Ponyville

A bullet whizzed by my head and pinged off the stone road, right behind me. A second later, a shot echoed from somewhere near the centre of the town. Instinctively, I tried to activate SATS, but the spell failed. The shooter was probably out of range. Thinking quickly, I bolted behind the nearest house, into an alleyway where I sat down, panting. My head was spinning, my left ear ringing loudly, and my heart pounding heavily in my chest from the effort and adrenaline.

I don’t know why I thought a historic site such as Ponyville would be free of raiders, I mentally berated myself. Well, I guess they aren’t necessarily raiders, just ponies that shoot first, ask questions never.

Given the delay between the bullet and the sound, the sniper had to be quite far away. I hadn’t taken the time to check out possible vantage points, so trying to fight her would have been way too risky. I was definitely at a disadvantage here, even with my fine marksponyship. This was one of the few situations where I regretted not having a larger calibre scoped rifle. Though even a scope wouldn’t necessarily give me time to find out where the sniperpony was. She knew where I was however, and taking too long might get my head blown off.

Now, the question remained how I would get out of this predicament. The sniperpony most likely had vision on both sides of the alley I was hiding out in. My only edge was my ability to teleport. I’d learned that not too many ponies expected unicorns to know that spell, and even fewer really understood how to deal with it. I could definitely understand why; the spell was a massive pain to learn. Too bad that with my current equipment, I couldn’t cast it far or often.

This left me with two main options. I could either sprint out of the alley, zig-zag to try and throw off her aim, then teleport to safety. Only issue was that I’d still be out in the open way longer than I was comfortable with. She’d almost hit me earlier, and I had no way of knowing if it was a fluke, or if I was actually at risk of getting shot. I did have healing potions, but I preferred to not take the risk.

The other possibility was to try and teleport into the house behind me and hope that would give me another opportunity to flee. Plus, while two blinks in a row were too much for my horn to handle, if I spread them out, I could avoid the risk of burning out. Maybe I could even sprint out from the next house and close the distance a bit already. I couldn’t say I was comfortable teleporting into a space I couldn’t see, however. Plus, staying in there to rest wasn’t guaranteed to get me out of the woods, either. This sniper definitely had allies, who could try and swarm me at any moment. Maybe they were already on their way…

Fuck it, I had to make a run for it. My barding wasn’t rated for sniper or even regular rifle rounds, but it would definitely help soften the blow a bit. Just in case, I took out two of the potions in my bag and strapped them to my military harness. I stood up and ran as fast as I could, making sure to alter my trajectory every few seconds. Whenever I heard a shot ping off the ground, I would sprint straight ahead, knowing she needed to cycle the action.

When my sense of balance left me once again, I opted to continue straight, hoping the enemy sniper wasn’t that good. If I fell on my rump now, I’d be screwed, no matter how much zig-zagging I’d have done. As I charged up the teleport, a bullet whizzed past my head. That… might have taken my other ear off, had I not been wearing a helmet.

After I materialised behind the furthest building, I felt like absolute death. I was coughing and wheezing, while my head throbbed painfully. I could hear my heart pounding in my ears, loudly enough to overpower the usual ringing. My head was spinning, and the taste of copper filled my mouth. My vision blurred, and I had to concentrate to see things clearly. I am not made for physical effort, I mentally whinged.

I was momentarily safe, but also really close to passing out. I turned to my saddlebags and took out the tablets I’d kept just for such an occasion. I honestly should have taken one before even attempting my wild sprint, but who could blame me for being reluctant to take powerful drugs. I pulled out my canteen as I placed a Buck into my mouth and chewed it into dust, grimacing at the terribly bitter pill. I then tried to wash away the taste with a swig of water.

From here, I could follow the road away from town. Given where the shots came from, it was unlikely she would have a proper line of sight along that road. Where was she, even? The obvious option would be that large building at the centre of town, but I didn’t like the obvious. She could also be in some of the taller houses.

I arrived near an old, decrepit farm house. I needed a place to stay the night, and this seemed good enough. However, as I approached it, I noticed that inside were about a dozen white bars. The orchard I’d trotted through was irradiated enough to make my PipBuck click, and I really didn’t want to sleep in my newly acquired tent. Who knew if I’d survive the night? Add to that the possibility of hostile ponies stumbling upon me during the night, and it was a recipe for disaster.

This left me with two options: either trot on for a few more hours and hope to find a safe place to sleep in, or talk to the ponies hiding out in the barn and convince them to let me stay the night.

I opted to at least try the latter. Naturally, a yellow mare poked her head out the window upstairs, aiming a rifle at me. At least she didn’t try to shoot me—yet. “Whatcha want from us?” she shouted.

“I just want a place to stay the night, honest,” I answered. “I tried going to Ponyville, but somepony shot at me on arrival.”

She leaned back inside, presumably to talk with somepony behind her. After a few moments, she turned back towards me. “Do you have anything to trade?”

“Yeah. Ammo and food, mostly.”

She talked to the pony behind her some more. “Fine, come in, but don’t start anything.”

Moments later, the front door opened, and a mint green earth pony waved me in. I entered and found myself surrounded by three ponies with firearms in their muzzles. The hay-yellow mare I’d talked to earlier walked down the creaking stairs. “So, you’ve met the silver-maned crazies of Ponyville?” she asked flatly.

“The what? I’m afraid I don’t know what you mean,” I responded.

“The tribe living in Ponyville. They call themselves the Silvermanes. Extremely territorial and aggressive, as you’ve experienced. They’ve killed several of our own when we were first passing by, and they’re insane cultists that worship a book about magic.”

Now this piqued my interest. “A book about magic?”

“Not sure, some of us overheard their conversations, and they were talking about the ‘Holy Black Book’ and how its ‘forbidden magic would make them strong’.”

That… Sounded like exactly the type of thing I needed to kill an alicorn, if it was true. I had to find a way to get my hooves on that book, now.

“Ah, I see. And who are you, ponies?”

“Just a travelling family. We left our hometown because of a disagreement and are trying to find somewhere permanent to stay,” replied the yellow mare.

“A… disagreement?”

“Yes. We didn’t like the way they ran things. They insisted on keeping to themselves while following their traditions. The ponies who followed me did so to defy those rules.”

“I see,” I stated, then opted to change the topic entirely. “You wanna trade stuff? I could use some medium bore ammo and maybe some different food. All I have are old cans and preserved foods.” I’d already lost interest in their tribe’s story and didn’t feel like pretending anymore. “Actually, if you have any booze, I’d like some of it as well.” I hoped for wine, but anything would do.

We ended up haggling for the better part of an hour. I got some purified water and ammunition for my automatic rifle, in exchange for rounds of calibres I had no use for. Afterwards, I agreed to do some repairs and maintenance on their weaponry in exchange for staying the night in what had become their temporary home. I ended up properly introducing myself, and so did they.

“How long have you been here?” I asked the yellow mare, whose name turned out to be Haybale.

“A few weeks. Frankly speaking, we’re trying to come to an agreement with the Silvermanes. We wanna stay around here, since the wildlife is similar to what we had at our previous home. They’re of a different mind, however. When we came here, they attacked us, killing two of ours. Even now, when we’re hunting, we occasionally get attacked by them.”

“Why don’t you leave, then? It sounds dangerous to stay here, so why bother?”

“You underestimate how much we like hunting. There just aren’t as many radigators anywhere else.” She hesitated for a few moments before saying, “You know, I’ve been considering another option. You mentioned you’re a mercenary, right?” I nodded. “Would you be interested in helping us enact a… less peaceful solution?”

I shrugged. “Depends. What’s in it for me?” While it would fit my plans to find the black book, I wouldn’t tell her that.

Her expression turned sour. “I can’t say we have too many caps or ammo to pay you with. But we could provide you with a few weeks’ worth of meat.”

“Call me crazy, but I don’t feel like risking my life for something that will quickly go bad,” I stated in reply.

“It’s jerky, it doesn’t go bad that quickly,” she insisted. “Tastes like pure salt, but it stays edible for ages.”

While I couldn’t survive off meat alone, it was still valuable food, and it wasn’t centuries old. I found it a little odd how, within a few short months after Bricks introduced me to meat, I’d already grown accustomed to it, despite not eating it very often at first.

“Meh, I guess I can always sell it afterwards. I’m in.” After a brief pause, I added, “Do you already have a plan? You sounded confident.”

“Well…” she replied, “I’m glad you asked. The biggest issue is that damn sniperpony on top of the town hall. He or she walks around the balcony of that building and takes shots at anypony trying to get into town. I think there’s only one of them up there at a time, but I could be wrong.”

“Yeah, but there isn’t exactly much I can do about her. Or him I guess, not like I know. If what you’re saying is true, I’d need a higher calibre rifle to have a chance at hitting her from a safe distance. Even then, I’d need cover where I could lie prone to properly align a shot. At an angle like that, she’d have the advantage.”

“No, I have another idea.” She gestured to one of the mares playing cards, and the latter sighed and got up from the table, disappearing into the room in the back. “I was thinking, maybe you could sneak into the town hall and kill the sniper discreetly. Then you’d give us a signal over the radio and take the sniper’s position. You don’t have to actually hit many shots, but having an enemy there will surely disorganise the cultist tribe.”

I raised an eyebrow. “Well, that all sounds well and good, but I’m not that sneaky.” As a matter of fact, I didn’t really trust myself to walk by a deaf, sleeping pony without waking her. “I’d actually have better odds at shooting her with a 7mm round from the edge of town.”

“But that’s why I said we got lucky.” She pointed at my left foreleg. “That is why you’ll be an asset.”

My PipBuck? What use could it be in this situation? SATS wouldn’t pick her up unless I was rather close. And even then, it was terribly inaccurate at longer ranges. Oh wait. I felt silly. Did this mare have a StealthBuck? As realisation dawned on my face, she smiled. The mare she’d sent into the back room came back, carrying the device in her mouth.

“It seems you’ve caught on. I don’t know how long those things last, but in any case, if you go in there at night, you’ll only need it to cross the lit up sections of the road. You can see it from here; they only light up certain key parts.”

That likely meant they had two guards on duty at the same time, at least during the night. Otherwise, they would run the risk of somepony sneaking by behind their back. At least I assumed that, given my experience in Macintown. Still, this was feasible. Even if I ended up having to kill one or both of them loudly, by that point, the chaos would be good enough for the exiles to take the town. Yeah, this would likely work.

“So, do you wanna do it tonight? I’ll need a few hours of sleep, though.”

She hesitated for a moment, then nodded. “Yeah, I think it’s best we do it as quickly as possible. In the middle of the night, when it’s darkest.”

We agreed on an exact time, and then I quickly went to sleep upstairs, where they had set up a temporary dorm.

I was glad none of them had called me a foal or questioned my age. I’d been getting less and less of those comments lately, and I wondered why that could be. Perhaps it was the confidence I’d gained in my abilities? Well, I’d grown a little, but that could hardly make up for the difference, could it?

Before I could fall asleep, others started coming to sleep in the makeshift dorm. Afterwards, it took a few more minutes for me to finally drift off into unconsciousness.

In the moment, it didn’t hit me that I’d be trusting those strangers with my safety while I slept. There weren’t too many bucks amongst them, and mares hadn’t betrayed me yet, so I didn’t think much about it in the moment. I suppose they weren’t a danger to me, since they needed something from me, but in hindsight it did feel like I was taking an unnecessary risk.

Basking in the comfortable feeling of invisibility while I walked the dark streets of Ponyville, I stifled a yawn. I’d had a cup of coffee, but even that wasn’t enough to make up for how little I’d slept. I had no doubt adrenaline would keep me awake when the time came, but until then I had to tough it out.

In the dark, I could only barely make out the silhouette of the town hall and certainly couldn’t see the ponies that most likely sat at the top of that building. Occasionally, a white bar would appear on my EFS, only to vanish again once I moved enough. I didn’t think much of it, most likely just some ponies sleeping in far away houses.

Even though I was functionally invisible, I still made sure to avoid the spotlights wherever I could. StealthBucks were great, but they weren’t perfect, and the odd shimmers could maybe alert the guards. Whenever I did cross a lit up portion of the road, I always took the quickest path through it.

As I approached the town’s centre, more and more white bars appeared on my EFS, presumably belonging to the sleeping ponies inside the houses. I was surprised to find even the markers belonging to the sniper ponies to be neutral. Then again, I supposed they weren’t exhibiting any outward signs of aggression that my PipBuck would pick up on.

The fact that there were two of them was inconvenient, but expected. However, there was also nopony else in this building. At least, nopony that my EFS would detect.

I stood in front of the door, considering my options. I could walk in through the front, but what if they trapped that somehow? I tried to check my PipBuck’s time, but couldn’t read the text on the nigh-invisible device. I still had at least twenty minutes, probably around thirty, but better safe than sorry. I took a look through the window and found myself unable to spot any sort of traps. Even if the door was trapped, the inside seemed safe. This far from the top, the pair likely wouldn’t hear my spell. I channelled it, then materialised on the other side.

As always, I was grateful for the StealthBuck’s ability to muffle sound. It wasn’t anything too powerful, but it was always helpful. I had to admit, I’d really missed the comfort of invisibility. It was just… nice to know that I didn’t have to worry about prying eyes, no matter where I went. I felt… so much lighter.

Now was not the time to daydream about it, though. I glanced over the room, finding the spiral staircase leading up. I noticed some of the steps were damaged, looked flimsy, or were downright missing. As expected from such an old building. Not seeing too many other ways, I started walking up, careful to not move too quickly. I had all the time in the world, and getting myself spotted now wouldn’t be good.

Despite my best efforts, the stairs still creaked under every step. Some were louder, others were rather quiet. Thankfully, those noises were partially muffled by the spell aura.

That, however, proved insufficient as I approached the top of the building. Suddenly, a female voice rang out from above, “Bro, did you hear something?”

“Yeah. Probably some radroach downstairs. There’s been more and more of those lately. Might be a nest somewhere. I’ll pester Sacred about it,” replied a buck.

“No, Glitter, this was way too high up. I don’t think roaches would be able to climb this far.”

Glitter was quiet for a second, and I could only assume he sighed. “You worry too much, Appleseed. We’ve been watching for hours, and there’s no creature here that wasn’t earlier. Only pony who came close was that scavenger runt that Auntie Carrot spotted during the day, and she bolted the second she was shot at.” He paused again and continued before Appleseed had a chance to protest, “But you’re probably right. Better safe than sorry, and all.”

That wasn’t good. I needed to find a place to step out of the way, but up here there wasn’t anything. I started walking backwards, but only managed a few steps before a pony emerged into the tower. Thankfully, she—assuming it was Appleseed—wasn’t preoccupied with staying quiet, so her hoofsteps heavily overshadowed mine.

As she got closer, I first noticed the gun in her muzzle, then started to make out some of her features. She was young, about as old Candy would have been. I felt a twang of guilt at the realisation I was about to cut all of that short. She was just too close, and even in the dark she would soon be able to notice the shimmers of the stealth spell. If not, she’d notice my presence when she would inevitably bump into me at the very latest.

Quietly, I took a deep breath and waited for her to come just a step closer. Then, in a second, my horn flared. At the same time two things happened. First, I clicked on the safety of her gun. It was a standard CB Holy Luna pistol, chambered in 9mm. I’d seen that gun once or twice in the wasteland. I wasn’t worried about her shooting me in the chest. I knew that calibre wasn’t strong enough to pierce my peytral. But if she shot, it would make the attack a lot harder, even if I managed to easily kill both snipers.

Second, the combat knife I’d bought in Somnambula pierced her throat, and the interior of the building flashed bright red as I put my entire strength into pulling it towards me. I couldn’t risk her screaming, and I didn’t know anatomy well enough to precisely slit her throat in a way that would keep her quiet. If silent and precise wasn’t an option, hopefully quick and dirty was.

This wasn’t nearly as quiet as I hoped it would be. Her open neck produced a disgusting gurgling sound, while her arteries splashed my mane, chest, and face in her blood, briefly creating a wall of floating red before the StealthBuck detected it as part of me and made it disappear.

When I saw the expressions of disgust on Banter’s, Petal’s, and particularly Lockpick’s faces—the latter looking ready to vomit—I apologised. “Sorry, I shouldn’t have described that in so much detail, I’m just recounting things as I remember them, and apparently that stuck with me.”

They accepted my apology, and I continued my story.

She started falling forward, and I ducked underneath her while levitating her over my head. I would have tried to stop her entirely, but I was worried she would simply drag me with her, given how much heavier she was. Her lifeless form loudly crashed down the stairs.

Less than a second later, Glitter cried out, “Sis? Are you okay?” He waited a few seconds before continuing. I felt another pang of guilt as I was reminded of myself when I’d lost Candy. “Come on, this isn’t funny. I know that red flash was just a rigged laser pistol going off.” He didn’t sound very convinced. His tone was begging rather than asserting.

He poked his head in, floating a suppressed submachine gun beside him—a machine pistol of griffin design. The building was slightly illuminated by the mild purple glow of his magic. This meant he would notice me a lot quicker, but it also meant I could afford to see where I would teleport. Now that there was only one guard left, I was much less worried about making a little bit of noise, but I could not let him fire that gun.

I slipped into SATS, queuing up enough actions to deplete the spell, then executed it. In a flash, I found myself in front of him. My telekinesis pressed the discharge button on his weapon, dropping the magazine into the staircase below. My combat knife came floating and slashed at his throat while I heard the submachine gun shoot a single subsonic round, then click harmlessly. The cut wasn’t nearly as deep as I would have wanted, but it was apparently enough to kill. More blood splattered the inside of the tower and my fur and mane. Since the wound was much smaller, it was a minuscule amount of gore, compared to his sister. Yet, for some reason, it felt significant.

I floated his corpse backwards onto the balcony. I felt icky, and really wanted to wash myself off. However, I had no time to waste. I took out the torch from my saddlebags and hoped it wasn’t soaked and would still burn normally. Fortunately, it wasn’t. I levitated it high above my head, signalling my employers to move in.

While I waited for the rest of the ponies to do their part, I looked around the balcony. I found two sniper rifles chambered in .308 calibre. They were both too heavy for me to add to my regular arsenal, so I would have to sell them at the next opportunity I got. Although… maybe I could sell my carbine and buy a lightweight shotgun to make up for the sniper rifle’s shortcomings.

Still… I’d be carrying around a lot of weight in guns alone. My current zebra rifle was more than versatile enough and worked in most situations—although the 7.62x39mm ammunition it used was horribly difficult to aim with at longer distances.

It was a heartbreaking decision, but I would have to sell off both of those gorgeous rifles at the next opportunity.

About an hour later, I was washing myself in the Ponyville river. The water was cold, dirty, and radioactive, but I needed to get at least relatively clean before heading off to bed. Unfortunately, the blood caking my fur and mane had already dried and was a pain to properly get out. I was almost done with my chest and face, but I dreaded dealing with my mane, especially since it would likely imply dunking my whole head into the stream.

When my face was finally somewhat free of crust, I decided to simply cut most of my mane off. A few months had passed since my last haircut, so it was only appropriate. My mane was getting long enough to get into my eyes sometimes, and I’d been meaning to shorten it anyway.

Too bad I can’t do this precisely, I thought. I’ll probably look stupid for a few weeks. Oh well, it’s not like I need to look decent to survive. I’m no whore, after all. I levitated my knife up to my head, then pulled some bangs taught, cutting them off at the base.

Ever since that job with the ghouls, I’d not landed too many jobs as a guard. Instead, I’d been getting work as more of a mercenary. I’d picked up a few bounties, too, but most of the time I was hired directly.

I slashed more of my mane off.

I roughly understood how much to charge, but also what to expect. Most of my clients had ulterior motives that they wouldn’t tell me. Sometimes, I’d be hired to assassinate a target that my employer would describe as evil. They’d claim I’m killing a rapist raider with no sense of justice, only for me to end up killing some scavenger who’d simply stolen what they shouldn’t have. Most of the time, if my client insisted my target was a horrible or despicable pony, it was simply because they were afraid I wouldn’t take the job.

Truth be told, I took anything that wasn’t absurdly risky and paid well, so their efforts were wasted. In Dodge, I’d gone hungry for long enough to know I was willing to do anything to have food on my plate every day.

Another bunch of hair fell into the river.

Incidentally, whenever a client had relatively mild complaints about their target, I found that they were mostly all based on reality. This was why I believed Haybale when she told me of the Silvermanes’ territorial tendencies. That, and I’d experienced firsthoof how aggressive they were in defending their home.

When I was finally done shaving my head, I placed it into the running water, rubbing my hooves to get out as much grime as possible, as quickly as I could. I had to resist the temptation to give up and just go to bed with dried blood in my mane, as the cold was giving me a horrible headache. I pressed my eyes shut, bit my lip, and continued until it felt like I was clean enough. I’d have to bathe more thoroughly tomorrow, but this was a start.

I put my saddlebags back on and started walking. I didn’t exactly know my destination, but I had no doubt I’d find some place to spend the night. After I’d gotten rid of the guards, my clients moved in and started their operation. They primarily tried to chase the Silvermanes out of town. Some of them had the common sense to not fight back and were peacefully shooed away. Most, however, tried to kill the attackers. A few of Haybale’s ponies sustained grave injuries, but with me in the sniper tower, it had been surprisingly easy to help out the attackers. The Silvermanes hadn’t expected the town hall to be controlled by the enemy, and thus were not careful about stepping where I could see them. Rather unsurprisingly, all of their manes were silver.

A group of three ponies tried to climb the tower to deal with me, walking so close to the building I was unable to aim at them properly from up there. Unfortunately for them, I saw their red bars on my EFS before they even entered the building. Glitter’s submachine gun made short work of them once they reached the balcony.

At first, I hadn’t paid much attention to Glitter’s corpse, but with three more ponies, I noticed their manes’ natural colour wasn’t actually silver. It was particularly obvious with one of them, whose natural mane was black, the dye job looking especially botched.

I stopped as I reached a large tree. Now that dawn was slowly coming around, I was able to notice that this tree had… windows. I’d read about this, this was the ancient Golden Oak library. Most likely, the majority of books in here were lost to time, but I had to at least check it out to make sure. Sleep could wait.

Quickly enough, I found the entrance. I took a step inside, when something suddenly came flying towards my face. It almost missed me, but I still felt the sharp sting of a wound on my cheek. Immediately, I fell behind the doorway. Blood flowed down my face and neck, feeling hot on my cold skin.

“Motherfucker. I just cleaned myself!” I shouted into the dark library. What surprised me the most was the fact that nothing appeared on my EFS. This could have just been a trap, but the timing was just a little bit too perfect. Plus, I hadn’t heard any mechanism go off, nor had I felt a tripwire or anything more complex. I looked behind me, trying to see what had been thrown at me, but in the dark I couldn’t find the blade anywhere.

I took a sip from a healing potion to alleviate the scorching pain in my face. Then, as I noticed it hadn’t done much, I soaked my right foreleg’s fur with some more potion and rubbed the wound. Stars, just how deep did that cut? Then I levitated out my combat knife. If somepony was in there, they would attack again before I managed to spot them in the dark. Worse, given that they didn’t show up on my EFS, it was likely that SATS wouldn’t work on whomever was in there either.

I had a trick, however. The second time this night, I poured everything I had into my telekinesis. This time, however, I didn’t pour my magic into strength, but sensitivity. I’d experimented with this a few times already, but hadn’t had the opportunity to try it in any real situation.

With how much effort I was putting into maintaining the spell, I could feel even the most subtle of movement on the knife. This extended to sound, if only very slightly. As I moved it around the room, it eventually hit obstacles, but nothing soft. I was about to give up and conclude it had just been a trap when I felt some vibration. I slashed about wildly until I hit soft, warm tissue. Immediately, I stabbed right where I’d cut, and a mare screamed. For a second, my magic went numb. Then, the sensation returned, and I focused on making the wound as lethal as possible, pushing the blade further in.

She collapsed onto my knife, and I lost concentration. I was panting while my heart beat loudly. My horn was throbbing painfully, and my head wasn’t faring much better, spinning and aching just as badly. I waited there a few more minutes, letting myself recover. The first few times it happened, it surprised me how straining my magic could have such an effect on my entire body.

It made sense, though. A unicorn horn was an organ like any other, after all. It needed energy to do its job, and with how close it was to the brain, it definitely deprived the latter of its needed oxygen.

After a few minutes, I decided I’d rested enough and that I would try entering the building once again. Before that, I wanted to take a closer look through the window. Shining my PipBuck light inside, I didn’t find anything out of place, except the corpse of a mare in the corner opposing the entrance.

I carefully stepped inside, surveying the place with my PipBuck’s light. This time, nothing came flying my way. I found the interior to be in surprisingly good condition. This place was probably under the same sort of spell that had preserved Arcane Spark’s cottage on Foal Mountain.

Approaching the mare, I noticed her mane was dyed in the same way as the other ponies from the tribe. At first, I thought it might have been her natural colour, as the roots were also silver, and the dye job overall very convincing. However, upon closer inspection, I noticed that it wasn’t quite homogenous—though still much smoother than the others. She probably dyed it every few days. Had she been the leader?

I lifted her up to find my knife, embedded deep in… her eye socket at a downward angle. I suddenly understood just why she’d screamed so loudly. I then noticed there was something underneath her. She was clutching a book, its cover entirely black. She’d probably pressed it against her chest before I swung my knife at her.

I searched for a light switch and flipped it on. Almost unsurprisingly, it still worked. The chandelier above my head turned on, illuminating the room. I found myself surrounded by books. In good condition, too. The room itself was extremely clean, as much as I'd have expected back in Stable 4. Well, perhaps not as clean, but it was close. The enchantment that kept this place from rotting most likely also controlled the air quality and humidity.

I took another look at the black book. This was why I’d killed a mare Candy’s age. I just hoped it would be worth it. As I touched my hoof to the cover, I realised it was painted black. I was immediately worried and flipped it open. The title page read “The Great and Powerful Trixie’s stage magic explained.” Is this just a book about party tricks? I thought.

Skimming the pages, I found that indeed, there was almost no useful magic described in this. Some of the spells could have practical applications. For instance, a firework spell might be able to act as a flashbang with enough modification. Still, with every page that I read, I was more aggravated. I’d gone through this much effort for this? I groaned and kicked the corpse of the mare I’d just killed.

However, I continued skimming the pages, hoping to find anything to make this whole ordeal worth it—I certainly wasn’t getting paid enough. Another page that caught my attention had some information on disappearing acts. It wasn’t quite an invisibility spell… More of a simple camouflage. It could help you escape the stage using smoke and mirrors, but I doubted it could be useful in any real scenario. Still, I wondered if that had been enough to throw off my EFS, or if some other factor had been at play. I’d try to learn it if I had the time, just in case.

Disappointed, but spent, I shut off the light, went back to grab my saddlebags, and made my way up the stairs. I needed to get a few hours of sleep, and this place seemed as good as any.

The further I went up, the dustier it was. On my way up, I passed a kitchen, a dining room, a bathroom, a small room, and a way out onto a balcony. I was surprised how good of a vantage point this was. I could see most of Ponyville from here. The only downside was that, unlike the town hall, it only faced one direction.

At the very top of the staircase, I found a large room with lots of vertical space. A ladder led up to a bed on a large shelf. I locked the door behind me with the key stuck in it. It probably wouldn’t stop anypony determined to get in, but it would at least get me a few moments to react and reach for my weapon.

Climbing up to the bed, I took off my saddlebags, harness, and barding. I slipped into my bedroll. The mattress wasn’t very comfortable, but it was far better than sleeping on the wooden floor. Soon enough, I drifted off to sleep. That night, I dreamt of Candy, but instead of falling off a building, she’d had her throat ripped out.

The next evening, we had a giant feast. Apparently, the Silvermanes had a giant supply of meat in storage, and Haybale decided to celebrate victory by eating their enemies’ supply. Out of the twelve ponies on our side, one died during the attack, while two others were injured. Out of the twenty or so Silvermanes, at least ten had died, and the remaining dozen were driven out.

I cut off a piece of the steak in front of me, making sure to take my time to enjoy it. After swallowing, I told Haybale, “This is delicious. Probably the best food I’ve ever had.” It wasn’t a lie. Stable food, as nutritious as it was, remained extremely bland. And wasteland food… yeah. To this day, it’s still the tastiest steak I’ve had. Even now I don’t think I’d be able to make something as good as she did.

“Thanks. Food like this is a staple of where we used to live, and I happen to know the recipe,” she replied. “Hunting is a really big thing there.”

“Huh. You never told me more about it, come to think of it. This makes me wanna visit,” I answered between mouthfuls of beans.

“Oh no, I can’t recommend that. Actually, I’d even go as far as to recommend against it. It’s a town named Arbu, and the inhabitants aren’t usually very welcoming of outsiders, so avoid it if you can.”

“Ah, I see,” I replied before shifting my attention back to my steak.

Author's Note

If you haven't read the original Fallout: Equestria, this is the one chapter where you'll need some extra context. Mild Fo:E spoiler: Arbu is a town of cannibals that gets destroyed about 15 years after this chapter.

And if you're here because you were looking for Fo:E content and you're wondering why anyone would read a Fo:E sidefic without reading the original… It's because I've been telling people that knowledge of the original isn't required to understand this story. This chapter is the one exception.