before they could continue down that path. She knew once they started, she wouldn’t be able to stop them, and she’d wind up on the ground, sobbing into the dust that had once been lush fields of grass and plentiful flowers. She couldn’t do that, not now, not when she was so close! Besides, she’d done plenty of that out in the wastes.

Azure kept trotting until the dust gritting into her hooves told her that the dirt road had become cobblestone beneath the debris. She heaved a sigh of relief, gazing up at the ruined, charred skeletons that had once been gleaming skyscrapers. At least she was home.

She lowered her head again, passing by the twisted remnants that had been street signs and the shattered piles of wood that had been carriages for the upper class. She wondered if any of those ponies had survived, or if they had all taken their lives the day word came down that the Shield had fallen and Celestia had gone missing.

Brushing these thoughts away into the same place as all the others, Azure grunted and continued on, weaving along this corner, into that alleyway, past this torn-up pile of rubble that was once somepony’s home, until she reached her apartment complex. Sighing, she again thanked anyone still listening that at least her building was spared. She ducked inside, through the shattered glass of the front door and over the plywood boards that had been laid out for her to pass through safely.

“Auntie!? Grampy!? I’m home!” She called. After a while, her muzzle wrinkling and she stepped deeper in. “Auntie? Somepony?” This was odd, usually somepony would be near enough to the door to greet her, where was everypony?

She wandered into the darkened hallway, head whipping around as she tried to squint into the darkness. For one of the very few times in her life, she wished she’d been born a unicorn. Specifically, one skilled with illumination and item-locating spells. Actually, that would make a lot of things out in the wasteland easier. For now, she chose not to focus on it too much, instead focusing on finding her friends and—

Hooves darted out from the dark, locked around her mouth and body. She screamed, kicked. They remained firm. She was dragged. Hallway a blur. Panic and adrenaline poured through her body. Then a familiar voice whispered: “Hush, filly, hush!”

Immediately, she went limp with relief. “Grampha!” She managed around the hoof in her mouth.

“I know, it’s good to see you back so soon too, now hush!” The larger stallion hissed, finally releasing her.

At this point, Azure realized he’d been whispering, and followed suit, dropping her voice: “Grampa! What’s going on?”

He held a hoof to his dried, chapped lips, urging her silence. Nodding, Azure mimed zipping her lips, and the older stallion returned the nod and motioned for her to follow.

The pair crept through the hall, staying as quiet as possible despite their hooves warping and creaking the wood at seemingly every opportunity. Azure couldn’t help a cringe with every squeal of wood, every crack of a nail. She didn’t know why they were staying quiet, but she knew if it had her grampa worried, it was definitely worth keeping mum.

Finally reaching the basement, grampa hurriedly opened the door and ushered her inside, down into the stairwell that, curiously, should have been lit with numerous magically-powered candles. Was what they were hiding from that much of a threat? That they couldn’t even risk candles inside their own hidden home? She bit her lip, her pulse quickening as they hurried down the darkened stair. Finally, her grampa’s horn lit up with a little hum, and he shared a quick nuzzle with her, the patchy fur on his cheek tangling itself with the dirt and grime on hers. “We’re back,” he announced.

“Oh thank Celestia,” her Auntie appeared out of the darkness, flanked by the little filly from 2B. She couldn’t remember the filly’s name, nopony could, and she had stopped talking since the Shield’s fall and the hell that rained down on the city. Then again, who could blame her? The little filly had watched her city burn away in an instant, followed by the dawning realization that her parents had almost certainly been killed in the blast. But still, the filly managed a tiny smile at the sight of Azure, almost as wide as her Auntie’s.

Immediately, the older mare rushed over to embrace her, wrapping jiggling, fatty hooves around the younger’s neck. Well…fatty wasn’t such a good word for it. Azure’s Auntie had been fatty before, now she was chubby at best. How long until she was skin and bones like the rest of them? Would they all even live that long? “Three days!” Her Auntie enthused. “Three days, you said you’d be back in two!”

Azure bit her lip. Aww shoot, had she really been gone three whole days? She quickly returned the embrace. “I know Auntie, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to be gone that long.”

“Well, it can’t be helped,” her Auntie gave her a final squeeze before letting her go, a squeeze that pressed Azure to the older mare’s ribcage. Azure squeaked and tried not to think about how long she’d have until she’d be able to count every rib Auntie had. “Tell me, what did you find? Some of the little ones could really use it about now.”

Azure beamed, pulling her sack off her shoulder and tossing it open on the ground. A bundle of burnt twigs and dying leaves immediately scattered across the floor. The filly’s tiny face lit up beneath the dirt and grime caking it. Her Auntie’s face warmed. “Thank Celestia,” she sighed, taking up the bundle. “This should get us through another few days.”

A shaking hoof ran through Azure’s mane and she giggled for the first time in days, honestly giggled without having to force it. “You done good, kid,” her Gramps enthused. “That’s all we can ask for.”

“Thanks,” Azure chortled. “But tell me: why’re the lights out? Why’s everypony hiding?”

Her Auntie’s and Grampa’s faces fell. The filly noticed the grown-ups’ reactions, and immediately her ears folded low. She may not have known why she needed to be scared, but she knew a reaction like that from a grown-up couldn’t mean anything good. Azure’s Auntie set the bundle aside, turning to the filly with a thin smile. “Dear, why don’t you go bring this to the rest? I’m sure they’ll appreciate it.”

All traces of a smile gone, the little filly nodded and slowly picked up the bundle, dragging it along the stone floor as she retreated into the darkness, towards the sounds of skittering hooves and hushed whispers deeper in the basement. The older ponies watched her go with smiles wrinkling the corners of their aging eyes, then finally turned to Azure, their heads bowed low.

“The humans are coming,” her grampa said. “We don’t know when, but they are.”

Her Auntie wrinkled her muzzle at her gramp’s trademarked lack of tact, but she followed him up: “The harbor fell last night: we’ve been hearing shots from those ‘goons’ of theirs ever since. They’ve been getting closer.”

Azure’s heart dropped into her stomach. Humans… the very reason she wore the band now slipping down her leg. The ones who had stolen their princess and rained devastation from the sky upon them. The ones who had murdered and raped and destroyed so much while confined to their own little world that Celestia had seen fit to try and take them into the fold of her Kingdom, only to be met with hatred and utter ruin.

Azure wasn’t the most ardent Celestia-supporter, but she knew damn well that life under the Solar Princess was a lot better than whatever humanity might have waiting for them.

“We have to get out of the city,” she gasped. “Tonight.”

Her Auntie gave a slow, sad shake of her head. “And go where?”

“Anywhere!” Azure gasped. “If the humans are here, that means they’re about to take over the city and kill everypony, or they’ll kill everypony trying to take it!”

“We’re safe here,” her Gramps insisted.

“And how long will that last!?” Azure fired back. “How long do you really think we can hide from them!?”

“Azure dearie, please, calm down,” her Auntie gasped. “The Royal Guard will—“

“There is no Royal Guard anymore!” Azure shrieked, only realizing she’d done so when her voice had stopped booming off the walls and she realized the only sound was her own breathing. The hushed whispers had stopped. She could imagine the scared looks locked on her, having just voiced the terrifying idea that had been in the back of everyponies’ minds, but nopony had dared to speak out loud. She saw it in her Auntie’s and Grampa’s eyes, and immediately she pulled back, her ears folding low. Yet at the same time, her mind worked. She hadn’t survived scavenging outside this long without an ability to keep her wits, that’s how she’d walked away from the trade deal for some canned food that had turned out to be a trap on the city’s edge just a week ago.

“Auntie, Grampa,” she whispered, reaching out to them both. “We need to leave the city.”

“And go where?” Her Grampa shot back, a bit more venom in his voice.

“Anywhere that isn’t here,” she hissed. “Anywhere that buys us a little time! There’s got to be somepony left in the Royal Guard, somepony has to be fighting still! Maybe we can...”

“Some of us can’t even walk, dearie,” her Auntie sighed. “Sugar Song’s only gotten sicker since you left. She’s coughing up blood now.”

Azure bit her lip. She’d really been hoping Sugar might get better on her own, but that looked like it wasn’t going to happen. “The central markets...there’s a clinic still running...”

“And it’s not free!” Her grampa bellowed.

“We’ll find something to trade! Anything!”

“It’s also near where the humans have landed,” her Auntie sighed. “Dearie, face it, it’s either totally inaccessible to us, or under human control now.”

Once more, the gears turned. Azure’s eyebrows hunched. A determined fire flickered behind her eyes. “So...there’s a chance the ponies fled...”

“Azure...”

“If the ponies fled...and if the humans don’t know it’s there...” she turned, trailing off as she headed for the door. “It’d look like any other building, the humans might not know what’s there.”

“But you’d have to slip past their patrols either way!” Her Gramps rasped. “Celestia’s sake, little filly! Your first instinct is t’walk right into those monsters!?”

“They’ll need time. Like any army, they need time to setup patrols and lock down the streets. That medicine isn’t out of reach yet!”

“Do you even know what you’re looking for!?”

“No, but this is the only chance we have!” She screeched. Again, that silence pounded in her hearing. She ignored it, folding her ears against it. She had to remain focused. She raised a hoof pleadingly, locking eyes with that wrinkled gaze. “Grampa...please, even if we stay, how long do you think we’ll last without medicine? Or real food? How long do you think all of us will last?”

The older stallion paused, sucked in his lips, like he always did when he knew he’d been caught. He turned, looked at the emaciated, dirty frames around him, some of them wheezing, some of them with those weird, pink splotches all over their fur that so many other ponies had gotten before they’d simply died. Some of them didn’t look like they’d survive the next night without any more food. One teal pegasus with burnt nubs for wings just kept staring at the ceiling, the occasional blink being the only signal that she was still alive.

“Please,” he whispered, turning back to his granddaughter with tears brimming in his eyes. “Those monsters have taken everything else, I can’t…I know what they do to ponies. I know if they capture you—“

“They won’t,” she smiled reassuringly, just like she did every other time before she went out on a supply run, and touched a hoof to his cheek. “I’ll be fine.”

“Please...” he whispered again, and now tears did trickle down his cheeks, cascading through the ravines and cracks formed by years, ravines that had gotten deeper over the past weeks. This time, Azure didn’t pause. She turned and darted back out the entrance, shooting up the stairs in a frantic dash while his voice echoed after her. She heard hooves thundering behind her, but she didn’t stop until she passed through the hallway and out the front doors again. Her Gramps might have been stronger than her, but she’d always been much faster. He wasn’t even up the stairs by the time she galloped out the front door, away from the building, trailing tears on the dirt-covered cobblestone the entire way.

She ran into the first human patrol just a few blocks away from the apartment building.

She paused, raised her ear, her heart still pounding from the gallop she didn’t want to admit had drained more energy than it should have. She was having trouble holding her head up now, and her hooves trembled where she planted them. It was harder to catch her breath as well. She needed rest, needed a nap, but time was of the essence, like she’d said to the others. The longer she waited, the more time the humans would have to discover the trove of medicine lying under their leather-bound, meat-eating, violence-spewing boots. If she was right and the ponies had abandoned their clinic, and the humans hadn’t had time to setup proper patrols in that one specific area.

If.

But that was still better than sitting around and waiting for certain death.

Either way, she was still aware enough for the sound of something scraping against the cobblestone just up ahead to reach her ear, and for that sound to lead her to the pair of specks rising from the mist dead ahead. She stopped, her heart catching in her throat, and immediately dove into the burnt remnants of what was probably a covered wagon a few weeks ago.

Those boots scraped along the cobblestone, approaching her hiding spot. She clenched her teeth to steady her beating heart, one hoof tracing over the PER band now riding up by her shoulder. She was something of a militiamare, she had been trained. Though that “training” had been little more than a couple weeks concerning basic shield spells and a few hours being shot at with stolen human weapons, those ‘goons’ they used for everything. But was that enough? Might she still get the drop on the humans? No, that was stupid. The patrol would be missed if she succeeded, and she’d have even more humans to deal with on her way back. Besides, could one barely-trained mare really take on two human soldiers? Probably not.

“...ike all the others...” she heard. A deep, male voice she knew had to be human. It practically rippled with hatred and lust for destruction. Her breath caught in her chest and she ducked lower into the rubble. “Jesus-H-Christ mate, they’re all like this.”

“Don’t say it, man, don’t think too hard about this,” the other voice said. Now Azure could hear their boots scraping right by her hiding spot. Her breath caught. “They started the war, remember that.”

“They were fuckin’ defenseless!” The first voice gasped. “We rained hell down on a buncha defenseless civvies!”

“You saw Tokyo. You saw what that sun-whore did just as good as I did. The fuck were we supposed to think!? That maybe they’d blown their load on that one hit and were ready to toss their hooves up in surrender!?”

“I dunno...” the first voice said, and Azure figured the hunger must have really been getting to her, because for a moment, she thought that voice sounded...regretful. Either way, the pair were walking away now, and thank Celestia, wherever she was.

Azure let out a breath she didn’t know she’d been holding. Slowly, careful not to make a sound, she dragged herself out from behind the cart and crept back down the street, sliding away in, thankfully, the opposite direction the human patrol had gone. Hopefully, that would be the last human patrol she’d see today. Still, she kept to the side of the road, ducking low every time she heard so much as a skitter of something over rock.

As she crept, something flared up in her heart. Her teeth clenched again, but for completely different reasons this time. Here she was, a proud mare of Equestria, being forced to slink around in her own hometown, and why!? Because of those evil, hateful monkeys who just wouldn’t listen to reason! They’d wanted to help them, of course they had! Celestia had always held nothing but grace and love in her heart! And sure, becoming a Newfoal had one or two side effects, maybe knocked off a few IQ points, but dammit it was either that or die in their own, stupid, self-destructive habits! Were they really so determined to destroy everything they had to burn her home as--

She’d made a mistake.

She’d been too focused on her own stupid thoughts.

She hadn’t noticed the young man with the blue UN flag on his helmet, traipsing along in the street, jogging with an ammo belt over his shoulder and his weapon held awkwardly by the barrel until he practically tripped over her. His eyes went wide, jaw gaping.

For the first few moments, the pair just stared wide-eyed at one another, as if neither could quite believe what had just happened. It was as if somebody had been screaming at them to be ready for this moment for a large chunk of their lives, but now that it had, both realized just how ill-prepared for they really were. Granted, Azure had an empty stomach and the destruction of her nation on her mind. The human only had his run distracting him, probably to get more “ammo” to his fellow teammates, probably because they had run out trying to annihilate some group of defenseless ponies somewhere the bastards the evil genocidal pricks how dare they--

“RAAAHHHH!” She screamed, leaping at the man with a cry of rage. He just kept standing there, still with that dumbfounded look on his face. Azure had a moment of gratitude to thank Celestia for that opening before her body slammed into his chest, all four hooves planting themselves firmly in the front of the human’s uniform. She may have been malnourished and exhausted beyond belief, but she had momentum and surprise on her side. The human went down with a loud “oof,” hitting the cobblestone with her atop him.

Suddenly, Azure was stomping. Her hooves were coming in and out, in and out, no regard for tactics, no regard for proper application of force like she’d been taught, just a repeated motion backed up by earth-pony strength and sheer rage. She screamed again, this time letting out all the fear and all the worry and all the terror of the past weeks as she continued to strike, beating the man, watching his surprise turn to shock, turn to agony, turn to simple, stunned stupidity as her hooves finally began to draw blood.

It was the blood that got her to stop. She’d never drawn blood before. She’d always used her skills and wit, even in the last days as it was becoming clear the Shield was going to fall, even during that food deal that went so bad, she’d never drawn the blood of another living creature before.

Hang on...how long had he been bleeding? How badly had she beaten him?

Azure pressed a hoof to the human’s throat, exposing the sensitive skin at her hoof’s base to feel for a pulse. It was there, but…but...it was...faint. Faint, and getting fainter. Her mouth went dry. She should have been doing something. CPR, bandaging the wounds, something! She was a pony! She was supposed to be better than these things! But she just laid there with her hoof to the human’s throat as the pulse slowly and steadily faded away, eventually eking out until, finally, it was gone. She shifted her hoof, trying in vain to find some sign of life, trying to ignore the deathly gasp of the human breathing its last, a gasp she had heard far too many times these past weeks, but no.

The human was dead.

Azure had taken the life of a sapient being.

An evil, treacherous, awful sapient with rape and murder and plunder on its mind, one who had come to her home on a chariot that rained death and destruction, but still, a creature capable of calculation and understanding. And she had ended its life.

Slowly, she rose on shaking legs. She stumbled off the human, continued down the street with a strange, gray fuzziness in her head. The PER armband slipped to the ground. She did not stop to pick it up.

The streets blurred by. She shook her head, strained to remember why she was here, what she was doing. What was going on? Was this shock? Had she really been so shaken by what just happened? Why? It was just another human. Just another filthy, disgusting human who...who had…

Who had cried out for his mother before he died.

Her eyes misted over. She sat down, her flank hitting the cobblestone. She knew it was stupid. She knew another patrol could happen across her at any moment, but all she could think about in that moment was the single, sharp cry of “MAMA!” that had gurgled up from the human’s throat in the last second before she stomped its voice box out.

She looked down at her hooves. They were covered in blood. Her jaw dropped, something wailed off from far away. It was a high-pitched cry that slowly dropped, becoming a deeper, more keening scream. It took her a few minutes to realize she was the one screaming.

She fell to her side, her stomach heaving as if she was going to throw up. It had cried out for its mama, and she had responded by stomping its throat out. Oh Celestia...it wasn’t supposed to...be like this...it was supposed to be...so glorious, taking the life of one of...one of…she was defending her--

“Awww, shit, Jameson! Get your arse over here!”

Her eyes opened to tiny, tear-filled slits. What was…

“Jesus H, another live one! Fuck!”

Something skittered to a stop by her head. “Miss?” A deep, masculine voice asked. “Miss? You alright?”

Azure looked up. A human was crouching by her head. Except...his uniform wasn’t like the others. He had an armband on, like she did, but it was much more simple. A white background, with a red plus-sign emblazoned across its front. She couldn’t even begin to guess its meaning. Was this the human’s version of the PER?

She looked up at him, and lowered her head. She was tired. So, so tired. She didn’t want to do it again. She flopped over, hitting the cobblestone on her side. Both approached her cautiously, hands gripping her, scooping her up, something wrapping around to support her back.

She tried to think of Gramps and Auntie, but instead, she thought about that single, sharp cry as she blacked out, tears welling behind her eyes.

Azure swam up into the waking world through an endless sea of darkness.

The sea was filled with millions of ponies. She caught a glimpse of her Gramp’s sideburns, a hoof she could have sworn had that same chip in the edge her Auntie had, but otherwise it was just millions of random strangers, screaming, undulating with the sea.

When she surfaced, her eyes opened, and then the darkness retreated like the tide from her vision, slowly leaving behind a blurry mess of shapes. Eventually, the blurry shapes formed together into a mass of symbols. There was that red plus sign again, and...symbols? No, words...Red Cross? And across from that, another sign. Who in Celestia’s name was Médecins Sans Frontières!? What was that even supposed to mean!?

She shifted, winced as a lance of pain stabbed through her head. She lifted a hoof, or at least tried to. Her heart dropped when it was stopped by something that clanked. She looked down, saw the leather shackle secured around her hoof, and it all came roaring back to her.

She’d been captured by the humans.

She’d been captured by the monsters that had destroyed her home out of sheer spite.

She lay back on the bed...or cot...whatever, throwing a foreleg over her eyes and trying not to cry and crying anyway. She wasn’t supposed to show weakness, that was all the training said. She was supposed to be strong, to exemplify the defiance all ponykind would show to the rotten little monkey-barbarians. Yet here she was, sobbing her eyes out. Great. All hail ponykind’s savior, this weak little mare crying like a filly in the heart of the enemy. Only question was: what happened now? Would they serve her up as a side dish to their soldiers? Or was she pretty enough to be saved for their “brothels”?

“Young Miss?”

Azure turned in her cot and found a young, olive-skinned man with slanted eyes that bore the most gentle look she’d ever seen anywhere. This, of course, was likely a look cultivated by the human propaganda ministries, none of these beasts were truly capable of gentleness. He was likely here to get her to lower her guard, make her talk about something they wanted to hear.

She looked at him. “Azure Skies.”

“Ahh, Zidong Chen!” The man smiled and extended his hand, apparently mistaking her revealing the basic bit of information she was told to reveal upon capture as an attempt at friendliness. “A pleasure!”

She looked at the extended hand until he awkwardly cleared his throat and pulled it back. “I am here for your…medical evaluation?”

To see how much torture she could withstand, most likely. She nodded. The man smiled, lifted up her hoof, inspected her barrel and all the patches of fur where it thinned out from some skin disease or another. He tutted, shaking his head as he stood up and wrote something down on a clipboard.

Again, he smiled, tearing off a piece of paper and leaving it in a sleeve at her side. She turned, only mildly curious, and then the greatest surprise of her life hit her. As she sat up, his hand reached to her. She winced back, and the most wonderful feeling she’d felt these past few weeks overwhelmed her senses. His hand scratched into her mane, but rather than the forceful motion of her head she’d been expecting, the human scratched her scalp, the pads of his fingers acting like the most wonderful scalp massage imaginable. Maybe it was the weeks of stress getting to her, maybe she’d just gone too long without a loving touch that didn’t reek of desperation. Either way, it felt like the caress of an angel.

“You’re safe now,” he said, standing back and walking off. She watched, leaning over her cot as he worked his way down the row, giving that same loving touch to each pony in her column. She quirked an eyebrow, watching. Had the humans figured out a way to make one of them portray compassion? That seemed like something they might manage…

As soon as the human’s back turned, she set herself to opening the paper sleeve. It took a few minutes of awkward fumbling, using just her teeth and her one free hoof, but she managed to wriggle the paper free with a minimum of bitemarks and saliva, only to let out a frustrated scoff. It was written in one of those awful, chicken-scratch languages the humans were so fond of, of course. Because of course they had a million different languages between them.

“Malnutrition and mild blunt force trauma,” the man’s voice intoned. Azure froze, every hair on her body standing up as he gently took the paper from her hoof and tucked it back in its sleeve. His hand settled down in her mane. Once more, she tensed for a blow. Once more, she found herself sitting there, looking very awkward as he casually pressed her back into the cot, pulling the sheet up to her chin. “Recommending an IV drip, plus plenty of bedrest,” he insisted, still with that damned façade of a kind smile.

She huffed, but couldn’t argue against anything in that diagnosis. Instead, she figured silence was the best route here, with everything that was going on. It was really best to avoid digging herself any deeper with a misplaced word, at least until she figured things out.

Just then, the clopping of boots on cobblestone sounded. Azure lifted her head off the thinning pillow, first anticipating another shove, but the human turned to the sound as well. Two more humans appeared with a stretcher between them, carrying a smoldering ruin of meat that once might have been a pony.

Azure gawped at the charred pony as it was set on the cot across the small walkway from her. Dear sweet Celestia, what could have done this!? What human weapon could…

“Oh Jesus God,” her doctor gasped, setting to the pony’s side. “Overcharge?”

Azure’s stomach lurched. Overcharge… The magical burst of power only a unicorn could use. The one spell she’d been taught to avoid capture. Of course, plenty of ponies had to be using it these days. Better than languishing in human captivity.

She sighed, settling into the cot. She gazed over at the pony. She didn’t know if she would’ve had the guts for something like that, not that she had the horn to try. Though maybe if she could slip a knife from her captors later on, maybe even take a few with her…

“Where was this one!?” Her doctor asked, shining a light in the corpse’s eye.

“Old apartment building in Sector Five,” one of the soldiers answered, and her ear perked. She lifted her head again. Her jaw dropped. It was the same soldier from the street, the one that found her! No, but that could mean…

Did he just say ‘old apartment building’?

“Wait,” she rasped, sitting up on the cot. The soldiers turned to her.

The doctor rushed to her side. “Ah, miss…”

“Lemme…lemme see this pony,” she spat. She had no reason to think they’d oblige, but no one stopped her as she stumbled out of bed and crossed to the charred mass of flesh. She watched the pony’s twitching form, its rattling gasps as it tried to bring air into a burnt throat…

…that chip in the hoof, Azure gasped in horror. “Auntie?”

The pony pried itself up, its wide, mostly-blind eyes locking with Azure’s, horrified recognition in them. The pony let out a series of agonized breaths, then launched into a coughing fit.

“Auntie!” Azure tried to sit up, but was stopped by the leather cuff. “Auntie, please!”

The humans were a whirlwind of activity now, running back and forth, one coming with a big metal cart. Needles were jammed in. A breathing mask was fitted over the pony’s face. Azure could only watch it all through tears filling her eyes. She could do nothing but scream the same thing, over and over again as the pony’s writhing form grew weaker, slower, and finally, went limp altogether.

She stared at the pile of flesh, long after the doctor finally stopped chest compressions and pulled the sheet up over its head. She stared at the vague outline under the sheet. Then, she realized someone was talking to her.

“Wha…” she asked, looking up at the same olive-skinned doctor as before.

“I was asking if you knew that pony,” he said, his eyes misty, but far away, as if he’d seen this sort of thing far too many times to be stunned by it anymore.

Azure could only nod, her jaw hanging open.

The doctor sank to her side, laid a hand on her shoulder. “I’m sorry,” he whispered. Azure looked up, realized the two soldiers were also there, also looking at her in concern.

“Were there…others?” She managed to rasp, looking at one of the soldiers.

The soldier remained silent, then he slowly nodded his head.

Azure let in a shivering gasp of breath. “Did they…they…”

“Miss,” he said, his voice low, gentle, “This one’s the only one that made it this far.”

Azure fell back in her cot. She stifled a scream shoving a free hoof into her mouth. Gramps. The filly from 2B. Sugar. Auntie. All of them. Every single one…

“Miss?” The olive-skinned man again. She could barely hear him over her heartbeat raging in her ears. “Did you know them?”

She looked at the charred mass of flesh. She closed her eyes against the tears. She said nothing. Didn’t have to.

Grampa…Auntie…the filly…Sugar Song…

They’d all fought so hard to make it this far, and now…

She sniffled, tears welling in her eyes. She turned, craned her neck over. The humans were pulling a sheet over the cot with her Auntie before rushing off to Celestia-knows-what-else, and in that horrifying moment, she realized something: they weren’t going to torture her. Why bother? They’d already done the worst thing they could have to her.

They’d made sure she would live.

Author's Note

Bit of a side-story for my long-running "The Conversion Burea: Setting Things Right," because I'm a procrastinating SOB like that

I am still working on it, I'm just trying to wrap up another long-runner at the same time, so hopefully people enjoying that will be satisfied with this for now.

Peace.

-K