All Roads Lead Home

Chapter Nine:
The Voices of The Tunnels

“Only nurakhus truly know where the lines between the living and spiritual fall.”

“You got a bandage?”

Dusk rolled her eyes and nudged Sea Mist, who sped off into my room. She and Hoarfrost stared at me as I was slowly creating a large pool of blood on the floor. “So when were you gonna tell me about the assassins, Hoarfrost?”

He sighed and walked over to the mare in black. “I did.”

“No you didn’t.”

“You’re dense, aren’t you?”

“Thanks,” I scoffed. “Now without the subtext.”

“I said before, ‘I hurt ponies.’ The Party doesn’t like what I’m doing. You’re smart, Serenity. Put it together.” Hoarfrost rolled the mare onto her back to look at her face, bruised and battered. “Well, looks like the Party is getting serious.”

“What do you mean?” Dusk trotted over to him.

“Look at that stable dweller, the cowboy, and then this one. No patches, not even a passport on their person.”

“She’s a Morale agent.”

“Bingo.” Hoarfrost’s quieter tone was laced with a pulsing pain.

“Wait.” Dusk pressed her ear up to the mare’s chest then glanced over to me. “Why is she alive? Is the cowboy too?!”

“Yeah.”

“Serenity, they were here to kill us! Why didn’t you… no– don’t tell me you’ve gone soft,” she groaned.

Sea Mist finally returned with all my gear and brought it over to me. I started patching myself up.

“Listen, I’m not soft. I just– violence should be a last resort, not a first one.”

“They wouldn’t agree.” She pointed at the bodies.

“I don’t care what they think. It's the right thing to do.”

Sea Mist smiled when I looked over to her before she finished up dressing my wounds.

Dusk bumped Hoarfrost with a wing. “Get your stuff, we have to go.”

He didn’t protest and quickly galloped off. Dusk sighed. “You’ve killed ponies before, Serenity. Most folks have. There’s nothing wrong with protecting the world with a rifle in one hoof and a blade in the other. Some people only unders–”

“Shut up,” I butted in. “Everyone mistakes their lust for retribution as justice. I thought that too until yesterday.”

“What’s wrong with that?!” she exploded, causing Sea Mist to cower behind me. “You ain’t protecting others by offering cupcakes and hugs! They get what they deserve.”

Had I really changed that much? Were the childhood bedtime stories about loving each other a lie, or did the world become so nihilistic? It was hard to swallow. Maybe we can be judge and jury… but executioner? What gives us the right? I don’t know. So why should we have the power? It all sounded esoteric. A game created by children.

“Are you listening?” Dusk had gotten in my face while I was in my own head. “Someone has to do the dirty work. To stop that evil–”

“I’m not some damn angel with a shotgun!” She recoiled as I screamed in her face. I took a deep breath. “I wasn’t sent down to decide who lives and dies. That easy route doesn’t help anyone. Just creates more problems for others… like Cider.”

“But–” she tried to cut me off, but I continued.

“At that point, would it be wrong for them to want retribution after what you’ve done? Who is more justified?! This is life, not some damn Western. You don’t get to shoot someone and walk off into the sunset… Look, I am no angel and I am not here to save you, or anyone.”

I greedily sucked in air in a vain attempt to calm my rage. “Sorry… but most of these ‘saviors and heroes’ believe life is something to be protected, and not shared. That’s fucked up, and Amani knew it.”

Dusk bit her tongue. I wanted to apologize for yelling, but she needed to listen. Whether she’d understand was a different gamble. Hoarfrost had been standing in the hallway, frozen like ice, probably understanding why I was mad yesterday. That was good.

I walked over to the kitchen counters to finally drink my cup of water and pack my journal away. I hated the quiet that infected the air. That kind of awkward quiet after a fight. As I walked over to the door and gestured to them to follow, my grandmother’s words slipped out of my mouth. “It doesn’t matter what the public may see us as. We are what we do in the dark.”

======= ☢ =======

More checkpoints and tunnels, enough that just the mere thought of walking longer buckled more invisible weight on my hooves. It had been an hour since we left Amity; most of us were tired and irritated. Luckily, it didn’t take much to convince Hoarfrost to change our route to Friendship station, but of course that meant it’d take a bit longer to get there. No more Old Guard controlled stations for anyone, not with the target on the chairpone’s flank. So we headed out the east exit instead of the north to throw off any followers.

“So what’s… Apathy station like?” Hoarfrost chimed out from behind.

“It’s not Apathy– that’s just what the Old Guard renamed it. Its name is Evergreen. The whole station was built under a massive garden, so you can understand why.”

His voice wavered a little. “And the Stripes control this?”

“Pfff, don’t be nervous. These were some of the nicest zebras I’ve ever met.”

“Five years ago.” Dusk chuckled.

“Can’t have changed— actually, not gonna jinx it.”

“That’s the smartest thing you’ve said today.” I tried my best to brush off her comment.

A flash beam blinded us from up ahead, followed by the sounds of guns being cocked. I put a hoof up and squinted to look past the light. All I got was a few shadows, one of which walked straight up to me and jabbed their rifle barrel into my chest, causing my fresh scars to burn. I was met with the end of his barrel when I tried to get up.

“Who the hell are you?” They said, strongly emphasizing each word.

“Travelers.”

“Raven?” the zebra called out behind them. Some information was passed nonverbally, causing them to snicker. “Alright ‘travelers’, looks like the spirits want you for questioning. Get up.”

We marched past the station’s sentry-protected entrance: a large garage door opened with chains. The black and white striped logo of the faction was presented proudly in the center. Zebras, young and old, stopped whatever they were doing to watch us pass. Compared to Sunlight and Amity, the station was modest, yet detailed. Buildings clearly followed a template here. Homes were all the same size, none higher than two stories. Businesses took over the food court area. Sea Mist was in awe at the Hayburger that had been replaced with an alchemy shop whose front was covered with multicolored elixirs, hoof-written grimoires, and colts trying on some beautifully detailed, flat, rolled up, round-topped hats. Each store after was just as tidy and colorfully vibrant. Hoarfrost was smiling just as much as Blue, but yet… I swear there was a twinge of envy under his expression.

Dusk was fidgeting just behind me, all of that visible uncomfortableness colliding into a question, “Sorry, but why didn’t you disarm us?”

“Oh, stalker… Raven told us you wouldn’t try anything.”

“What?”

“Don’t worry, you can ask her yourself later.” The zebra chuckled.

We were quickly hustled into a meeting hall of sorts, like cattle into a pen. Our armed guides locked the entrance before leading us further in. I was wrong in calling it a meeting hall; it was a cathedral. My dad or nana would be the ones visiting these kinds of places while I’d waited outside with Amani. I really wish I would’ve snuck in now. Candles illuminated colored glass windows constructed from different broken shards, repurposed into something new. Something beautiful. At the end was a candlelit altar on a large stage, not like ones made for dead loved ones or the princesses of old, but instead to the Zone itself. To the spirits artistically drawn on banners hanging from the ceiling. Out of the seven, only one was too abstract in style to appear as anything more than scribbles: The Great Spirit. The others, Chaos, Order, Magic, Hope, Love, and Retribution, mostly had images that were more than just lines. An apple, skull, book, dreamcatcher, stars, and cards respectively.

One of the guards broke my thoughts. “Nice of you to feign interest in our culture, but it’s not gonna help.”

“It’s mine too, jackass.”

He chuckled. “Good one.”

I just stared at him even after he stopped. Tried my best to make him uncomfortable by looking through him. He shuffled on his hooves. Direct eye contact bugs everyone out. I should know, because I hate it.

“So,” a mare said as she stepped out from a door on stage. “Travelers… I’ll ask this once. Why are you here?”

“I’m sorry mi—“

“No, no, no.” She commanded the room even when cutting Hoarfrost off. Her face was turned from us, as she seemed more focused on lighting a candle for the altar. “I want it from the girl.”

Sea Mist immediately gave me a worried look. My heart felt hollow as all I could do was mouth ‘you’re fine’ followed by a half-hearted smile. Cautiously, as if afraid to crack the ground at her hooves, she creeped up to the front of the party.

“We’re trying to get to F-Friendship Station.” Blue stuttered out.

“Hmmm,” The mare finally turned around. The stripes on her face appeared to form a heart from her eyes to her top of her muzzle. “Okay, but I’m still curious. Why are you here?”

“I don’t kno—“

“Stable 11 doesn’t exist,” she cut Sea Mist off coldly. “Birch.”

“Yes, nurakhu.”

“Search ‘em.”

Birch’s words bounced around my head. Nurakhu… Nura— it had been a while since I had spoken that tongue, but I was pretty sure nura meant shaman… oh shit.

As Birch pulled off my gear, he paused and stared at my bare, tattooed back, mortified with disgust. The sharp muzzle of his pistol rested against my head. “Who the fuck are you, pony?”

“Serenity.”

“You act like that means something,” he spat.

I felt the nurakhu walk up behind me. “His name doesn’t, but his family does… if he’s telling the truth.”

Something was poured down my back, burning every nerve on the way down to my tail. I didn’t hold back my scream. Sea Mist covered her ears while one of the guards tried to hold back Dusk. I didn’t even see Hoarfrost before dropping to the ground. My muscles refused to listen, instead writhing around. By the time the pain stopped I was left gasping for air.

“Holy spirit… it’s real.”

“Nurakhu, what do you mean?” I heard Birch ask between the pounding in my ears.

“The ink is magic-laced. He’s telling the truth, but I expected him to be stripier.”

“What did you pour on him?!” Dusk hollered.

Birch helped me to my hooves. “I’m sorry, stalker, but we have rules that keep us alive.”

“What was it?” she snarled.

“It was a mix that removes all foreign additions to the body, except magical ones.” The nurakhu picked my chin up and looked me in the eyes. As she studied mine, I already knew what was gonna be in hers. Regre– No. That wasn’t remorse in the nurakhu’s eyes, but a surgical lack of it. She turned to Dusk and sighed. “Are you aware your friend is like me?”

“What the fuck are you talking about?” I interjected.

She waved off most of the guards, except Birch and Raven. As soon as they left, the mare sighed and sat down in front of me. “Who gave you the tattoo?”

“My nana.”

“And you wanted that?” She tilted her head.

“Out of respect for my brother, yeah.”

‘You are aware that you aren’t real ‘brothers’.”

I tightened my brow. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“You’re… you’re a pony and he’s a zebra, I don’t see how–”

“I don’t see the issue with that.” I snapped back.

“Fine, I tried to be nice but I guess you're just stubborn,” The nurakhu cracked her neck and took a long breath. “The role of nurakhu is passed down through family. You have none.”

“I have a family.”

“Yeah? But where are you really from?”

I bit my tongue.

“I’m sorry but that’s not your real family.”

“It’s real to me.” My rage was seething out of my teeth, my tone darkening. “And if I’m a nurakhu now… then I’ll do it for him.”

“You’re lucky, pony. You’re lucky he was the best of all of us.” She stood and rushed out of the cathedral, steaming.

Raven, a mare smaller than Sea Mist, with beautiful long braids, grinned at me and made a few rhythmic gestures with her hooves. After she finished, I was left confused until Birch tapped me on the shoulder. “She said, ‘Sorry for how Hope treated you. Welcome home, Child of the Stars.’”

“You sign?” I raised a brow.

“I’m a CODA.”

I nodded. “Oh.”

Raven signed again, while watching my lips, which Birch continued to interpret. “Ummm… I’m guessing you were kept separate from Amani’s path, right? I have to apologize again if this isn’t what you wanted or aren’t prepared for.”

“How can anyone be?”

“Yeah.” Her body lightly bounced to a soundless chuckle. “This is a path you have to enter alone, but I’m sure the Chairpone can discuss with Hope about the constant bomb threats from Amity Station in a bit. The stalker is free to do as she pleases, but I’d like to see the stable dweller’s time spell.”

“How… do you know all that?” I was taken aback.

“Each nurakhu is– how would you put it? Picked? I guess ‘favored’ works. Each nurakhu is favored by one of the spirits. Of course you may converse with more, but usually one or two actively show themselves. Mine was Chaos.” She paused not for dramatic effect but to rub her temples while choosing her next words to sign. “Chaos is… well, it's just life in its purest form. The Serpent visited me to play jokes and spin wild tales of the old world. Unlike others’ spirits, he focused on fun instead of a more serious agenda. Then, as a final joke, Chaos shows me the strings of the universe. I know things. Retribution appeared and was angry with the trickster’s joke. After that I never saw Chaos again. No one has in months.”

“You want me to cast my spell to see if Chaos… the spirit was lying, right?” Sea Mist stumbled out.

Raven nodded. I stopped Blue before she could get any closer. “Listen, before all this I just wanna ask one thing.”

“Your dreams… right?” The nurakhu grimaced. “I’m sorry, but those are for the nurakhu themself to analyze.”

“But the dreams mean I don’t get a choice?”

For a second time the mare nodded, but slower. I let Sea Mist walk up to Raven and place her hooves on theirs. Unintelligible voices whispered from the banners above, but it seemed only I could hear it. Sea Mist’s horn and eyes were engulfed in an amaranth glow before continuing into formless pale jade eyes. They stood there for one… two… three heartbeats before Blue’s spell faded.

Raven was crying, her face twisting into darker and deeper terror with each breath. Sea Mist wrapped her hooves tightly around the mare, trying to soothe her. Birch was frozen at the sight. I watched as both Hoarfrost and Dusk awkwardly slipped away while all this occurred. I could only hope they took the nurakhu’s advice on what to do.

“Blue?”

“She—“ Raven pulled Sea Mist closer before she could continue. The nurakhu shakingly signed and looked at Birch. It took him a moment to recompose himself.

“She’s just repeating: ‘It’s real. It’s real. It’s real…’ Wait.” The guard quickly became confused. “Wa—what?”

She signed the same thing again and again. “The world's a stage and we are all merely actors.”

“Blue, what did you see?” I asked.

She started rubbing the top of her pipbuck. “I d-don’t know how to explain it. Her future was much more solid. You and her head up to the garden, but… I don’t feel anything after that until you return. Like someone ripped a page out of a book.”

I blinked in astonishment.

“We mustn’t try Retribution,” Birch translated for Raven. “We need to go to the park above. You have to become nurakhu now. The play needs you to lead.”

“Fuck me,” I murmured as she led me through the back exit of the cathedral. Sea Mist gave a little wave goodbye before the door divided us.

There were no houses behind the building, not even a single zebra. One wide set of stairs and escalators rose to the surface above. The silence was filled with our hoofsteps and the quiet crackling of my bracer as we ascended to the station's real lobby.

Snow softly waltzed in from the smashed glass revolving doors to powder the floor with a flawless white carpet for hoofsteps to ruin. Luggage of various sizes had been next to chairs and walls, untouched long enough for the decay of the plastic exteriors to begin. Faded tickets and passes on water stained tables were everywhere. But what surprised me was a skeleton, slumped in one of the chairs. Most of the remains found up here were brought back to be mass buried, at least the ones not being gnawed on by mutants. These bones didn’t give off the impression of fear like many others, instead mild annoyance at one of the solari boards. My mind started running wild with possible stories.

How dare the end of the world stall their train? Didn’t they know how important this meeting was for their career? Maybe they couldn’t be bothered with even getting up to run from the radiation. Why would someone want to die tired? Where was there to go, anyway?

Raven brought me back to reality by tapping me on the shoulder, beckoning me to continue following her out of the lobby into the snow. My bracer instantly began crackling louder at the sight of the massive garden in front of us. Fields of anemones, their petals appearing like crystals against the faded light posts around them. The nurakhu led me across the twisting pathway towards the center, then sat down and closed her eyes, as if she was praying. I couldn’t help but look around, confused.

The wind chanted phrases to my bracer’s crackle, the air becoming a little thinner to breathe. The flowers gave off a sweet smell that probably was leftover magic from the bombs. I couldn’t place it, for the same reasons why I couldn’t understand what I was supposed to be doing.

“This is real spiritual and all, but shouldn’t we be concerned about the mutants…?” My bracer’s geiger counter was wavering just below the quarter point on its scale. “Or the radiation…? Hey!”

I shook the zebra but she ignored me. What a help she–

“Calm down. She’s knocking on the sky, or I guess you’d call it speaking with the dead,” a rough, firm voice called out from the fields.

What was behind, well… it was a skeletal… pony?… zebra? I don’t think it mattered what race. It was equine in nature, wrapped in a torn, beaten up duster and cowboy hat. Little bits of flesh, not rotten but no longer red, hung from different bones. The haunted pieces of someone.

“Do you mind not…? It’s unnerving.” I looked away as the being appeared to frown, the ground supernaturally rejecting every step he took forward. Cold mist chased their coat tails. “Thank you.”

He looked me in the eye, his relaxed movements making me feel small. The being stopped mere inches in front of me, towering over me and enwrapping me in his shadow. My body screamed to run as he studied me, like a predator would prey, before continuing. “What’s your worst memory?”

I hesitated a little too long for the being’s liking.

“Don’t lie… I’ll know,” he added.

“Why?”

“Why should you or why would you lie? Serenity, we both know the answer to that. You’ve lied your whole life, in the hopes that you’d convince yourself it’s the truth.” I was taken aback as his skull cracked into a wide smile. “That’s right… right?”

“Sure.”

“You are much easier to read than your brother–”

“And you already know the answers to your questions,” I cut in.

“And much angrier than him too,” he finished, unfazed.

“A lot of pomp and circumstance for someone I don’t even know the name of, don’t you think?”

The being snickered. “Studied and slick. If I had a heart, you’d’ve pierced it.”

“Enough with the jokes.” I glanced over to Raven, still praying in the field, before letting out a sigh. “She brought me here to become nurakhu and frankly, I don’t know what the fuck I’m even doing up here!”

t h u n k

A card stuck out of the dirt at my hooves. The being beckoned me to pick it up, while shuffling a stark-looking gray deck of cards in his own hooves. I plucked the gift out and turned it over: an upside down pony on a cliff.

“Sorry, but I don’t have time to decipher playing cards or whatever. Nor do I really give a shit.” He looked a little hurt as I tried to hand it back to him.

“Serenity,” the being sang quietly as I trotted over to Raven. “Serenity!”

“What?”

“Honestly, I didn’t expect you to be so dense, but that’s my fault. Look, you can either believe that your brain is slowly rotting away with each breath of radiation up here, or–”

“Accept that you're a spirit, right?” I finished his line.

The being tipped his hat. “What do you know of spirits?”

“Enough, but I still am lost on what I ‘need’ to be a nurakhu.”

“You’re already one,” he said curtly.

I lost the words to respond.

“There isn’t a trial or test. Certain bloodlines are gifted with the ability to speak with the Infinite. They’re trusted to make deals and guide others.”

I felt like an idiot. “That’s it, huh… then you’re…?”

“Too many names, most lost to time, but your culture would call me Retribution, the Dealer of Fate.” Retribution gave a little bow before continuing to shuffle his deck. “Your fellow nurakhu brought you here to smell the radiation of the flowers. They bring people closer to the lines of the spiritual. But she’s really here to see if Chaos will come back.”

“Will they?” I couldn’t help but raise a brow in interest.

“No. I put that serpent in… timeout.”

“I-I…” The words stuttered out of my mouth as I realized the power a being like Retribution must have to trap another spirit away. “I hope I didn’t try your patience.”

Retribution let out a hearty laugh. “Don’t worry. You’re not the first pony to adopt a playing card nickname I’ve had to deal with. I guess it’s an expected irony.”

“Then do you mind a question?”

“Sure, but every one after will cost you.”

I shuffled on my hooves. “So what did Chaos say about me?”

“Ask something else,” he shot back quickly.

“No.”

“I gave you a warning.”

It was nice of Retribution to worry about me, but I needed to know. “I’m aware.”

He shook his head. “All of you climb up to the Zone in hopes of gaining some solace, yet… ask for pain. Serenity, he said you are a hero. Chaos screamed it from the ruins and into every nurakhu that would listen.” The depressions in Retribution's eye sockets deepened as he gazed at Raven. “He brought hope to hurt others, just to laugh.”

“That was the last joke he told Raven? Why…? Where’s the humor in that?! Why do that?” I pleaded to the spirit.

He turned to the flowers. “Every joke needs a punchline, just like every story needs a hero. That was his final joke: Make someone believe they matter, or… make others believe they do.”

I couldn’t help but cry. To be honest, I don’t know why. Maybe it was because I couldn’t be what others wanted me to be. Or maybe it was that deep down I wanted to be a hero. Be filled with warmth and love, helping others. A feeling of recognition that was stolen from me before I even knew I wanted it. Replaced with the hollowing twisting emptiness in my gut.

“Why would a spirit care about what Chaos does?” I said, rubbing my eyes like a filly.

“I don’t. He was just doing my job.”

“T-then why did you speak in my ear? Call me home? Why did you help me?” I took in deep breaths and tried to recompose myself.

“I didn’t.”

“Then who?”

“What are you willing to give to know?” Retribution gave a devilish grin.

“Fuck you.”

“Awww… Serenity. It’s just a quid pro quo. I give you something, you give me something. For example…” He circled around me. “You’re not gonna change anything. Stopping those bombs, as much a good deed you think it may be, won’t do anything. Red Eye dies, Fillydelphia burns. And you… hehehe… you will have so much blood on your hooves, you will wade in it. That's the role.” His sincerity twisted into an impossibly wide grin. “I can change the world, like you always wanted to, only on a scale that matters. You could be a part of that too… if you want.”

We locked stares. The dark pits where his eyes would’ve been physically sickened me. The shady curves of the skull seemed to express a dark freedom he had. The freedom to be above it all: any and all laws, basic rights of others, and even his own crimes. I understood why they called him the Dealer of Fate in that singular moment. He was a hero, in his own eyes. Protecting his beliefs, no matter how tainted or fictionalized, from the truth of others. It was the look of a self righteous beast.

“I’m good,” I answered coldly.

Retribution sighed as Raven was getting up. “Well, you’ll be back. Everyone comes back… eventually.”

I blinked and he was gone.

======= ☢ =======

Raven tried to comfort me on the way back home, down to the tunnels. She knew I had talked to a spirit, but I was sure not to reveal who. I could only rip myself apart deciding if the hope that Chaos gave her and others was worth it to keep… or if I had the heart to make that hope vanish. I kept quiet until we returned back to the cathedral, where everyone was waiting for us.

“So, you can guarantee no more pain will come to the Stripes?” Hope asked Hoarfrost.

“Yes nurakhu, I promise with my life.”

I snickered. “A little dramatic, don’t you think?”

“This is why we don’t let you talk. Right, Dusk?” Hoarfrost smiled.

Dusk nodded, pulling Sea Mist closer to her to make her do the same. Blue pushed away with a pout. Hope ignored all of it and looked me directly in the eyes. “Who came, pony?”

“Well… no one good.”

“Just tell me.”

“Retribution.” I let out quietly.

She didn’t flinch like Raven did. Instead Hope trotted over to the altar and sat down in front of it, pulling out of a hoofful of dust she shook over the candles in the process.

“I'm glad you didn’t take his offer, but,” the nurakhu sighed. “You need to leave.”

“But we just got here?” Dusk objected.

“Fate follows hi–”

“So did my brother,” I cut her off.

She turned her head to glare. “And what happened to Seventeen?”

I frowned as Hoarfrost started pushing us out of the door, rambling about us needing to go. Before I left the cathedral, I couldn’t help but turn around. “How did you know?”

“The spirit in your eyes told me.”

“What do you mean?” I felt stupid even asking the question.

“The guilt. The guilt gave you away.”