Fallout: Equestria - Parallelism

"Turn on the fireworks."

A bright flash, a sharp bang. Followed by a second. Pillars of green flame rush up and sideways, tearing through the concrete structures. The raiders on the bridge fall with it into the river, and those closest to the explosion melt alive, mingling with the concrete debris. The bridge collapses into the water, taking the surviving raiders on it with it, finally destroying the crossings between the two halves of the city... And only two small black mushrooms and light gray ash will remind us that there was something here a while ago.

It all happened in about ten seconds. No one on that bridge was able to escape. When the explosions died down and the ash fell to the ground, the guys near my position get wise to what's going on and start yelling at us.

East and West Red Spark are now cut off from each other. The only way out of here is by air. It's a good thing I have winged companions. Otherwise I would have locked myself in this most 'welcoming' place in the world. Alone with the raiders whose fellows, figuratively speaking, I had just ordered to be incinerated to hell. Yeah, that wasn't going to be a rosy prospect.

"Yee-ha!" I hear Ferris' shout over the radio. "I can smell fried even here!"

"Nice work," I say to Motley in response.

"Much obliged. Where are you located?"

"Third building to the left of the bridge, ninth floor."

Outside on the other side of the river, three hovering silhouettes emerge: Ferris, Motley, and Edge. After a while, they fly into the apartment, in which I sit fatigued in a cushioned chair. My wounds are not yet fully healed.

"You did a good job," I say, looking at my partners with a tired smile.

"Always glad to help," Ferris replies. "But we're almost out of ammunition for the anti-machine rifle. What do we do next?"

"Search for the chief's head. Any idea where to start?"

"Unfortunately, no."

"You need to be examined," the pegasus mutters, noticing the blood on my neck. She walks over to me. "Your blood..." there is a noticeable sense of concern in her voice.

"Yes, I was shot in the neck. The bullet stayed inside when I drank the healing potion. I didn't have time to pull it out because of the bleeding."

"Oh... It needs to be pulled out right away."

"Will you help?" I ask.

"Of course..." she mutters in surprise and starts digging through her saddlebags for medical supplies.

"I'll look around for now," Ferris begins, "and keep an eye on the raiders. The destruction of the bridge must worry them, for they have been cut off from the rest of the city—so they must run to their chief and resolve the issue."

"Oh, good idea!" I say, and the griffon and Edge leave me alone with the pegasus, who immediately begins injecting analgesics, cutting the wound, and pulling out the bullet.

Even with painkillers, the process is far from pleasant. It's not anesthesia after all. I think of Bluerise's wet body to somehow ease the wait while Motley is digging in my neck.

After completing the procedures, which seem to take forever, Motley sighs deeply and relieved.

"Thank you," I smile at her. "You helped me out."

"Uh-huh..." she mutters, processing the tools from my blood and putting them back in the bag.

"Where did you learn medicine like that?"

"In the Enclave, where else?"

"Well... I mean, what motivated you to do it?"

"The benefits of healing. What other motive do you need?"

"I see..."

The pegasus doesn't want to talk. Ferris and Edge won't be back anytime soon. We need something to occupy ourselves with... Oh. Knowledge is power. I will continue to improve my knowledge of teleportation, repair, and a barrier.

Motley lies on the couch and stares silently at the ceiling.

She is very difficult to talk to.

A few hours later, Ferris returns with his faithful eagle and information about the location of a certain 'Factory'. There, the raiders repair their weapons and take ammunition. They visit the place regularly. We should visit it, too, since we, especially me, never got around to it.

We move to this place on foot... hooves.

This part of the city has suffered the most. There are no cleverly twisted mazes here: almost everything is littered with huge amounts of concrete and bricks, so it's hard to get lost here. In addition, most of the raiders here are already ghouls. Though they are strong and dangerous, it's not too difficult to slip past them. They often attribute any strange noise or rustle to the clouds of their minds from taking large quantities of drugs.

Typical and naive raiders.

I once hid in the ruins of the South Vegas to deliver a bag of drugs to
Motor-Runner. I don't remember why I took it upon myself to help the Great Khans by working for them as a drug courier—apparently to get some friendly support. I'll have to look through my notes sometime, in case I left my thoughts on it somewhere.

In general, the Crater reminds me more of a huge version of the South Vegas. The leader? Check. Discipline? Check... That's funny.
Motor-Runner, along with the Fiends, was constantly pestering the NCR soldiers in the Camp McCarran, enclosed by high concrete walls. He somehow managed to organize them—not without the help of smaller bosses.

Now I have to take out the leader of the raiders in the Crater, which has caused problems for the Vanhoover families' caravans, particularly Waterfall. What an... interesting coincidence. It's no secret that it's all due to the leader. That's why he must be found. Of course, not for a heart-to-heart talk about friendship and mercy and drinking chamomile tea with oatmeal cookies.

It would surprise me even more if the leader of the Crater raider gangs, like Motor-Runner in the South Vegas, lived in some underground bunker...

***

After a certain amount of time, we get to the place near where the Factory is supposed to be. It's only now that I realize that we're walking into a trap: there are a shitload of raiders coming here on a regular basis!

We all take cover in a half-ruined restaurant. Thank fuck—it's as empty as a drugged-out raider's head, but there's a surviving viewing terrace on the roof. From there we analyze the terrain around the Factory.

As expected, there are more than a dozen raiders nearby. Rumors of the bridge collapse have reached these; they are aware of what this entails, they are nervous and frightened.

A wall of old transport debris, bits and pieces of sheet metal, and billboard fragments has been hastily installed around the factory grounds. All in all, it's a mess of everything imaginable. All this is patrolled by several raiders in heavy metal armor and with miniguns or heavy automatic rifles, and on the metal roof of the Factory itself, two raiders with sniper rifles watch the perimeter.

Other raiders must also be defended against.

"The New Features," Ferris says aloud, interrupting my musings.

"What?"

"The New Features", the dark griffon repeats, "is a branch of Ironshod Firearms. This company used to produce the latest weaponry. I once found a document that said that special upgraded equipment had been produced for The New Features. I always wanted to take a look at it. The plus side of this equipment was that this one factory could produce any type of firearm, from pistols to anti-machine rifles of its own making. In addition, the factory was fully automated. Now it's clear how the raiders keep the guns in good condition."

"If one factory produced many types of weapons and was automated, didn't that affect quality?" I ask skeptically. Such a variety of equipment in one factory. It must have had some effect on the weapon itself.

"Each piece created was tested for reliability, and even in front of the customer, if he so desired. I have never once seen any mention of substandard weapons manufactured here. The reviews were all positive. The factory had a small laboratory, which was constantly improving the equipment, expanding production capabilities, as well as creating new modifications of weapons. Thus produced not only standard weapons, but also modified counterparts. It was possible to ask to create anything under the request... This factory... these blueprints and technology... My soft spot..." the griffon whimpers pretendingly, sniffing his beak. I'm not that dramatic a fan of gunsmithing, but I'd love to see the equipment.

"Now I see," Motley begins, "where the raiders get their weapons in such good condition and so many rare specimens. But that raises another question: how were the raiders able to fix the hardware to set up production?"

"If the factory is automated," Ferris replies, "then it probably has an automated repair system."

"Even so," I object, "how did they manage to get the operating system of the whole factory's workbenches right? You'd need some knowledge of programming, which raiders don't usually have."

Although one Fiend in Mojave knew how to work the terminals and even knew how to program. Personally, I don't know anything about programming. Brisa used to do all that.

"No idea at all," Ferris replies, spreading his paws.

"You mentioned a robotic factory system. Does that mean there are a lot of combat robots and turrets?"

"Quite possibly," Ferris brings his claws to his beak and begins to ponder, occasionally glancing at the ruins. "It's a high-tech factory, after all. The other thing that interests me is: how did it manage to survive? Considering the megaspell fell relatively nearby."

"If there are security robots and turrets in the factory, you could use them in a wipeout of the raiders. The problem is, I don't know anything about programming. As far as I remember, none of us know anything about terminals. We'll have to do it the tried-and-true way—restart the robot guard's operating system. That would reset the system's targeting sensors to default, and it would attack everyone. That's when we could use 'Berry'..." I stare frustratedly at one point in front of me. "She's a professional hacker."

"She certainly couldn't get in here," Ferris says quietly. "Besides, I'm pretty good at programming, too."

"You've got to be kidding me," I say skeptically, waving a hoof.

"It's not like you've ever asked," the griffon smiles. "And I don't think you're the only one so mysterious."

Motley turns to me, "And what do you plan to do? Infiltrate the Factory and make the security system take out all the raiders?"

"Of course... of course," I smile. "How else? I'll activate stealth mode and infiltrate the Factory."

"You're in high spirits even now, when we're not at our best..." the beige pegasus mutters thoughtfully and somewhat impressed.

"That's a way to keep control of your emotions," I smile back at her. She only shakes her head softly, smiling weakly, as if looking at a naive fool.

Griffon says, "In case you haven't noticed, the factory entrance isn't the wooden doors of a run-down bar," he observes, looking through the scope of his anti-machine rifle. "You can't get through that easily."

"We'll figure it out now. Did you think of anything with the bridge? We did. We'll do a little trick here, too."

"We'll get in by the air," Motley says. "Like with the bridge."

"We'll get," Ferris says, "to the Factory by air, reprogram the robots, then what?"

"We wait until they snap all the raiders. If we're lucky, they might kill the leader, too. If he's not there, we keep looking.

Snipers on the roof are distracted by the panic below. Absolutely no discipline, not doing their duty to protect the airspace—which is to be expected from the raiders. The guards are trying to contain and pacify the crowd that periodically tries to break into the factory."

"We're all fucked!" the raider shouts at the top of her voice. "Let me in!"

One of the guards, a ghoul, shoots her in the head. The bullet goes straight through and nearly hits the stallion standing behind her.

"We'll fucking kill you ourselves if you panic. I repeat, the issue is being resolved. Stay here."

Great... no one notices in this noisy crowd as the two raiders on the roof are swept up by a griffon and a pegasus, wringing their necks.

This time the pegasus drags me along with all my equipment. The previous time we had to disarm completely because of the need to gain altitude. We needed maneuverability and lightness, but now it's enough to fly to the roof of the Factory. There I check the magazines of the raiders' sniper rifles. Only one of them contains ammunition for my Whispering Night.

We enter the building through the rooftop entrance.

The topmost floor turns out to be a small office with the standard boring interior, with several raiders standing with their backs to us. We quickly 'lull them' and immediately start inspecting the office, but we find nothing of interest: only office trash, damaged documents and reports.

There are only office rooms on the floor below, and apart from half a dozen raiders there is no one there. Having dealt with them by the tried-and-true method—hitting them from behind—after a while we find the director's office. In it stands the terminal, which, unfortunately, has been destroyed. There is also an abundance of file cabinets along the walls, a torn old couch, a couple of chairs by the window, a lot of paperwork on the tables, burnt documents, and useless fragments of contracts. No excesses, and no safes.

"It's just a mess," I say out loud in frustration.

"Did you think you'd find immeasurable treasure here?" the dark gray griffin asks ironically.

"It couldn't be otherwise. This is, after all, the office of the director of a notorious arms factory! There must be some sort of humble stash," I say, peering behind every piece of furniture or anything unusual. I walk over to the chair and try to move it to see what's under the table, but it doesn't move at all—it's nailed to the floor.

"Do you like the chair, or are you going to sell it for a certain amount of caps and so you want to take it with you?" Ferris asks in the same ironic tone.

Yes, I really want that chair: perhaps it might even bring good fortune and wealth? Or maybe world domination while I'm a greedy, crazy bastard with a face mask on my face?

"Yes," I answer. "I need it badly..."

In another attempt to move it or pull it off the floor with my telekinesis, I randomly lean the chair back, but it doesn't go any lower, no matter how hard I try. It is simply frozen in the tilted position, at which point I hear the wall behind me come into motion.

Whoa! And here comes the immeasurable treasure.

Ferris is a little surprised by my find, Motley only looks with interest at what the wall concealed behind it, and so am I, in fact.

"Wonderful..." I say frustratedly, staring blankly at the empty display case.

A small red stand for some kind of weapon, but no weapon itself. And above it are a couple more small wooden shelves, which are also empty.

"Undoubtedly," the pegasus agrees.

"By the director himself or by someone after the megaspells fell? That's the question," Ferris says wistfully, looking at the weapon stand.

"We'll never know the answer," I say, putting the chair back into position. The wall seals the empty display case behind it. "Okay, time to move on."

***

As we descend into the workshops, we scout out the robot control center. They, by the way, only patrol the area indoors, so they're easy to avoid. Slowly making our way through the factory and killing raiders along the way, we find this very 'reset switch'. During our tour, I see that the raiders are loading the very raw materials they found into some kind of special iron container that recycles junk. This raw material is used in production.

The factory's automatic security control center is in a well-locked area. Behind secure, magically enchanted metal doors.

These unusual locks. If it weren't for my meeting Greenkeys, I wouldn't have been able to open them. Her knowledge comes in handy. Since we haven't discovered any keys, we have to unlock the good locks by hand.

It takes about twenty minutes, but takes about a third of my internal magic—I'm not very good at picking enchanted locks yet.

It's such a solid defense... I'm impressed.

Ferris shuts down the factory's equipment and reprograms the robots to the best of his ability. They start killing everything alive, while we hide in the control center and keep our noses to ourselves. We wait for things to calm down, sitting in a room full of all sorts of consoles and computer systems. They make a distinctive humming sound as they work. Behind the walls I hear gunshots and horrible screams.

It's sickening to hear. I have to concentrate on something else...

This room, surprisingly, is not a mess, on the contrary: every wire is neatly stacked with others of the same kind and just as neatly connected wherever it needs to be, pulling a thin strand out of the common thread. Everything here is extremely neat, and it even seems clear what is responsible for what.

There's also a terminal here, which holds all the blueprints of the weapons and modifications of this company. Naturally, with all that protection on the doors. It's strange that there's no security on the terminals—or that they've already been hacked into by whoever set up the production.

So it won't go to waste, I'm copying all the blueprints into Pip-Boy, to see if they'll be of any use to anyone. Ferris told me to do that. He says that the schematics of these weapons will be worth a lot, as half of them are rare models that are very difficult to recreate. Plus, in addition to the blueprints and equipment documentation, there are blueprints of the unique equivalents that caused this weapon creation feature to exist. According to the griffon, this information can be useful to both the Steel Rangers and the masters of Vanhoover and, of course, to himself.

And I need to do it quickly, because the blueprints have all but filled my Pip-Boy's memory.

About ten minutes passed, and the shooting has practically stopped, and the screaming has stopped. Because of the turmoil inside, the crowd outside finally panicked, trying to break into the factory, and the guards started shooting, after which the survivors themselves went inside and... were shot by robots. It's all quiet now. All that can be heard is the robots moving through the corridors, announcing to the void in their mechanical voices that the elimination of the intruders is complete.

Wow, the elimination of the intruders! Couldn't they have just escorted the unwelcome individuals out the door? I sometimes wonder at the pre-war views on defense—I mean, the robots could have killed anyone who entered this factory, even a foal. Well, there's nothing I can do about it: both here and in my world, countries were at war with each other, forcing extreme precautions, security and keeping their secrets. Total paranoia, propaganda and the like. And corporations have always been just as worried about their secrets as countries.

Having turned off the guards, we try to find the leader, or at least his corpse, but half an hour of searching ends without any results.

Unfortunately, the factory's laboratory is destroyed. It is located on the side where the megaspell shockwave struck. The lab was well fortified, but it was not meant to withstand this. It did not survive the explosion, but I must give it credit: it took the full force of the shock wave upon itself. But unfortunately, radiation is notoriously difficult to stop, which is why most of the workshop—and the factory in general—emits a decent amount of it. I've had to avoid dangerous places in the factory, which would have been an impossible task without the available anti-radiation drugs.

On the other hand, I am finally replenishing my ammunition. I have more than enough for a few days—without the constant fighting. Unfortunately, I still haven't found the necessary spark batteries for my Pushy. They have been used up for a very long time.

While searching, we discover a basement and an elevator leading somewhere underground... Something is coming up.

We take it down to the very bottom, the only level it can go to. From the elevator we emerge into a square wide corridor with concrete walls and a ceiling supported in two rows by cylindrical gray columns. At the end is something I wasn't expecting to see—a huge massive gear-shaped door with the huge yellow numbers '61' on it.

Well... it did coincide with my world, after all. And here the head of the raiders is highly likely to live inside a huge bunker... a Stable.

"Mother of my eagle! It's a Stable!" the griffon yells in amazement. Edge, on his master's back, excitedly shrieks in support of his master. Or that the griffon himself shouts almost like an eagle, so he supports him for company.

"I can see without you," I say in a shocked voice.

We approach an enormous door in the shape of a gear wheel. From inside we hear the distinctive sounds of equipment in operation. So the Stable is in good working condition, and that's a good thing... or is that a bad thing? I doubt there are any more living inhabitants of the underground closet Stable-Tec, which, in turn, loved social experiments on living ponies.

I walk over to the console and press the open button. The door opens. I am surprised by the lack of a lock. I have a bad feeling about this.

We barely cross the threshold of the Stable as.

"Who the fuck is in there!" is heard in the raider's arrogant and self-assured gruff voice. A ghoul. When he sees us, he's stunned, but after a few seconds he picks himself up and speaks gruffly again, preparing to fire from his combat saddle.

Ferris outpaces me. He pulls out the Stone Eagle and fires at the ghoul raider's head.

The next minute, a group of ghoul raiders with flamethrowers, led by the most ambitious one, show up from around the next corner and immediately fire a bright blast of fire at us.

Fuck!

I instinctively raise a magical barrier in front of us. The hot jet of fire crashes into the magical 'wall', spreading out in all directions.

Ferris and Motley fly up to the ceiling and rain lead on the flamethrowers.

"Almost got hot at the banquet," Ferris says.

I can feel it in my ass that this is the Stable where the raiders' roots have sprouted, spreading all over Red Spark. It's time to dig them up and burn them down, and the Waterfall family will have an easier life. Or at least their caravans would.

We enter the atrium. Our tremendous appearance draws the attention of the three 'confident' raiders who are there. None of them are ghouls, and each has a hell of a lot of rare weaponry—which is what the word 'confident' meant.

One wears heavy metal armor, lightweight power armor; his armament is a large minigun and an automatic rapid-fire grenade launcher.

Oh, wow. I wouldn't want to face him alone without a place to hide. Almost like Billy the Bulldozer.

The second one wears reinforced combat armor and her weapons are two black submachine guns, each with a silencer and a laser sight.

Is this some sort of raider special forces officer?

The third raider is dressed in dark gray armor with a black cape and hood. His weapon has a familiar shape; it looks remotely like a combat rifle, which was the most common among NCR soldiers. It also looks like a standard automatic carbine. Oh, he has pretty good equipment.

In addition, all three raiders wear PipBucks.

Wonderful! That's just superb! The only thing missing is a fire-breathing dragon.

The raiders notice our, as I mentioned earlier, epic arrival: immediately they pull out their menacing guns and aim them at us. We quickly crouch down, and just in time, we almost get hit by gunfire. Being on the second tier of the Atrium, we have a slight advantage over the raiders below. After firing a few unsuccessful shots at us, they stop firing and split up.

"Guys, things are shit," I say quietly. "They're going to surround us."

"Don't worry, we'll get through," Ferris tries to cheer us up. How that sounds like me.

"I'm taking the raider with two SG," the pegasus informs us.

"I take that charming behemoth," Ferris says confidently.

"Then I take the one with the hood and the cape," I sigh. I hope his weapon doesn't take me out the first time. "Scatter!" I say, and we spread out across the Atrium in different directions.

I run to the right, trying not to give the raider a chance to aim at me with the spell in PipBuck.

The rapid-fire rate of his weapon is unusually high, but does it sound like some kind of shotgun? What diabolical hybrid? Even my beloved riot shotgun is no match for the rapid-fire rate. If he fired an automatic volley at me, I'd be a mess; no amount of armor could save me from that much shot in such a short period of time, and at point-blank range.

"Where are you, meat loaf!" the raider with the rapid-fire shotgun yells.

Damn, I wish I had some grenades right now. I can't stick my head out, or he'll activate the aiming spell, and I'm fucked. I have to pick the right moment to attack.

"Show yourself, and I'll kill you fast," the raider sweetly mutters.

He makes the mistake of getting close to the balcony and to my cover. This is the moment!

I draw my sword and, flying over the metal railing, jump onto him, but he notices my heroic fall and manages to dodge. So I almost break my legs from surprise when I land.

Shit...

Good thing I was able to regroup in time.

Distracted by hitting the hard concrete floor of the Stable with my hooves, the raider tries to use telekinesis to immobilize me, but thanks to the telekinesis-protective necklace from the where the Princess Luna Information Center, he fails. He bewilderedly punches me in the head with the buttstock, and with such force that it leaves a dent in my helmet. The jolt makes my head buzz, and I fall over. The hooded raider looms over me, pointing the barrel at me.

"Do you want to suck it?" he mutters in a mocking tone.

With eloquent silence, I move to action.

I magically push the automatic shotgun to the side, and immediately a shot rang out...

That was fucking close!

I try to use telekinesis to immobilize him, and... I find that he's also telekinesis immune.

I have to throw the raider away with my hind hooves. Just as I reach for my revolver, my opponent fires a precise shot at it, destroying it.

Good thing it's not that silver magnum from a friend. In fact, I have no human weapons with me except my sword and Pushy. Everything was left in Heavenly Harbor.

Doing a roll, I telekinesis my sword. Jumping to my hooves, I throw the sword at the raider. He manages to shoot before he can dodge. His shot hits my front leg near the knee. Luckily he doesn't get all the shot, breaking off a piece of armor and partially wounding me.

Dangerous! I almost lose my concentration because of the pain. His fucking aiming spell!

Deftly pulling out Billy's sawed-off shotgun, I aim it at the raider's head. Taking the shot, I don't hit it, as the damn raider turns his head sideways in time. Since there's no time to reload, I throw the shotgun at my enemy for a distraction. He catches the thrown weapon in his telekinetic grip, and I run at him and knock him off his hooves.

The unicorn throws me off with its hind hooves. I don't fly as far away as my opponent had planned. As soon as I get up, he aims his devilish automatic shotgun at me, and I use a spell and teleport behind him.

A moment longer and it would have been too late.

As he tries to turn around, I pull out Whispering Night with its shortened barrel, turn on the VATS, and without the slightest hesitation shoot him several times in the head. His brains turn into a red mess, his body falls dead to the floor. The blood from his neck slowly spills out onto the cold floor.

That prick gave me a good thrashing.

After killing the raider, I was about to inspect the extraordinary shotgun, but immediately I receive a round from two submachine guns. About a third of the bullets pierce through the armor and hurt my soft tissues. If the raider had been closer, the spread would have been less, and therefore more lead in my body.

Shit!

The pain almost makes me lose my concentration. Turning toward the raider and aiming Whispering Night at her, I fire half the clip due to surprise. Half goes past, and half catches up to her: one of the bullets hits her right in the head. Finally.

I grab my wounded side, focus my telekinesis, and, gritting my teeth, pull the bullets out, then pull out a bottle of healing potion and drink it. Staggering, I head toward the raider's corpse. Motley, on the other hand, was supposed to kill this walking problem, now dead. Wait. Oh, really?

No, no, no, no! Not again. Please... Please...

I walk as fast as I can, but the pain in my side and in my leg, which refuses to go anywhere, almost makes me fall. I see another body behind the raider's corpse, lying motionless next to the steps to the second level of the Atrium...

Motley!

Shit!

Shit!

I get to her body after all. Her chest rises and falls slowly. She's breathing. Slowly, weakly, but she's alive...

I sigh in relief and sink wearily onto my rump.

Motley's armor is damaged in many places, bleeding everywhere. The beige face is all bruised from the beating. Apparently that raider wasn't such a weak hoof fighter if she could beat Motley. Before I shot at the raider, though, I saw that her face was also covered in bruises, and she was also missing one eye, and her armor was in even worse condition.

Motley's face was covered in many injuries, and her cheek had been hit by several bullets. Had it not been for her catlike agility, she would have lost her head. Her right wing is badly damaged by bullets and is bleeding. The other wing looks a little bruised, but it is intact.

She needs immediate treatment and stabilization. I can't do without medication, but I need specialized tools.

I will have to work with what little magic I have left. I'm running out... I'm almost on the verge of burning out. I must use some of my medicine to stabilize her and get her to the medical block, which is supposed to be near the Atrium. Her wounds must be treated before it's too late.

Shots and rocket-propelled grenades can be heard in the vicinity. Ferris and Edge are still fighting, which means they're alive. That can't help but feel good.

After dragging Motley into the infirmary, I carefully place her unconscious body on the operating table. After making sure that her condition is not worsening, I take one pill of mint-als. This is necessary for better concentration and to minimize mistakes during treatment. The low level of magic also affects rational thinking.

Everything around me becomes clearer, concentration improves, and it becomes much easier to think. Now I know exactly what I need to do...

Carefully removing the pegasus' armor, I see that bruises and abrasions abound on her body underneath. It's not unusual for me to operate on physical wounds, and it's even easier underneath the mint-als.

My father and then Brisa taught me how to operate with medical instruments to treat bullet and tearing wounds. Not to forget Arcade, who also showed me several techniques and ways of using medical knowledge. The only thing I didn't know about was how to behave when treating wings. Exactly until Motley showed and told me about the structure of pegasus wings when I was treating her while moving through the Crater.

During Motley's surgery, a slightly shabby and wounded Ferris walks in, with a battle-weary eagle also sitting on his back. The pet shows almost no sign of wounds.

"How is my most beloved pair doing?" the griffon asks, breathing heavily.

"Motley was badly wounded, she lost consciousness. Her condition is stable now. She should regain consciousness soon. And what took you so long, my dear? Where have you been?"

"Running... After I had barely put down that goon in the great dining room, a dozen well-armed ghouls came running up to me. I had to work up a sweat to keep them from getting past me. You heard that big rumble, didn't you?"

"Yes," I answer. As I was self-medicating, I heard and even felt through the shaking walls and floor a violent explosion. "Was that you?"

"If it was me, I wouldn't be here now. I hit my rifle right in the stock for that behemoth's automatic grenade launcher. The explosion took the lives of about half the raiders in the vicinity. I finished off the rest with my rifle. I had to try pretty hard to keep them from trying to come at you."

"Guess I'll have to thank you. Otherwise we'd all be screwed," I grin, turning to the griffon. I look him over again. "Don't you need a treatment? I've almost got Motley patched up."

"No, doc, thanks. I can take out a few bullets myself somehow. I'm a tough nut to crack. By the way, I've seen your abilities as a medic more than once: are you a professional repairman not only of technology, but of living flesh as well?"

"No, I'm not. I can only treat some combat wounds and injuries. Mostly practiced on myself when I traveled the Wasteland alone. The basic knowledge base of healing was given by my father and close friends."

In silence and concentration I continue to operate on the beige patient.

"That's it," I say after ten minutes, "done. Motley will soon recover, while I gather up some of my gear I dropped in the Atrium. You keep an eye on Motley, okay?"

"No problem," the griffon replies. "I won't let any stallion near her."

I roll my eyes.

I don't deny that Motley is attractive, that her smooth body movements enchant me, but—nothing more. I'm not looking for a relationship. Plus, she's moody. I don't like moody and joyless girls or mares.

At this point, the effects of mint-als wear off. The withdrawal from such a brain-affecting drug is not easy, but I got used to it a long time ago, although the oppressive mood due to the loss of... clarity of what's going on will have to be endured. The main thing is to concentrate on something neutral. Keep myself busy with something and not think about what I'm feeling.

I head to the Atrium to gather my gear, and the first thing I do is walk up to the corpse of the raider who had an unusual shotgun.

What a lovely weapon...

***

"Oh..."

My head... Pain...

"Where am I...?"

I can't see anything in front of my eyes... Ah, wait. Something clears up... I see concrete walls. The walls of a Vault. A Stable...

"Rise and shine," I hear the mare's distorted voice. Distorted by the helmet speaker, I suppose. "You've been out for a long time."

I try to look around more closely.

The creature... sits at a chair by the table in the center. It's wearing grim and somewhat terrifying black armor, covered like chitin; its tail looks like a scorpion's. The helmet is no less intimidating—shaped like the snout of an insect. Yellow faceted lenses.

So similar to... Enclave?!

What I see immediately invigorates me. I almost choke on the clarity of what's happening.

For fuck's sake! What's the Enclave doing here? Are they involved in this?!

I have to get up and...

I discover I'm tied up and I have a black ring on my horn—it's probably what's keeping me from using magic.

"Who are you, anyway?" I moan, still feeling the painful buzzing in my head.

"It doesn't matter who I am. All that matters is that you're the reason everything's gone to shit, the raiders are ready to kill each other because they panic, thinking they can't get out of here. A fitting fate for them, though... And I would also advise you not to move. For your own safety, sweetie."

I see a couple of land mines underneath me. Couldn't be better.

"So why... Wait. You're the leader of the raiders?" I ask in amazement.

She's the leader of the Crater raiders?! Oh, right, I forgot that in this world, ponies are dominated by females. More surprised by the Enclave's armor.

"Guessed that, huh? I'd have already given you over to the joy of that panicky scum that so desires your meat and your ass, but I need a hostage so I don't get fucked up by your partner, the griffon who has managed to take out so many experienced... Soldiers? Yeah, I guess that'll do," she taps her hooves against each other, apparently pondering something.

"So, I'm bait, then?" I ask, glancing at the Atrium.

"Right, right. And in doing so, if you don't twitch or make attempts to escape, I will kill you personally. Maybe... Or you'll be my pleasure toy when I get out of here."

"Where did you get that armor?"

Silly question, of course, but still. What else am I supposed to do in this situation?

"This?" I hear the mare sigh irritably. "My armor. It's taking you a long time to figure it out, you moron."

"And how..."

Motley and Ferris burst into the cabinet. The pegasus is in ragged and still bloodstained armor, and the dark gray griffon is with his pet.

"Deigned to appear," the mare in insect-like armor says. Motley is dazed after her phrase. "Well, shall we bargain, or will you still listen to my terms?"

"Went looking for you after an hour of your absence," Ferris tells me with a smile. Then he turns to the power-armored mare and says in a threatening tone, pointing the Stone Eagle at her, "Let him go. You're the only one here, and we shot almost all your buddies along the way."

"Why should I let him go?" the mare asks woozily and freely. "Make an extra move and your friend will go up in flames, his ass flying right over his head. If you try to remove him, there will be an explosion; if you make an unnecessary movement, I'll activate the detonator," the mare shows the item, twirling it in her hooves. "It seems pretty clear that I'm ordering the music."

"What do you want?" the griffon frowns.

"To capture you and give you to the raiders for amusement. They're especially fond of pegasi," she looks at Motley in her helmet. "Why would I leave you alive? You'd make fine soldiers in my army, but we have very different perspectives on the future. Besides, our relationship is hopelessly damaged."

Ferris snorts at that.

"V-violet?" Motley's trembling voice comes.

Suddenly there is a sepulchral silence. Upon hearing the name, the armored mare falls into a numbness, just as Motley did when she heard her voice, as she is completely silent and unmoving.

"M-motley?!" there is a sense of surprise in her voice, which changes to anger and rage.

They know each other from the voice...

"You're alive?!" the two pegasi say, almost simultaneously. One of them is only stunned by the encounter, while the other radiates a fierce anger, which, if given free choice, will burn everything to the ground, like an explosion of megaspells.

"Traitor!" Violet shouts almost immediately, and pounces on Motley.

My pegasus doesn't immediately respond, as she's not in the right state both physically, due to her recent injury, and mentally, judging by her reaction.

"This is all because of you!"

Motley misses a punch or two, but is soon overpowered by Violet. Compared to Motley, the black-armored pegasus makes a hoof fighter out of me like a dancer. Our pegasus presses Violet against the cold floor of the Stable.

I put my head down... Realizing as I watch such a drastic change of scenery, I completely forget that I'm tied up and surrounded by explosives.

"I... I thought... you died," Motley says with heavy breathing, holding the leader to the floor.

For Motley, it was clearly something near and familiar.

"I thought so, too."

"How did you..."

"I got grabbed by passing fucking raiders the other day! Let me go! I'll kill you, bitch!"

Violet screams angrily and tries to break free from Motley's hold, but Motley confidently holds her back.

"You're the reason this all happened," Violet screams, as if these are words she's been running through her head for months, and now they've finally broken free. "You're the reason I'm here! Because of you! You! You're the reason this fucking nightmare happened to me!"

Motley doesn't know what to answer. She is shocked by the encounter.

Ferris uses the moment to disarm the mines and untie me. Having done so, he hands me Billy's sawed-off shotgun.

How timely.

I'm lucky that Violet and Motley happen to know each other, causing the leader of the raiders to be distracted.

"Who is she?" I ask Motley, holding Violet to the floor.

"She was a member of my squad," Motley replies. Ferris points his Stone Eagle at Violet.

"The squad is fucked because of that whore! She did it to us!" Violet says, pointing with a twist of her head at Motley.

I look up at my pegasus in confusion. It's hard for me to know what she's feeling right now, because of the helmet hiding her eyes, but I can see from her pressed lips that she's ready to cry.

What happened a year ago, after all? The fight in which the Enclave was involved. It would be more accurate to say the fight was between the Enclave soldiers. Motley and Violet were in it...

"Let her go, Motley, I've got her in my sights," Ferris says. I join in and point Billy's loaded shotgun at her.

Motley lets go of the pegasus. Violet stands up and removes her helmet. Showing us her purple-colored fur on her face and her dirty, crumpled yellow mane in places. Her face is covered in scars, and there is anger blazing in her eyes with bags underneath, all the power of which is directed at Motley.

"How did you get here?" I ask, looking into those anger-filled eyes. I suspect there is a lot of pain and suffering behind that anger. It couldn't be any other way. I can imagine what she's been through.

"I told you I was brought in by those shitheads! I don't want to remember what those assholes did to me. Just kill me and be done with it. That way you put me out of my misery. Go ahead, shoot!" she turns exactly to me and drops to her front knees in front of me, resting her forehead against the barrel of the shotgun.

"Are you so eager to die?" I ask in surprise.

"That's why you came here, isn't it? You fucked up the main bridge between East and West Red Spark. Put down a bunch of ponies, some of whom once had families until they had to leave Vanhoover. Families, Prince, Kings... They all deserve to die for what they've done to them. And they fear us, for we have become an organized family through my knowledge of military science. You must rid the so-called masters of Vanhoover of this fear by killing me."

"Why in the world would you want to protect the interests of the raiders?"

"I don't care about them. They're just a product of this fucking Wasteland and Vanhoover in particular. I wanted them to finally kill each other so the Enclave wouldn't have to dirty its hooves in their blood. Everyone deserves to die equally."

"Why?"

"All they do is eat, shit, and fuck. In Vanhoover do the same thing, but with rules, and they want to take over the world. Parasites. I don't care about anybody. I'm loyal to the Enclave, even when he turned his back on me, because I've become that parasite. A raider. Because of that fucking cunt!" She glances at the beige pegasus out of the corner of her eye. "You see what your actions have brought you to? You're responsible for torturing me! You're responsible for me being here!" Motley lowers her head. A glistening tear runs down her cheeks from under the top of her helmet. "You've ruined life for all of us..."

"What the hell happened between you two?" I ask irritably.

Violet is definitely telling us all this in order to hurt Motley.

"She betrayed her own squad! She's a murderer! I thought the bitch was dead myself, but it turns out she isn't... Traitors always survive!"

"I shouldn't have been followed!" Motley says in an angry and broken voice.

"You killed an important pegasus and tried to smear him, thus screwing up our squad!" Violet shouts. "And then you got rid of us! You impulsive bitch!"

Motley puts his head down completely. There's a sepulchral silence all around, and I hear a few drops falling to the floor.

"Tears won't solve anything anymore, so you bitch would have to die in agony. And you..." Violet turns to me. "Go ahead, kill me... No, let Motley do it. Let her finish what she started," Violet says it as if she's cutting into Motley's soul.

Every word Violet says makes my companion shudder.

"I... Uh..." Motley mutters frantically, sobbing.

"You never believed in the Enclave and its good purpose. You never trusted his justice!"

"He was guilty..."

"No shit like that! He was acquitted, but you were not satisfied with that! And you killed him with all the brutality of a raider! You're no squad captain. Controlling emotions is one of the most important qualities of an officer. Even I was able to endure all the torment and humiliation from the raiders and managed to control them. And you, because of your fucking distrust, tortured him like the raiders tortured me. Pathetic shit..."

Violet turns to me.

"Come on, finish me off! Well, what are you waiting for? Just pull the fucking trigger and be done with it! Of course you'd prefer to kill me, because otherwise I'd be sure to get to the traitor and make her suffer. I would make her go through everything I went through!"

"There is no other way, is there?" I ask with a sigh.

"Well, you sure are a fabulous dickhead," she laughs shrilly and loudly. A dismissive and condescending laugh, as if I were a child who said that friendship would solve any problem.

"What did you believe?"

"I believe that sooner or later the Enclave will return to Equestria, put it out of its misery, restore it. Cleanse it. Cleanse it of horny slave masters and raiders. Give it a noble purpose! To rebuild the country. But this traitor never believed that. She thought the Enclave was hypocritical, mixed it up with shit, despised it, threw accusations at it. It disgusts me to even think about it. I tolerated her because she was following orders, but she didn't care about the ideals of the higher officers of the Enclave or the future of the country, she was only interested in her paycheck, her personal gain. No wonder how, with such views on life, she could easily turn her back on her fellows, much less her lover! Rare scum!"

I look at Motley. She sobs softly. Then, slowly and staggering, she walks out of the office. Is any of this true? It would be worth asking Motley. Violet is a firm believer in the Enclave; nothing will change her now.

"I was hoping," the leader says, looking at the walking pony, "that my captain would kill me. I'm sick of this comedy. There's no point in talking anymore. She's gone. It's time to bring down the curtain."

"So what happened between you two?" I ask almost at a loss.

"You'll have to ask her yourself," Violet grins even harder. "You'll find out she's an uncontrollable bitch who's only interested in personal gain. Go ahead and kill me. I'm still a raider, no matter what my past may be. One less parasite in the Wasteland."

One less parasite, said Bubblegum, as I stared at Lilac Journey's lifeless body.

A shock of anger is coursing through my body.

A gunshot rumbles. Violet's head explodes with blood-red debris and blood splatter, and her body falls on its side.

I stare at the smoking barrel of the shotgun, seeing Celestia's silhouette on it.

The anger fades as quickly as it appeared.

I... must have twitched from the sudden flash of anger, magically pulling the trigger. That's not good. I have to control myself. Be cool in my actions, not give in to emotional impulses.

"There's fun in the Enclave..." Ferris mutters, lowering the barrel of the Stone Eagle.

"Now you know for a fact that Motley was in the Enclave. Don't you trust her?"

"I don't know. Motley didn't try to justify herself... So there were grains of truth in Violet's words. But I don't want to find out what she said wasn't worth a rotten egg. It's up to you."

What had that pegasus done that was acquitted? Was he really guilty? Or had Motley mistakenly deemed him guilty by circumstantial evidence? Why did she show him, as Violet says, raiding cruelty?

And then she also killed the beloved. How I understand how she feels... too well understand.

***

I study the Overmare terminal, which turns out to contain a huge amount of useful information, but not about this Stable. A jumble of Violet's notes and the maps she's made show detailed markings of the ruins of the city and its surroundings: the relatively surviving prewar factories, all sorts of underground tracks, the standard location of notable lone-wolf raiders, gangs, and so on.

Violet wasted no time.

The maps marked the possible passages and locations of about a hundred raider gangs from a couple of ponies to a dozen, and the number of loners, of which Violet estimated at least two hundred. At least the ones she could find. She determined their strength and sanity.

The raiders were already scattered, and Violet was trying to fortify the weak points in the city... She hadn't had time to get to the northern parts of the city through which we started our infiltration. Also, controlling the raiders is extremely difficult. They don't leave the borders of Red Spark very often because of the risk of being attacked by the masters of Vanhoover, and they satisfy their urge for brutality and aggression on each other. The sane ones are extremely few. They are usually Vanhoover refugees and ghouls.

Violet gathered all she could muster around her. Took over the Factory and the Stable, which were shared by many different gangs, and supplied weapons, ammunition, and quality drugs to anyone who would listen to her. Organized groups of several gangs and loners who attacked the mines and farms of the Vanhoover families. The Waterfall family was the priority, and Steelmane whenever possible.

The Factory supplied weapons, Stable, thanks to the cartridge press, ammunition, and the unidentified source supplied quality drugs, clothing, and some technology.

The unidentified source piqued my interest. A stranger in odd outfit like a messenger or courier, tracked down Violet and handed her an offer. As a sign of goodwill, the first shipment of items the raiders could not get or make themselves was free. The raiders will have to attack the Waterfall farms and occasionally shoot at the Steelmane mines. The shipment consists of three crates and was supplied for each attack, even an unsuccessful one. One crate contained quality drugs, the second contained restored prewar technology like tools and consumer electronics, and the third contained clothing and miscellaneous jewelry. The crates were delivered by transport and cargo robots. They were followed only by a mysterious pony courier.

What surprised Violet was not that someone from Vanhoover was using the raiders for his own purposes, but how the stranger was able to find her. He was fully clothed in a grayish-black outfit with a cape of the same color. His head was hidden beneath a tight headdress, and a frightening mask hid his face.

The mask gave her the creeps, Violet described: there was something about it that made her fear for her life. The white mask looked ragged and cracked in some places, any pattern or markings resembling nostrils or mouths missing... only the cutouts for the eyes. It was that they caused the most unsettling fear. The shadow easily concealed the presence of the pupils, making the 'eyes' appear empty and black, in addition to the area around the cutouts covered in black, which gradually dissipated as they moved further away, creating the illusion that there was no clear distinction between the eyes and the rest of the mask. It was as if a boundless and all-consuming emptiness was emanating from there.

Violet had the feeling that this emptiness was about to consume first the stranger's face, his body... and then everything around him, including herself. He himself did not utter a word or sound, as if he really had no mouth. Throughout the meeting he was mute and silent... a creature from the afterlife, a ghost. He made an indelible impression on her, a panic-stricken terror. She had barely managed to control her emotions at the moment of his first appearance.

And she didn't want to refuse. She was already eager to bring the raiders and the masters against each other so that they would kill each other. So this order matched her plans.

Who was this mysterious stranger? Who does he work for? Who is it that profits from the Waterfall family's troubles? We'll have to think about that later...

I activate a secret passageway in the terminal, like the one at Stable 44, but the Overmare's code has already been broken. Not a good sign.

After opening the secret passage, I go downstairs with Ferris. There's also a small room, like the one in Stable 44, where I and the Steel Rangers found the first key card. When I open the safe, all I see inside is emptiness and nothing else. Not even a single document.

We return to the office with empty hooves and paws.

Did Violet take the key card? I try to sort her notes by keyword. Certainly there were mentions of Project Dome, but Violet thought it was a prewar myth to distract the zebra secret service, and nothing more. So she wasn't the one behind cracking the code to the secret passageway where the key card was kept. Strange. Had Stable's former Overmare discovered it?

On the other side of the window on the Atrium, Motley is leaning against the railing, looking down with an empty, lifeless gaze. Her eyes are as apathetic and sad as they were when we first met. I've had a hard time getting her to talk into a distracted dialogue before... I don't think I can do it now. Most likely, she wants to be alone. I won't disturb her.

I shake my head, pushing away thoughts of the past, and turn away from the window into the Atrium.

Ferris and I carefully look around the office for the key card, just in case, but before I do, I download all the information from the terminal to a separate PipBuck that Ferris found in the Stable. My PipBoy's memory is already filled with blueprints of weapons and workbenches. Of the tangible items, I find a dark orange plasma rifle in one of the lockers, and a fair number of spark batteries in the drawers underneath it. We give it all to Motley. However, she's clearly not in the mood for it right now...

I study the map of the present Red Spark, with all the available sewer passages and labyrinths, again and for a bit longer. These lists and maps will be of great help to both the Steel Rangers and the Vanhoover masters: with this information, the raiders can be dealt a serious blow, and they will no longer pose a threat. The map and lists were constantly updated—Violet kept a close eye on what was going on in the ruins. While the information was still current, it should be sold quickly to the Vanhoover masters and given to the Steel Rangers.

Speaking of the Steel Rangers. Iron Willford asked me to get two technologies, including the power armor of the Enclave. I'll give him Violet's armor. It's pretty ragged, but it's in working condition since Violet's used it. For one of the technologies I'm promised a reward in the form of the book of repair spells.

I'll be able to do even more amazing things with magic! Yay!

All that's left to do is take off my armor... I hope Motley won't mind me taking her former partner's armor?

As the armor is being removed, Motley walks in and sees what I'm doing. It makes me want to fall under the ground. I turn to her feeling like I've been caught doing something dirty.

"I need some Enclave power armor for the Steel Ranger scribe, you don't mind, do you?" I ask, embarrassed, scratching my rump with my hoof.

Naturally, the timing is wrong: I killed her teammate, and now I'm taking the murdered one's things. A member of my partner's squad is dead, and I'm thinking with excitement about repair spells. That's great, that's just great, Daniel. I feel like a creep.

"Take it if you want it," the pegasus replies indifferently. She says it in a tone that immediately makes me not want to take the armor. "Just don't leave her dead body here."

"I'll burn her body?" I say uncertainly, actually asking her permission.

"All right," she replies quietly and calmly.

Seeing her so depressed suddenly makes me want to hug her tight and say something encouraging. The thing is, I don't know exactly what to say.

"Motley..." I start, but she immediately interrupts me.

"Do whatever you want. I don't care."

She tries to treat everything with apathy. Apparently some kind of defensive reaction to what happened. Sometimes it's better for the psyche to deny the relevance of what's going on.

"You're not taking Violet's personal belongings?"

"Just the badge."

"And her plasma rifle? It's in the closet," I say, gesturing my head toward the closet.

Motley slowly walks over to the cabinet and opens it. She looks at the contents of the cabinet without saying anything or moving. This goes on for about half a minute. Then she breaks the moment of silence. Ferris and Agee aren't here, they've gone somewhere in the depths of the Stall.

"This," Motley says quietly, "is Typhoon, a special kind of plasma rifle—it has increased rate of fire and reduced spark battery power. We all chipped in and bought this rifle as a birthday present for Violet... I was the initiator, as I wanted to connect with her, but no matter what I did, she saw a catch in it."

Motley, without another word, takes Typhoon along with the ammunition and approaches Violet's body. She stands for a while, staring blankly at the decapitated corpse, picks up her personal badge, holding back gusts of vomit, and turns to see no more of the mutilated head. She stares at the bloody badge for a few seconds, and then, with a heavy sigh, she places it in her saddlebag.

For some reason I think she's starting to hate me, but she hides it behind a mask of apathy.

"Are we done here?" she asks without looking.

How disgusted I am.

"Yes. Let's take her body to the nearest disposer and leave this place."

I look over the map of Stable 61 in Violet's terminal, looking for the disposer. Still, unfortunately, all the previous information has been deleted—I'm left wondering what happened to the inhabitants of this Stable.

"Daniel," Ferris interrupts me as he walks into the office, "I know how fascinating it is to read someone's diaries, especially those of the mares, but Fate and Time are best not tested."

I find the location of the waste disposal facility and head there with Motley to burn Violet Ardor's body. Once we place the pegasus' body in the disposer and get it running, I ask my partner, "Are you all right?"

Motley doesn't answer anything, just stares silently at the process of burning her dead friend.

Shit... What a stupid question. She's obviously not okay.

I don't ask her anything else. We sit in silence for a while, and after the burning process is complete, we go back up to the Atrium. Motley sits, thinking something of his own accord, waiting for me to finish fiddling with my gear scattered around the Atrium and the medical bay.

After quickly gathering my gear, I walk over to the body of the pony with the unusual shotgun. My spare PipBuck, scanning this raider's gear, reveals that his stone-colored armor is in decent condition and has about the same degree of protection against physical damage as mine. Underneath the armor plates are high-tech polymers that give the armor moderate resistance to radiation and high and low temperatures.

These polymers make it less cold in the bitter cold, especially here in Vanhoover. Among other things, the armor also has some kind of magical protection, but not much, judging by PipBuck's analysis.

This kind of magical protection means that the chance of being disintegrated or damaged by a strong magical spell is slightly reduced, which is good, because being vaporized or turned into a viscous substance is clearly not in my plans.

The armor is less vulnerable to the damage left by volleys of energy-magic weapons. On top of all that, on inspection I notice that the armor has some sort of special generator, but for some unknown reason it's missing.

PipBuck marks it as Nightwatch.

I remove Nightwatch from the raider's body and put it on myself, only throwing away the black hooded cape. My cape with the ace of spades and the number '21' is better.

My client has ammunition for his rapid-fire shotgun, a few hundred caps, a couple of bottles of strong healing potion, a couple of packs of RadAway, and RadSafe in his gear.

Once I've gripped everything I can spare with my hooves, I head for the unusual shotgun I've spotted. I inspect it. The shotgun is almost all matte black, its ivory-white buttstock adorned with patterns of black that resemble rose petals. The barrel is marked on opposite sides with large gold letters that read, 'Defender'.

On the outside, the shotgun resembles a large-sized combat rifle. Almost the entire body is one piece. The shotgun itself is in perfect condition. When I picked it up, I could literally feel that it was radiating magic.

It comes the turn of the unicorn that almost sent Motley and me to the other world. Her two black submachine guns with silencer modifications look exquisite. At a glance, you can see that they are assembled from fairly rare and high quality parts that improve basic performance over their unmodified counterparts. In other words, they are far superior to their standard models in terms of performance. Despite the fact that they are identical in appearance, each has its own name Ascension and Downfall, but they do not differ from each other in any way.

The bags and pockets were full of bullets for submachine guns, seventy-five of them, two bags of screw, a salt shaker half-full of Buck, and plenty of ampoules of painkillers of all varieties and colors. Not that all this wasn't enough to turn you into a killing machine, but once you get on drugs, you can't seem to stop.

There was also ammunition of the same caliber: a couple of hundred each of armor-piercing and expansive.

As can be seen, she has more of them than the regular ones.

Another interesting thing is the closed helmet that hangs on her body at the side. By the way, the unicorn's armor seems just as strong as the one I just took off that raider. Some kind of advanced model of combat armor, only noticeably lighter. It fits Motley's size, and all that's left to do is make openings for her wings, which with my magical repair skills shouldn't be too hard for me. The closed helmet has a built-in respirator. The functionality of the helmet is quite similar to mine—now she won't be so disgusted by being in the sewers.

I wonder how Motley is feeling right now.

I look at her. Absolutely nothing: an impassive expression on her face, a blank and thoughtful look.

With a bitter feeling for my companion's distress, which she is in no way willing to share, I continue fiddling with my trophies.

I go into the medical bay for the rest of my belongings, and instead of that black cape with the hood, I attach my cloak with the ace of spades on the back to my Nightwatch armor. I'll never leave it behind—my reminder of the Divide. A reminder that I have a thousand lives on my back that have died because of me. The package's delivery had such a catastrophic effect in the Wasteland... and I am responsible for it.

With blue telekinesis magic, I slightly adjust the cloak on my back.

I have no right to forget that.

***

When I return to the Overmare's office, I see that Ferris has brought a huge minigun with bags full of rare ammunition next to it.

And the griffon doesn't go for little things.

"That's the size," I say to the griffon behind the Overmare's terminal.

"That's Big Daddy," he replies. "One of the three raiders was armed with it. Big Momma grenade launcher was destroyed when I hit its grenade pack. I was talking about that noise—that was just her being blown to smithereens. The raider was torn apart, but the machine gun survived. That alone tells me that it's built with strong alloys of different metals, guaranteeing high durability. But it's not particularly heavy... compared to its relatives, of course. Such a marvel of weaponry is a shame to throw away," Ferris replies passionately, then looks me over carefully. "I see you haven't been wasting your time, either. You're showing off your new armor, and you've attached your cape to it, too. I see you cherish it like a memory. And the new weapon..." he stops talking as he takes a close look at one barrel peeking out of my capacious bag. "Isn't that... Hey, let me see!"

"Well, look," I say and levitate it to Ferris.

"A sliding bolt! Grease me into the charging mechanism! It's an Apostle!" the griffon says in amazement, looking at the shotgun, and then looks at me, obviously waiting for my reaction. Edge shrieks enthusiastically.

I shrug my shoulders in confusion.

And why Apostle? After all, it's engraved 'Defender'. Or maybe he calls things by their proper names all the time?

"What do you mean?" I ask Ferris.

Really, why is he so surprised? This is the first time this has happened to him in my memory... What's so special about this Apostle?

"You don't know?" asks the griffon in surprise.

"No, why don't you enlighten me? If you would be so kind."

The dark griffon carefully strokes the shotgun in his paws like a loving mother strokes her child, saying in an affectionate voice, "The pinnacle of gunsmithing. This is one of the Apostles. Firearms specially designed at the behest of the Equestrian Princess Luna. She awarded them, so to speak, to the heroes of Equestria. Heroes didn't have to be military. Heroes could include ordinary citizens of Equestria who performed a unique deed that would make the whole country proud."

Ferris hugs the shotgun, resting his cheek against the buttstock and closing his eyes placidly.

"The Apostles are special in that they used the latest in technology and magical weaponry spells to create them. They are without the major flaws of their type of weapon, which is why they are so exceptionally versatile. And completely indestructible. You could drop a megaspell on it, there wouldn't be a scratch left..."

"And how many are there?" I ask, smiling as I look at the griffon tightly gripping the black matte black shotgun with the ivory buttstock.

"The exact number of the Apostles is unknown, but they say there are about six or seven in all..."

How did I ever get something like that, and from some low-life raider? And anyway, it sounds too good to be true—no flaws, indestructible...

"How do you know about them?" I ask.

I've seen a lot of strange and crazy things, of course, but this... I can't believe it.

"Every self-respecting gunsmith of Vanhoover and pre-war collector knows about them!" The dark gray griffon cradles the shotgun like a cheapskate cradles a suitcase with caps. "In the Vanhoover Wasteland they found references to the Apostles. The prices of these weapons are so high that they could be considered an artifact from tales of knights, princesses, and dragons. It's unbelievable luck that you found an Apostle. Each one has its own name, given by Princess Luna herself. If my memory serves me correctly, the old journals didn't mention that all Apostles are the same type. So you won't find another one of the same type, roughly but mildly speaking, 'apostle shotgun,' anymore."

"Are you sure it's the same Apostle?" I ask skeptically.

It's easier for me to believe in dragons than that.

Oh, right...

"Definitely," the griffon smiles.

"So I'm a big lucky pony?"

"Hell yeah!" laughs Ferris. "Big enough to affect the moon's orbit in the sky. The main thing is, don't show it in Vanhoover. There's a good chance they'll take it away in a few minutes and you won't get shit. Or they'll just stroke you with a knife in a dark alley and take it away. I hope you understand?"

Miss Luck smiled at me again, but she also put me in further danger, since I acquired such a valuable and rare artifact. A shotgun like that can get me killed. What will not do for a rare item... I'll have to be more careful with that Defender in town, and not wave it in front of every passerby.

"What do you want me to do with that shotgun?" I ask.

"Anything. Use it in your bedtime games or Discord knows what else. And for real." He licks his beak. He looks embarrassed and flustered. "Well... It's your find, and besides, you're the one who fought with its former owner... Besides, I'm not much of a shotgunner, and I prefer long-range or big guns. Which you already know. Anyway, I'd just like to take a look at this shotgun. Find out how it was built and what it was made of. If you let me, of course," he looks at the shotgun in his paws like he sees a perfect female griffon. His playful eyes just say that he wants to study every inch of the shotgun.

"Do you want to take it apart and see what's inside?"

"I doubt that's possible, since this weapon is indestructible, but it's worth trying my luck and undressing this prude."

"Okay. I'd give it to you, but waiting for you to examine it... You know what? Come with me. I can't promise you won't take a bullet or some radiation in my dubious ventures, but I swear you won't get bored."

"That's an interesting proposition. What do you need me for?"

"You're an experienced fighter who knows the Vanhoover Wasteland like no one else. Also a gunsmith. That's why I'll need such an ally."

"What's your point? An ally for what?" the griffon asks skeptically.

"On the search for Project Dome, a trove of scientific knowledge and high technology."

Ferris sighs deeply and looks at the Apostle. Once again he runs his paw from the barrel to the stock.

"I told you it was a myth, but fine. There's nothing to do anyway. But! Mind you. I can leave anytime I want."

"No problem."

"And I won't set foot in the town."

"Fear not, my lair is in the White Shell mountain range on the corner at the very northwest end. It's called Heavenly Harbor. And... I've been noticing... have you got some trouble with Vanhoover?"

"You could say that," Ferris smiles crookedly. "By the way, what are you going to do about Stable's ammo press? It's quite in working order. These ammo," the griffon points to the piled bags of ammo, "are from a new batch of ammo presses. The quality is quite high."

"I don't know, but I'll definitely block access for raiders to this Stable. It's full of working equipment that could be used for repairs to Heavenly Harbor."

"Repairs?" Ferris asks perplexedly.

I briefly recount to him the situation with the killing of residents and the condition of the bunker.

"I see... So now we block the door and then we leave here in hopes that we'll still come back for more parts?" he asks.

"For sure. We need to get out of here."

Ferris tosses Defender back to me.

"I know how..." he says. "I've already looked at the maps made by Violet. You don't understand Red Spark the way I see it, so you don't know how to look. I've already found a way out. There's an entrance to an old sewer that leads beyond Red Spark next to the Factory.

"Is that what we're going to use?"

"Yes. By the way, it only opens from this side. And without maps of the sewer it's easy to get lost because of a lot of blocked entrances-exits; almost all the branches lead to a dead end. But we have maps, so we can get out without fear of raiders or getting lost."

Leaving the Stable, I close the steel door of the underground shelter and lock the console with the Overmare key found in the cabinet.

The entrance to the secret sewer is well hidden; it's not so much accidental as it is deliberately hard to find, guided by maps. It is located in the basement of a ruined liquor store, and the entrance to this basement is blocked by a small concrete slab, which Ferris and I, though with great difficulty, but still get out of sight.

And yet... Secret passages? It does not seem that their existence is dictated by technical necessity. Who left them? Could it be the Controllers? That would explain a lot.

Once down, we walk forward through the tunnel. After a few minutes of walking we reach and pass a sliding metal gate that opens only from our side.

There is no one behind the doors. And no one can be heard. So there is no need to worry.

So that the raiders won't use this path again if it is accidentally discovered, we decide to destroy the console that opened these doors. The timer on the explosive is set for sixty seconds, which means that in one minute the raiders will lose their only emergency exit.

The door closes behind us, and after the allotted time there is a muffled clap. That's it, there's no turning back, only forward all the time. I hope we're not trapped in this tunnel in case there's no back way and Violet decides to fool her possible assassins. Now that would be a good opportunity to fuck us from the dead.

But I can teleport us through the rubble. Yeah, I should be able to. But I'd use most of my magic to do it.

***

We're heading roughly southwest along the sewer and are now passing in the area over which the river runs. Ferris, fully loaded with bags and trophies, walks ahead and surveys the environment.

Well... Flag on his shoulder. He understands Red Spark better.

"Motley," I turn to my partner. She looks at me slightly absent-mindedly. "Why didn't you stop me from killing Violet?"

There's no answer. Just when I want to ask another question, he suddenly gives me an answer, cold and indifferent, "I don't know."

"I take it you haven't gotten along since you first met?"

"What does it matter?" the pegasus asks counter-question.

"I'm responsible for you. I want to know what happens to my companions."

"You're not my father to look out for me."

"I'm not blind. I can see how you don't care about anything. Maybe you don't care about your life either. Maybe you just want to die right now."

"None of your business."

"Yes, I don't pry into personal matters, but I am concerned about your state of mind. It could affect our effectiveness. The decisions I made could have a fatal effect on your life because I didn't know you were suffering from something. And I surely know it has something to do with Violet."

The beige pegasus does not answer. She looks under her hooves to avoid stumbling over debris and rubble from the tunnel's concrete.

I can't help myself and sigh deeply.

No, I'm not rushing her anywhere. And I don't blame her for not wanting to talk about herself, but we're on the same team. I don't talk about me, either. Maybe...

I shudder, a bitter lump in my throat.

She killed the pony she loved... I can well understand why she does not want to talk about what happened. The tearing sense of guilt and shame, the undying anger at self and the pain of loss. I know it all too well...

I can still feel the echo of these experiences and feelings in me.

Eight years have passed since the death of my first love. My hands did it all.

"I killed my first love."

For the first time in a while, Motley expresses confusion, which is replaced by surprise, as if she has suddenly been slapped in the face. She stops and stares at me.

I stop and turn around, too.

"I know exactly what's in your heart, Motley," I smile bitterly. "It happened eight years ago. I loved her... and I always will."

There's a slight shiver and weakness in my knees. My heart pounding in my chest, ready to burst free. Anger and pain and shame awaken in me again... I try to smile, and move on.

Why did I say that? Oh... Bad... Wrong... How stupid of me... I shouldn't have told her that. But I can't undo what I said. The pegasus doesn't need to know that. Knowing it won't affect our effectiveness in combat. I've been able to live with that and not think about... I've learned not to think about it, but... Why now?

"Is it true?" I hear the pegasus' voice behind me.

My legs tense with insult, and I almost stumble. My heart aches for the fact that she doesn't believe me. It feels like I'm about to choke. This is the most painful moment of my life—and I am not believed.

All my life I've managed to avoid it, and now... Some kind of breakthrough. No... Don't let it, Daniel! Don't allow yourself to get emotional.

I'm taking a deep breath. Several times.

"Yes," I answer.

The pegasus is silent and answers nothing more, pacing behind me. Silence and quiet. The rustle of her shoes on the concrete surface of the sewer is like the shots of an anti-meachine rifle. Loud and annoying.

Relax, Daniel...

"I'm sorry..." I hear her voice again. "It's hard for me to trust anyone."

The pegasus senses something in my voice. She realizes she's hurt me with her distrust. I feel a kind of relaxation and calm within me. It makes me feel better that she understands my feelings.

"I understand," I begin, "but we've fought together, covered each other's rumps, so we're not such strangers to each other. How did you end up here? What did you kill that pegasus for?"

"He raped and killed my little sister."

"Oh... What happened?"

"It all happened in New Pegasus, where I'm from. The growth there is on the level of Vanhoover, but without slavery. Everything as much as possible by pre-war standards. That's where my whole family is from. Father, mother, sister and me. My mother worked in the hospital, my sister too."

That's where her good medical skills come from. She has half her family involved in that field.

"One day this... creep got in there after some kind of fight. He harassed my sister. But what could one do against someone with so many connections in the Enclave? In New Pegasus, as in all over-the-top cities, the main force is the Grand Pegasus Enclave."

"Against a corrupt system, there's nothing to oppose... right?"

"Yes. A few days later my sister went missing, and a few more days later she was found... raped... Her body had been drugged with all kinds of drugs."

"Your sister..."

"No!" the pegasus is outraged. "There's no way she used that stuff! She was made out to be a junkie! Her job at the hospital... They used that against her, too. Some of the drugs were missing from the warehouses... They made her look like a junkie. All set up to get that pegasus to get away with it."

Why would Motley assume that it was that pegasus who was responsible for what happened? Even if Motley's words were to be believed. To believe that she knew her own sister well... That... That rape and drugging could have been done by anyone. Not necessarily by that pegasus.

Or am I doubting Motley's conviction as much as Violet's?

"Are you sure he's the one responsible?" I ask cautiously.

I want to be on Motley's side. Such a tragedy, after all. It's hard to remain objective in situations like this: a third party is needed. And they must have rightly decided that the fact of harassment is not sufficient grounds for an arrest. Harassment itself is common even in this mare-dominated world.

Motley looks doubtful.

"After the trial, he smiled at me," her voice lowers to a menacing whisper. "And he said he was unpleasantly surprised that such a pretty and innocent-looking mare turned out to be a dirt junkie. Besides, when I tracked him down and tortured him," the beige pony's lips take on the outlines of a bloodthirsty smile, "he confessed everything to me himself."

And then she killed him... Or overdid it with the torture. Well... a confession like that doesn't mean anything. Under torture, a victim can say anything to avoid torture. Motley was obviously emotional, if she didn't realize it... And she still doesn't. But now she has her own doubts.

Well... It's not for me to judge her. It's hard to remain impartial in situations with loved ones.

"Is the Enclave capable of defending its own?"

"He didn't serve in the Enclave. Only had family ties. Just a high-flying bird. Young, my age. Was. After he died, I was instantly reported wanted. I had to flee."

"And how did the rest of your family react to your daughter's death?"

"My father has been dead for a long time, and my mother almost had a heart attack. She wasn't even in court because of the shock and couldn't testify. Father... Not long before my sister's murder, I became convinced that there was a lot of shit going on in the Enclave. Officially he died heroically on a mission, but in reality he was executed... I don't know what for."

The way I see it, the Enclave prefers to show that they have no traitors—they're too good and don't make excuses to betray them. Useful for patriotism. It worked for Violet. I think Motley got into the Enclave that way herself, inspired by her father's heroism.

"The Enclave," Motley continues, "is a rotten apple with worms crawling under its perfect rind. Too bad the rest of the squad didn't understand that. Especially Violet."

That's the very distrust of the Enclave. Because of my encounter with the radical and ruthless Enclave in the Capital Wasteland, I'm more inclined to Motley's position.

But I still don't know which side I should take. It's a different world: perhaps there are differences. In any case, it's already happened. Nothing can be changed. It is not for me to decide, but she is my companion, who did not hesitate to throw herself into battle and risk her life. I have no doubt in my mind that she wanted justice if she went to court. Tried to do it by the rules, but everything turned out against her and her dead sister.

Without having any other facts, I still can't objectively pick a side. It's enough for me that now she herself doubts what happened.

What was it that made her doubt?

So... I side with my pegasus. My sister in arms.

"Motley..." I mutter and stop. She stops, too, looking into my eyes. I take her in my hug. "I believe you."

I want to believe she's not wrong. I may not approve of torture and murder, but that's the world. I only want to hope that it is as she described it. She is the former commander of the squad: she must have developed a critical and calculating mind, with which she came to the conclusion that the pegasus was guilty.

The pegasus stands in indecision at the sudden sight of my forelegs hugging her neck. But eventually she lifts up her front legs and hugs back.

***

Motley doesn't want to talk about what happened to her squad. But there's not much to think about. The site of the fight in which the Enclave was involved, which I recently checked with Flow, is clearly related to her escape. The former members of the squad followed her. An argument ensued, for they did not understand the whole point of the Enclave as she had not experienced what she had. And the argument turned into a fight.

I have no doubt that it was the actions of her squad that left those traces of the battle: one of the bodies was dragged away toward Red Spark—and a year later this body named Violet, having managed to be a victim, managed to get out, take over and organize the raiders in tandem. Conducted the attacks on the Waterfall family and a bit of Steelmane... To please someone, for a reward.

The rest of the squad must be dead—especially her favorite.

We spend the rest of the journey in silence; each pondering his own thoughts. At least Motley doesn't look so depressed anymore and is focused on her surroundings.

There are no particularly dangerous enemies on our path, just a few rats and radroaches. All of the exits to the surface are blocked by rubble, so the path is completely tunneled out of the raider city.

It takes us almost half a day to get to the exit. On the surface, we try to avoid direct encounters with the Crater raiders and are already almost outside of it. And if we can't avoid the raiders, Ferris and I eliminate them from a distance—I do it by Whispering Night and Ferris does it by the anti-machine rifle—because everyone knows that tactics of non-contact fighting are the best tactics.

I've never felt more at ease in my soul than I do now... Outside of the city I literally had a rock fall from my soul: I had survived such a dangerous... adventure. Even the Prince's Kings, for some reason, could not survive in this place. All thanks to the fact that I was not alone, but with trusted support.

I want to take off again on Venture. I have missed it, but I will reach it tomorrow, judging by all appearances.

After a few hours of walking in a wide arc around the ruins of Red Spark, we hear distant gunfire and occasional explosions. It sounds like the raiders are attacking someone. We need to help. It's not my style to just walk by and not help those in need.

Please let me get there in time.

Climbing a small hill, I look through the scope of my rifle. A quarter of a mile away, the raiders attack an old army truck, puncturing a tire. The dead orange pony beside the truck is already being searched by some of the raiders with joyful laughter. The stallions strip her of her armor and begin to fuck her dead body.

The rest are trying to get to those who have taken shelter in the old brick mansion. Shots are heard coming from inside.

Ferris and his winged pet stay on the hill to cover us.

We leave our bags of Crater loot on the hill so they don't bother us during the heavy fighting, and Motley and I head down the hill. Ferris prepares to eliminate some of the raiders now engaged in necrophilia.

We attack simultaneously, without letting the engaging raiders know what's happened. The rest of the raiders continue the firefight inside the mansion.

This desecrated orange pony...

It can't be...

That's... Juice... One of the survivors of the Bluerise caravans.

"Daniel, what happened?" Motley asks over the radio, standing at the open front doors.

Shit! Shit! Shit! Shit!

After running through a yard strewn with dead raiders, I stand on the opposite side from Motley at the front doors. The raiders must have noticed something was wrong, since they're already waiting for us. They suspect there is a sniper outside, so they don't risk sticking their heads out. Judging by the marks on the Pip-Boy, there are at least six raiders inside the building, ready to shoot anyone who comes through those doors. Motley uses a grenade, agilely removing the pin and throwing the projectile inside.

"Fuck!" is heard from inside. "Run," and after these words an explosion occurs.

"Music to my ears..." Motley utters and runs inside, diverting potential fire on herself.

I activate the stealth field in Pip-Boy and run after. The raiders from their combat saddles try to hit the pegasus who ran into the living room. She moves too fast and unpredictably. I pull out Whispering Night with a short barrel and shoot the raiders who look out of the corner: two misses and two hits. Then I hear gunshots in the living room.

Oh fuck, Motley!

The pegasus beats the face of the earth pony and then, choosing her moment, she grabs her by the head and twists her neck.

"You okay?" I ask worriedly.

"Yes..." she answers. "She came around the corner and took a couple of shots at me; luckily, the armor held out. There's about three more to go, right?"

"That's right, ran upstairs: there's the sound of hitting wood from up there. Somebody must be trying to break down the doors."

Trying not to make any noise, we climb the staircase. I keep myself from rushing to the rescue. I have to keep my cool.

No sooner do I look around the corner than I hear a shot. Judging by the nature of the shot, followed by the convulsive sliding of the bolt, it is a hunting rifle, the caliber of which can make a huge hole in my helmet and then a hole in my head. I'm lucky, though: the bullet goes off at a touch and sparks my helmet.

It's a good time to check the automatic mode of the miracle shotgun, because I can't shoot blindly with Whispering Night. Clicking the safety, I stick the shotgun out behind the wall and fire. Indeed, the recoil of the turn is not physically felt, with sounds so loud and imposing.

A thud is heard, and I stick my head out. The raider, dressed in filthy rags, has turned into minced meat and guts.

Disgusting... And an amazing shotgun. It's frustrating that the magazine only holds twelve rounds—the automatic burst will completely and irrevocably use it up in a few seconds. It's better to use this mode against large and well-defended opponents. Or fast ones. The spread of the buckshot will help to snag them.

Checking my compass, I find two more red marks and one neutral mark. Damn... just as long as I get there in time. It's probably all upstairs.

Just as we enter the hallway to go up further, a raider suddenly rushes out of the room with a twirling saw in her knuckles. Motley kills her with a fire rifle in her combat saddle.

"Thanks..." I say.

"You're welcome. Next time don't forget to reload your weapon before you move on."

"Sure."

The sound of wood hitting continues. We go up to the third floor while I reload the shotgun. In the hallway we see several dead raiders and the corpse of a blue earth pony.

Dash... No... Not you... Young and... Well, her body hasn't been desecrated yet, though.

I turn the corner. At the end of the hallway, a raider with an axe kicks in the door.

"Open the doors," he says affectionately and with a sneer. He doesn't notice us, so I try to get close to him unnoticed, with Motley covering my rear.

"Come on, don't be so closed..." Another stab. "Open up to Shiny." Another axe stab at the white door. "I'm going to tear down your shelter..." Stab. "You will be my pet..." I get close enough, aiming the barrel of my shotgun at the back of his head. He punches a small hole, and sticks his head through it. "Here's Shiny!" he pronounces, bloodthirsty with joy.

I shoot. His head explodes into a red mess, and the rest of his body leans against the door, staining it with his blood.

Judging by the compass, there's no one else left. I magically turn the doorknob to open it.

"Don't worry, Bluerise," I say. "It's over. Everyone's dead."

No response.

I gently open the door. A grenade falls in front of me.

Fuck me!

Before the explosion happens, I manage to shut the doors and try to raise a magic barrier.

***

I wake up on a bed. My whole body is aching from the aftermath of the shrapnel grenade. I guess if it wouldn't have been for the doors, the armor and the barrier, my ass would have been in pieces. That's unfortunate. I can't feel any armor on me—just some kind of dirty blanket, though it's warm enough to keep me warm.

"Awake at last," the beige pegasus says with a smile. "You're lucky you got off with a minor concussion, but just in case, I had to strip you down and check you out. The shockwave threw you back into the wall, and you hit your head pretty hard."

"How long was I out?"

"Not long, about half an hour."

"What about the survivor?"

"Excuse me," someone nearby says timidly and guiltily. The voice is familiar. "I was too scared and didn't immediately realize it was your voice. I thought my fear had already made me hallucinate... I was so worried that you wouldn't make it."

A rather familiar gentle voice. I turn my head toward it and see a purple unicorn with a pink mane.

Yes, that's her. But what is she doing here?

"What a meeting! What a warm welcome!"

"I'm sorry..."

I inhale deeply, holding back my irritation.

Okay... Calm down, Daniel. Your head hurts, don't let your emotions take control. Things happen. She was cornered by the raiders. She's already been held captive by them where she was raped. She'll hold on in panicked fear until the end... No wonder she didn't respond to her name and to my voice, distorted by the helmet speaker.

I exhale.

"Well... Stuff happens," I say calmly. "It's okay, as long as nothing serious happened because of it. And what radioactive wind brought you here?"

"I'm really sorry about what happened..."

"Okay, calm down. I told you, forget it." I grab my head over an attack of pain. "So why are you here?"

"Red Eye and his army are spreading faster and faster. I chose the most northwestern town on the pre-war map in hopes of having peace in the middle of nowhere like this without the slavers army."

How wrong she was...

"How did you get a working pre-war army truck?"

"Connections, acquaintances... someone owed me a favor. So I packed everything I needed for the move at a brisk pace. Took Juice and Dash with me. We wanted to go somewhere far away from all these global events..."

The purple unicorn lowers her head. She already knows that Juice and Dash are dead.

"I saw..." I say, not knowing what words to use. "I'm sorry, I didn't have time..."

"It's all my fault. Their deaths are on my back. It was lucky for me that you were here... a second time to save..."

The unicorn comes up to me and hugs me. Her body trembles with excitement. She sobs.

"How glad I am to see you!"

As much as I enjoy the hug, I can hardly suppress the urge to howl in pain. I actually almost got blown up by a grenade here!

"Hey, watch it!" the voice of the pegasus comes. She wraps her forelegs around Bluerise and tries to pull away so that she doesn't pull me after her, too. "He's hurt."

"Oh... I'm sorry, please," the unicorn breaks her embrace with a guilty look. "I just wanted to..."

"Oh..." I sighed in relief. "It's okay. I'll get over it."

It's almost dark outside the window.

"I think," I begin, "we'll make a stop at this mansion. Where are Ferris and Edge?"

"Still in position and making sure no one gets in here," Motley replies.

"Tell them to head over here."

***

I light a fireplace in the living room. The raw material for the fire is leftover furniture from the looting. Ferris, along with Edge, are watching the perimeter on the roof. The eagle, since a bird will not be suspected of anything, occasionally flies over the neighborhood to spot the enemy before he even notices the mansion.

Motley sits next to me in the living room, and Bluerise is outside.

I say, "I'll check on her. Keep an eye on the fire, will you?"

The beige pegasus nods.

The purple unicorn in insulated leather armor and a lit oil lantern stands over two fresh graves in the backyard of the mansion, surrounded by a metal fence with sharp bars. Orange light falls on metal sheets sticking out of the graves, with the names of the murdered ponies, 'Juice' and 'Dash', scratched out and the date of their deaths: 9.3.1352. Nearby lies a shovel stained with earth.

The light pink mane ripples as the unicorn turns around to look at whoever approached her and turns back.

"All we wanted was peace..." she says.

"In the Wasteland, peace is impossible as long as you're alive. Now Juice and Dash have found eternal peace."

"I wish they had lived longer before they found that peace."

"And I wish they had. I liked them. Good ponies."

"Thank you. We've remembered you many times. They'd love to see you again."

"Good to know."

Bluerise stands in silence. The light of her flashlight illuminates the metal makeshift gravestones. She sighs.

"What do I do next?"

I look at the freshly dug graves—two mounds of soft, fresh earth.

Bluerise must be feeling lost, having lost her last friends in this place. She was on her way to such a faraway place with them, after all, to settle down together in some quiet town away from the global events instigated by Red Eye.

"You need to rest for starters, eat... warm yourself by the fireplace. Get a good night's sleep. And we'll think about it tomorrow," I say, putting a hoof on her shoulder. "Come."

"It's... difficult with them. I don't know any of them," she says in a bashful voice.

"I've been through some rough and tense battles with the raiders with them for days on end. We've saved each other's lives more than once. I trust them in that regard. Don't be afraid. I won't let them hurt you."

Bluerise inhales deeply and exhales slowly.

"Well, all right. I'll go get something tasty from the truck."

"Oh, that'll be great."

About ten minutes later, we're already sitting by the fireplace, seated in a semicircle. In front of us, postwar canned goods, homemade beer, cans of juice, jerky, various flowers and plants gleam in the firelight... and also hay.

Bluerise has stocked up pretty well for the move. Judging by the jerky, they stopped along the way to hunt local game. They ate some of the meat and processed the rest and took it with them. That's what I did, though, along with Lilac Journey.

I wonder if Bluerise stopped by on her way to Reserve with griffons, particularly the capital of New Lionheart.

By the way, she sits on my right and everyone else sits on my left. Apparently she wasn't entirely convinced by what I said, so she sat so that I shielded her from the others.

Griffons are a predatory species in their own right, not shy about eating pony meat, and the pegasus... I think she might have some associations with the Enclave.

I enjoy the beef jerky, munching on canned pickles. I decide to abstain from beer, but Ferris takes a sip of a bottle. Everyone else drinks water or juice. The dark griffon with the dark gray feathering pounces on meat with open delight, the beige pegasus on canned and non-caloric fruits and vegetables. Bluerise tastes a little bit of everything.

"This is delicious meat," the griffon says, stuffing another brownish-red piece into his beak. "I'll have to give Edge a taste, but he can keep an eye on the territory for now."

"Thank you," Bluerise says politely. There is not an ounce of distrust or apprehension in her voice. Like a merchant, she knows how to hide her true attitude... to her customers.

"So you're from the East Coast, are you?" the griffon asks. "What was the purpose of coming all this way?"

"We were fleeing from Red Eye's army. He's subjugating the entire coast rapidly, so we headed northwest in search of a quiet place. As far away as possible."

Ferris laughs.

"Well... you've obviously picked the wrong place for this."

"I already know Red Spark is populated by thousands of raiders, it's best to stay away from it... What about Vanhoover?"

"Uh-oh..." the griffon stretches out with a smile. "The city is fully occupied... As I recall, it has about two hundred thousand slaves and about seventy thousand masters."

Bluerise drops a can of canned carrots. Orange thinly sliced slices of carrots spill out onto the stone floor with a slap. She looks at the griffon.

"What...?" she asks.

"For nearly a hundred and fifty years it has been rebuilt by the slaves under the watchful eye of the clan families," he adds.

"Well, they're not the only ones," I begin. "There are also the police, created in the pre-war image. Also Kings... with three dozen of them. A special group of ponies and griffons who act as protectors, judges, and enforcers of their own sentences. They do everything they can to protect the interests of the city, even breaking its rules. Everything is run by the unkillable and powerful unicorn. Anyway... you have to see it for yourself to understand."

I sympathize with her surprise. She was fleeing the Red Eye slavers army that's taking over the coast... In Vanhoover, she can get a taste of what Equestria could become if Red Eye prevails.

"What is she?" Ferris asks, looking at the stunned look on the purple unicorn's face.

"Red Eye's army and his empire," I begin, "are trying to rebuild pre-war factories and plants with slavery."

"You mean... this is essentially Vanhoover in the early years?"

"I guess so. I'm not from here myself."

Ferris spreads his paws to the side and says, "The Wasteland is the same everywhere, spawns the same personalities. So, out of the fire and into the abyss. One type of slavers has been changed by another type, more organized and with principles."

"What do you mean, in the early years?" Bluerise asks, as if awakened from her shock.

"Think of Vanhoover as," I say, "if I had seen the future of Equestria under the Red Eye."

"But slavery... Two hundred thousand... that's so many unhappy souls."

"Not really. The level of brainwashing is so advanced that the purpose of their lives is to serve others. They get pleasure out of it. Believe me, they live better than most Wastelanders. Thanks in large part to the development of the city and its infrastructure."

"Can I become a... slave?" Bluerise asks with a gasp.

"I don't think so. The local philosophy and worldview says: you are the master of your life if you are responsible for your actions. You know how to take care of yourself and work for the common good, that is, for the city. With your skills of trade, it is neither profitable nor expedient to keep you as a slave."

"Then who becomes a slave?"

Ferris decides to answer that question instead of me.

"The ideal candidates for slavery are considered raiders and beggars. They either don't know how to take care of themselves or are so irresponsible that they think only of their own primitive desires. They do not know how to manage their own lives. They are useless. Parasites. Therefore, through slavery, they become useful. Slaves must want to be useful, so they feel happy when they serve their masters."

Once again I am convinced that he is from Vanhoover, but for some reason he cannot return there.

"I'm wondering," Motley says, turning to Ferris, "why don't you live in Vanhoover?"

"I don't want to talk about it. I, like many Vanhoover masters, have fallen into disfavor with the most influential figures. I had to flee, but unlike ponies, griffons can live and survive on their own."

That's why I've never yet seen a griffon raider. They have the advantage of wings, size and claws. They can get anywhere with no problem.

"I wonder what you were promised for going to Red Spark? Yes, their organization was growing rapidly, they were already beginning to pose a threat to Vanhoover, but judging from the raider leader's diaries, someone was okay with it. What's more, they were being used."

"Gang raiders," Bluerise interjects, "have often used caravan companies to eliminate competitors. Another reason I wanted to get out of there. Wait. The raider leader? You mean you were able to kill the leader of the local raiders?"

"Yes," the griffon smiles. "Cohesive teamwork. The others didn't manage it. Kings of Vanhoover, though they're no slouch, have earned their title after all, but they can't work as a team with each other. Too proud, especially the griffons."

Pride... To achieve such high status, it is necessary to be able to go over their heads, to take advantage of others. Because of which they have no one they can trust.

"How are you different from the others?" I smile, looking at the griffon.

"I have never aspired to the status of a King. It's not my thing. Fuck it. Anyway, Prince doesn't pay for his assignments."

Motley looks at the griffon with a faint smile.

"You didn't need a King status," she says, "since you were high enough as it was. With your engineering knowledge."

"And you're perceptive..." he smirks. "For an Enclave bird. Luckily, a former one."

I notice Bluerise to my right raise an eyebrow curiously.

"But you never answered," the griffon continues, looking at me and Motley. "What were you promised for solving the raider problem?"

"Twenty-five thousand caps," I answer.

Ferris whistles. How do griffons even manage to whistle with their beaks?

"Impressive. You could buy a nice apartment in the city for that money. And who promised? Waterfall, I suspect. After all, that's the family that's a priority for the raiders."

"You're thinking right," I say.

"It's a shame they're under attack. Of all the families, I liked them most. Hard-working bees. They hate slackers, so they're especially demanding. You picked the right family to cooperate with. They're nicer than the others. The lesser of the five evils."

"Yes, I've been to the Vanhoover Five Families Council and seen it for myself. The Steelmane families also seemed nice to me."

"Oh, fuck!" the griffon bursts out; he rolls his eyes at me. "Only family members, Kings, Prince, and his closest wards can be on the Council. How did you get there?"

"I want to be a King, which Prince already knows. He invited me."

Ferris stares at me like his beak is about to fall off.

"Holy eggs! You got the attention of Prince himself... I'll be damned."

Motley stands up on all four hooves and stretches himself sweetly.

"Thanks for dinner," she says to Bluerise. "It was delicious. And I'm going to go rest. My shift's after Daniel, right?" I nod. "Then, I'll go to bed early."

"I'll feed Edge that tasty meat and go get some rest. Make sure we don't get attacked by raiders. We're near Red Spark, don't forget."

"I won't forget. Don't worry."

"Thanks. Great meat and beer," he says, looking at the unicorn, and goes outside. Me and Bluerise are left alone.

"Need help cleaning up?"

"You could... Thanks."

I help her carry the rest of the food back to the truck. Its hull is sturdy enough to withstand a small-caliber bullet hit, but the wheels are unprotected. A pair of front and two pairs of rear. The raiders shot through the two rear wheels on one side. Just enough to repair the damaged parts of the rubber with repair magic and inflate them again, but I'll get to that tomorrow, which I report to Bluerise.

"Oh... it completely slipped my mind," she says. "Thanks for helping. I think I should give you something..."

After a couple of moments in the amber smoke of her telekinesis and in the green light of my Pip-Boy, I see a book: "Teleportation. Level: Specialist."

"I think you could use it. If not, you can sell it in Vanhoover for a couple thousand caps."

"Oh, thank you very much. With this book I will improve my teleportation spells."

"You were able to master it?" the purple unicorn pleasantly surprises.

"Yep," I say and smile smugly.

"Impressive," she nods, smiling faintly.

"Well... go get some rest. Tomorrow we'll decide what to do next. It'll be better in the morning."

The unicorn nods and returns to the mansion.

It's dark, windy, and chilly outside. I shiver, put on my helmet, and go to guard the roof with Whispering Night. This blue and black rifle has proven itself well. A good telescopic sight that I use to keep an eye on my surroundings. Periodically I turn the helmet's thermal vision on and off.

A few hours pass; it's midnight. Local. There are twenty-six hours in the day here instead of twenty-four on Earth. Strangely enough, in all this time I haven't felt much discomfort with the longer daylight hours. I adapted to this time, as I adapted to this body.

The 4th of the Month of Heather, Greenday. Forty-second day of my stay.

Forty-second day... Like the number on Lemon's cutie mark. I wonder how she is? Isn't she bored while guarding Venture? It's been a few days... There are enough provisions in Venture, she would make it.

A lot happened yesterday. Blowing up the bridge, the Factory, Stable 61, Motley's former partner, the sewer escape, the rescue...

There's a rustling sound behind me. With my night vision on, I turn around and see a tired Bluerise.

"Can't sleep?" I ask.

"Yeah... It's been a hard and scary day. And I'm uncomfortable alone in the company of a faintly familiar pony and a griffon."

"To you, I'm also a faintly familiar pony."

"Except that I owe you my life twice."

I let out a weak chuckle.

"So what... want to get some fresh air?" I ask.

"Not without that. It's just..." I see her awkward look in the green light of the night vision. "It's just... I feel calmer when you're around."

"You can come closer if you want."

The unicorn smiles slightly and comes closer, staring into the black and cold emptiness of the night. I can reach her with my hoof.

"Aren't you cold?" I ask.

"A little."

I unhook my cloak and wrap it around her.

"No, what are you..." she protests, but she doesn't resist much.

"Don't argue with me. It's not easy enough for you to sleep. I don't want you to freeze to death in here."

"Thank you..." she mutters in a confused and grateful voice. "Is that the cloak when we met?"

"Yes."

"I remember it has a symbol on it, but I forgot to ask about it. What does it mean?"

"Luck."

"I wish I had a cape like that," the pony says.

I don't hold back my chuckle.

"But this cape is important to me."

"How?"

"It serves to remind me of the past. Of my mistakes... Of the decisions I've been responsible for. About all the lives I've influenced. About how any small action can have catastrophic consequences."

"Wow... Now he seems heavy to me for some reason."

"How did you recover from that captivity?"

"You mean the first time you saved me?"

"Yeah."

"Well... It's been over a month since then, after all. The Wasteland is harsh. I still remember what you said about being patient and waiting for the right moment. There's a lot of violence in the Wasteland. But... it's hard to be bearable without a pony close to you. And this isn't the first time I've been..."

"Oh..."

"The first two times... I was too naive."

"It wasn't your fault what happened to you."

"It's hard to think like that, Daniel. It's hard not to blame yourself for your stupidity."

"I understand," I say. Bluerise looks at me with a curious look, seeing only the red visors of my helmet in front of her. "My ignorance and naivety have made others suffer. In my youth, I helped anyone who needed help... And later, some of them turned out to be heartless killers and hidden maniacs. In a way, I am responsible for their new victims. If I had known... When I was outside the bar where you were being held captive, I wondered if I should get involved. I knew nothing of the situation. What if you're a slaver's caravan or something."

Bluerise smiles faintly.

"So if you'd hesitated... I'd still be a prisoner," she says in a trembling voice.

"I guess so."

Suddenly, Bluerise hugs me tightly.

"How good of you to make up your mind. How good..." her voice is intermittent. She seems ready to cry now, but she's a tough pony. She's been able to contain herself. "If it wasn't for you, I..."

"Well, well..." I hug Bluerise back and hold her close to me.

"I'm happy you intervened," I feel her hug me tighter after those words.

Even if I didn't save everyone? Then everyone would be alive... even if they had become slaves. Gold, Juice, Dash—all of them would be alive.

"I'm scared..." she adds.

"Why?"

"You seem to be the only one I feel safe with. But at the same time, I can't travel with you. You obviously have a dangerous life."

"Travel with me?"

"Yes..." she murmurs softly. She snuggles against me, and I don't see emotion on her face.

"What do you want?"

"Safety and peace. I just want to trade, talk to different ponies. Gossip... And now I find myself back in a place where the slave trade reigns."

"Where would you like to go?"

"I don't know... The main thing is not to be touched. To be in a place where I wouldn't fear for my life."

"Vanhoover is beautiful in a way," I begin. "If you don't count slavery, it's the safest town in the Wasteland I've seen."

"Do you want me to settle in that place?"

"Personally, it would be good for me to have an experienced merchant on my side in this town."

"I... don't know. Yes, I owe you more than one life, but if..."

"Don't worry. I won't leave you alone in the city. If you get enslaved in any way, I'll be sure to get you out and help you find another place. I promise."

As long as I'm in Vanhoover and until I get home. She'll have made some good connections by then, though. If she has them, she won't be in any danger.

"Good to know. Thank you. What do you suggest?"

"Enter one of the families. As Ferris said, it's better to be friends with the Waterfall. They seem like the best option. Work for them, and they'll protect you; and if you still turn out to be a capable pony, there's no way they'll let them put slave chains on you. My protection won't even be necessary."

"But if..."

"If things go wrong, I promise: I will find you and set you free. Or, if I'm going to leave Vanhoover for good, I'll let you know about it and we can leave if you want, okay?"

"Well... " the unicorn sighs deeply. "Okay. All right, then. If I can't trust you either... then who should I?"

"Thank you. I won't let you down."

"Can I... stay with you a little longer?"

"No problem."

As Bluerise hugs me and I cradle her against me with my right leg, I try to keep track of the area at the same time, using the thermal vision and Pip-Boy's compass.

The unicorn hugs me for too long: it looks like she's dozing. Well, let her rest. I'll wait for the end of my shift.

Not an hour later, Motley shows up. I switch back to night vision so I can see her half-covered helmeted face. She sits to my left and smiles slyly.

"What?" I ask in a whisper. The pegasus whispers, too.

"Nothing. Is there something between you two? You seem to know each other."

"No."

"Why not?"

"With my dangerous life, relationships are the last thing I should be thinking about."

Not to mention the fact that I'm going back to my world, and I don't need connections here.

"How is she? She seemed uneasy in her conversation with us."

"Well... you know what she's been through today. She just doesn't trust unfamiliar faces."

"Right. But she's asleep in your side right now. What are you to her?"

I think it's better to leave out the part where we got laid while we were drunk. We were still driven by alcohol and animal instincts. Also, my wet-body fetish was influenced, which made me unable to resist.

"I rescued her from the raiders' captivity about a month and a half ago. You know what she's been through."

"Oh... With the way she looks... I can guess what kind of attention she was getting."

"You're pretty, too. Especially your eyes, which that helmet now hides."

The pegasus, judging by her ajar mouth, is slightly blushing, looking straight ahead into the night's emptiness.

"Thank you... You'd better go to sleep. Take her with you. With your telekinesis you can carry her downstairs without waking her up."

I nod.

I finally get some sleep... It really has been a long day.

***

The next morning, I restore the wheels of the truck with my magic. We have breakfast, load up all our stuff, and drive to Venture. I'm driving, since Bluerise doesn't know how to drive. Before me, Juice drove the truck.

Ferris sits in the luggage section while Edge flies over the surroundings, looking out for possible danger. Motley sits by the window. Bluerise is in the middle.

"Why don't you tell me what Venture is after all?" the unicorn asks.

"No, no, no. I don't want to ruin the surprise. I told you. You need to see it."

I hope she's okay with the Steel Rangers. But Lemon will definitely be happy to see us.

A few hours later, we reach the hotel where the pre-war civilian vertibuck landed.

Once up on the roof, Ferris and Bluerise look around, then ask where my surprise is. Motley stands paralyzed and my right eye twitches. I stare dumbfounded at where Lemon and my Venture were supposed to be.

Without saying anything, I slowly start walking in circles on the roof.

"I'm going to yank those bastards' hooves out and shove them up their fucking asses!"

Who dared? What scum stole my precious vertibuck?!

"Looks like you won't be flying today," Motley says to Ferris and Bluerise.

"Who the fuck stole my property?!" I rage into the void.

My blood boils with anger. I take off my helmet and am about to throw it away. I have to make a lot of effort to restrain myself from doing something stupid.

"By the way, where's Berry?" Motley asks casually.

"They probably took her too, sons of bitches," I say angrily.

"And you're sure," the griffon interjects, "that your steel-armed companion didn't take your... whatever it is, birdie?"

"Quite possibly, but I fucking hate to believe it," I say, choking with anger.

Devil, if it really turns out that way, I don't know what I'll do with her! I have to go to the Steel Rangers and that's it...

"Look," Motley says, taking off his helmet and picking up some paper. "A note."

"What does it say?" I ask impatiently, almost running up to her. Motley reads out the text.

"«Daniel, when we missed each other, I went to keep an eye on your Venture. But when I got close to the building I heard the sound of screws turning, and then I looked up and saw your vertibuck flying away. I could see that this was the first time the hijacker had sat at the helm, for the steel bird was visibly swaying from side to side. I was beginning to worry that he might have checked a rock there. He flew off toward Vanhoover. I'll follow. Find me at the Broken Radio Hotel, then we'll talk. Kisses. Your steelbutt friend.» She drew a smiley face with a heart on it," Motley mutters, "I didn't think she had a heart for drawing."

Lemon... Always on the positive side.

Wait a minute. Lemon's in Vanhoover? Is it okay that she's a Steel Ranger and they're not too popular there? But the Steel Rangers must have some place in town where they can be safe. I'm just sure of it, since my lemon pony was so confident in making an appointment for me.

"Then let's go to Vanhoover!" I say quickly, taking the note from Motley and stuffing it in my bag.

"Hey, buddy, did you forget that my breath won't even be there?" Ferris says hastily and excitedly. I stop and think about it.

"I remember..." I lie in a slightly annoyed tone and turn slowly toward him, trying to think of something. "Why don't you fly to Heavenly Harbor, then? Take a look around there, get settled in."

"I don't mind, but I wish I knew where it was," the griffon raises his front paws and spreads them apart.

"Maybe Motley can show you the way. And take some of my gear that I don't want to sell..." I say and look at the pegasus, who smiles slightly, as if to ask 'Are you out of your fucking mind?'

"Please," I plead. "I'm in a pretty intense position right now. I'll be sure to thank you somehow."

"Okay," the pegasus sighs, clearly lost to my begging face. "I'll do you a free favor."

"Thank you, Motley, you golden angel!"

"Just no hugs!" she lifts her legs.

"Whatever you say. You know, try on one set of armor later from the gear I found. It also includes a fully enclosed high-tech helmet. Might come in handy. I'm sure the armor will fit you. Once you've shown Ferris and his feathered pet to Heavenly Harbor, join us. Remember, Broken Radio Hotel."

"By all means," she replies. Ferris and Motley then pick up our gear, and we split up. Edge goes after his master.

I get back behind the wheel of the army truck, and I head to Vanhoover with Bluerise.

***

The pegasus joins us when we're almost right outside the South Gate. I stop the truck, she gets in, and I keep driving.

"How are Ferris and his pet?" I ask.

"It's okay, Ferris and Edge seem to like the bunker. It's pretty spacious for an underground facility, he says. He also says he'll pack up some of his supplies and move them to the bunker."

"That's good news. Why did it take you so long?"

"I should have gone to see Cherry and told her all about it."

"Oh, yeah. I remembered. And yes, you look great in that new armor," I mutter as I look her over. The helmet from the third version of the armor is hanging at her side.

"Thank you," she smiles slightly.

Bluerise looks closely at the city streets through the windshield. She admires their cleanliness and neatness. The neatness of the houses—at least on the main streets. She looks at the countless signs of establishments providing goods and various services.

"I can't get over the diversity," she mutters, looking out the window. "Too bad..." Her eyes focus on a slave. A well-dressed slave dragging his master's things. "Slavery spoils everything. How many ponies here accept slavery? Can I talk about that I'm not liking it?"

"You can, but you had better not. Your opinion, as usual, is best kept to yourself."

An hour later we reach the Broken Radio Hotel; we stopped at several stores along the way to sell the trophies. I sold them, thanks to Bluerise, for a very good price. She, by the way, was surprised at the local assortment—as well as the prices. Some items were cheaper than in the rest of the Wasteland, while others were noticeably more expensive.

The Broken Radio Hotel. A dark gray seven-story building with a sign above the main entrance; below it notifies us that rooms are available, and below it is another funny glowing sign in the form of a radio that sparks periodically. I think this is intentional, to emphasize the name of the hotel. It's funny, though.

We enter the hotel through double all-metal doors and into a small foyer. No expensive decorations or red carpets. There is a simple room with some peeling white paint on the walls and a slightly dirty floor. Opposite the entrance is a receptionist's desk, behind which sits a middle-aged earth pony with lime-green fur and a green mane.

When he sees us, he smiles.

"Welcome to Broken Radio Hotel. I know you want to ask, so here's the answer: the radio in our rooms is working. Will you be renting a room?"

"Maybe, but first answer one question—do you tell the name of the hotel to everyone who comes in the front door in advance?" I ask.

"Yes, because more than half of the visitors ask about the name and whether the radio works in the rooms. Mostly the masters who rent a room here are those who come from across town on their own business or from the mines or farms," the receptionist replies with a smile. "So are you going to rent a room or go to the bar?"

"And yet, why is this hotel so named?"

"Before the war, the place was called the Jolly Radio Hotel. But the customers of that bar 'liked' to break the radio. All because of the large presence of bars on this street, when they drank there and came back here, and after Those Times there wasn't a single surviving radio in this place. So the first pony who walked in said it was 'not a fucking jolly radio, only a broken one,' pardon my rudeness. That's how the sign got fixed, too."

"Excellent story. At least it's not the Drunken Radio Hotel. How much is a room for three for one night?"

"Perfect. Given your... good armor, you must be after a long passionate venture, am I right?" the receptionist asks, underlining the word 'venture'.

Somehow strangely he emphasizes that word. He also looks at me with anticipation. Why would some unknown pony want to talk about venture? Besides, only a few ponies know that I like all sorts of dangerous ventures, and that there are only two associations with the word venture...

I get it. Lemon. You're such a trickster.

"Yes," I say calmly.

"Here are the keys to room thirty-two. The first number speaks of the floor. Soon, or maybe tomorrow, you'll be approached to talk about your lost traveler's passion," the receptionist winks at me lightly. "On the house."

"Thank you very much," I nod understandingly, and we walk toward the rooms.

The number thirty-two reminds me of something-it seems to have something to do with the Star Paladin. Right! I remember. That's her age! Although it could be a simple coincidence.

"Free room? Charming," Bluerise smiles at me.

"Naturally! No one has yet resisted my charms: nothing done, but I got what I wanted," I say in a serious tone.

My two companions laugh.

"Even when it's a stallion," Motley adds.

The room is double... but with one bed. What a naughty Lemon. Thinking of putting me and Motley in the same bed?

We decide by democratic vote that the mares get the bed and I have to make do with the old sofa in the living room.

Bluericse brings us dinner from those leftovers in the truck. We spend the rest of the evening minding our own business. Motley warms up and exercises his fighting moves. The unicorn watches her admiringly, asking about it, and I... read a book on magical repair spells. Naturally, it is impossible to concentrate in the cheerful and noisy atmosphere, especially when such a flexible pegasus is training nearby. So I get out on the roof and, under the blowing wind, memorize theory until dark, occasionally glancing around.

I come back and find out that the mares have already taken a shower. And I go to take a shower, too, washing all the filth off me, enjoying the stream of hot water.

Bliss...

Bluerise and Motley are having a conversation on various topics. The pegasus prefers to answer in short sentences, and Bluerise cooing like a bird in the spring.

I'm glad they're finding common ground. I think if Bluerise wants to, she won't have much trouble getting anyone to talk. She's better at it than I am.

After reading some more, I fall asleep.

***

The 5th of the Month of Heather, Cyanday. Forty-third day of my stay.

I'm taking my morning routine and there's a knock at the door, followed by the sound of a pony voice, "Breakfast!"

Breakfast? What breakfast? I didn't order anything...

The lock opens from the other side, which makes me get ready to use the magical barrier. Motley hears the intruder, too, and comes out of the bedroom to help me receive the intruder.

The door swings open, and the yellow earth pony in a light, dark green outfit, hiding her entire overweight body, enters the room with a food cart on it.

I sigh in relief. It's Lemon... 'Berry'. I have to remember that everyone thinks of her as 'Berry'.

Has she decided to moonlight as a waitress?

"Hi, Daniel. I'm glad you're healthy and in one piece, and I'm also glad you're alive, Motley. And you..." the Star Paladin looks at the unicorn with anticipation.

"Bluerise," she introduces herself.

"Pleased to meet you. Berry," the ranger says and walks over to me. "Who's that? What is she doing here?" she whispers with suspicion in her voice.

"Don't worry," I whisper. "She can be trusted, she came with the caravan from where I came from. The caravan was attacked by raiders, and I was close by, but unfortunately only managed to save her. You can tell her later that you're a Steel Ranger."

"All right," Lemon sighs in relief. "I'll put my trust in you. I've brought enough food. Bluerise, this is your first time here... You can appreciate the local level of food. I bet you haven't tried the ice cream."

The ice cream is delicious. Too bad it's not strawberry dessert.

I tell Lemon about the hard fights in the ruins of Red Spark, trying not to bring up what I learned in Violet's notes. It gets to the sewer, and I purposely skip the part where I climb out of the pipe below where the toilet is. I have two reasons for keeping this unpleasant fact to myself: we're eating at the moment, and Lemon's jokes about it are inevitable—I've had enough of Ferris' jokes on the subject.

When it comes to the leader, I omit who Violet was before, and who my feathered partner was to me. Motley looks at me understandingly, nodding appreciatively. I don't see the point of presenting this information to everyone without her consent.

Lemon pretends to be a little upset when she finds out Ferris is okay, but that's not what interests her.

"Somebody sponsored the raider attacks," she says. "The robots were delivering three containers. One contained furs and clothes, the second drugs, the third tools and household appliances. Softhooves... Meadows... Steelmane... Somebody's trying to cover their tracks... or set them up. I doubt it's Steelmane."

"What makes you think that?" I ask. "Is it because they're in the technology business that you have a soft spot for them?"

"No, they're our main competitors. Dangerous because of their knowledge and robots. But... I've spent enough time studying the families, and I can tell you that the Steelmane are not peculiar to such schemes. They wouldn't risk supplying anything to the raiders to escalate into an uncontrollable problem."

Of all those listed, only one family is missing, which was in conflict with the Waterfall at the Council.

"What about the Falcons? Can they frame the others?"

"Proud birds don't do such dirty business. It's not typical of them. They're not rats."

"That leaves only the Softhooves and the Meadows?"

"Yes. Only they're too rich to do such a thing."

I briefly recount to her the events of Bluerise's release.

"You're lucky to have Daniel looking out for you," she smiles at her. "I'd be happy to, myself."

She turns to me, but the smile on my face looks different.

"Speaking of looking out. Where's my Venture?"

"If you found the note, there's nothing to recount. Just to add that I went to Vanhoover and picked up the connections, got on the trail of whoever has the vertibuck now."

"Steel Ranger connections in town?" I ask confusedly.

Earlier in my story, Lemon had told Bluerise that she was a Steel Ranger. This surprised the unicorn noticeably, since she was not yet aware of their situation here. I thought she was amazed that a pony of her shape could be a member. But out of delicacy she chose to remain silent.

"And you thought our base couldn't be within the city walls? Wrong. There are plenty of secluded places for rangers in other corners of the Vanhoover Wasteland. The old bunkers and basements of several bars in Vanhoover. The Broken Radio Hotel is one such spot. In addition to the usual masters, the Steel Rangers are here. We don't give ourselves away, and you know why."

"What's the point of these 'basements' in Vanhoover?" I ask with interest.

"Well, all I can say is that we buy raw materials and supplies here that are hard for us to get ourselves, that's all."

"Really?" I ask skeptically, still hoping for something more.

"I guess so," the ranger waves her hooves. "I don't really like doing things in town."

"Aren't you afraid of being captured and having all your memories copied from your memory?"

"First of all, who would suspect such a pony of involvement with the Steel Rangers?" she smiles embarrassedly. "And secondly, there are protective spells on our memories. I can't tell them, even under torture, because of the defense mechanism. I can only willingly tell them when I'm calm."

"Okay. So who stole my Venture?" I ask impatiently, beginning to picture myself driving into the faces of these thieves.

Lemon pauses, looks at me with no emotion on her face, and then the shadow of a smile appears on her face and she says, "The Steelmanes."

Yeah, so... Who?! The ones she's been defending recently?

"You're not kidding?"

"No. Your vertibuck was stolen by one of the blood kin of that family. Who exactly, I never found out," Lemon replies in a sorry tone. "It is confirmed by the fact that the vertibuck landed in their territory. They are as interested in technology as we are. I can understand them."

"Well... then we should go over there and discuss the case."

"Are you serious?" Lemon asks. The look on her face and the look in her eyes says to me, 'Are you fucking crazy?'

"What else am I supposed to do?"

"Confront the whole family? Definitely a high-class lunatic," the ranger mutters, rolling his eyes. Bluerise looks confused; she doesn't yet fully understand how powerful and powerful the families are, despite what I've been telling her. "First the Crater, now the Families..."

"And how will you operate a vertibuck?" the pegasus asks.

"Thank you for believing in me, but I doubt I'll be able to get him back today. So, where do I start my next venture?"

"I might suggest you start your search at the main manor of the Steelmane family," Lemon replies thoughtfully. "You know what... I'll go with you."

"What? No, it's..."

"Don't argue with me. You need cover. If you linger on the estate, I'll raise the alarm."

"Yeah? What are you going to do?"

The yellow's face suddenly expresses doubt. She doesn't know yet, herself, how she's going to pull me out.

"I think... I'll ask one of the ranger agents. Or something..."

Lemon worries about me for some reason. Too much... Or maybe she doesn't want to stay in the company of Motley and Bluerise.

"Well, okay. Just don't do anything stupid and listen to me."

"Sure," the earth pony is clearly happy that I agreed.

I have a feeling I'll regret that decision yet. If anything happens to her, I won't forgive myself.

"Fine. I'll put on a warm coat, and we'll go," she says. "And you have fun. Motley, show Bluerise around town. Let her have a look around."

The pegasus raises her eyebrow in surprise, which roughly means 'since when you've got the right to order me what to do?'

***

Lemon and I stroll to our destination, discussing the ponies and the places we meet along the way. She bought a newspaper, and sits on a bench nearby so that I'm in her line of sight.

A huge, elegant, four-story mansion. Its walls are of neat white stone and in perfect condition. It is surrounded by a four-meter brick wall. The building is well guarded: the perimeter behind the wall is scanned, judging by the distinctive sound, by Sentinels, there are turrets on the walls, and on the roof of the mansion is a unicorn guard in strong combat attire, armed with a rifle with a powerful telescopic sight.

It's an impressive mansion.

There were many mansions in the neighborhood in all directions, but this was the only one with such enhanced protection. The rest had low brick walls.

Surprisingly, some of the yards have green vegetation, and not some artificial, but real, with a fresh smell that spreads around. By the way, the mansion with reinforced protection does not particularly stand out. It's all classy and tasteful. It's likely that this neighborhood belongs to all sorts of rich masters, and the family has restored it after the Great War, as there are no traces of riots or the aftermath of general chaos here.

I come close to the main lattice gate. One of the Sentinels rides up from the back, but takes no action. As I marvel at the massiveness and shape of the main gate, I notice that there is an intercom embedded in the wall next to it. I walk over to it and magically press the call button.

"I need to see Robus Steelmane," I say, and release the button.

"Do you have an appointment?" an answer is heard after a while.

"Yes," I lie, pressing the button again, this time without letting go.

"What's your name?"

"Daniel Evans," I hear the sound of paper rustling after that.

"Sorry, you're not on the list."

"What do you mean I'm not? I was clearly told that I had to meet with the head of the family on an extremely important matter that cannot be postponed."

"What business? If it was something important, I would have been told."

"Yes, I have just been assigned this task, you probably have not yet been informed of my arrival. I need to meet with him immediately, or there will be serious consequences, and it will be your fault for blocking my way," I say grudgingly. On the other end of the intercom I hear the guard's doubts.

"Give birth quickly!" I say impatiently.

"All right, all right. Robus has no guests right now, so come on in, but you'll turn in your weapons, including stabbing and cutting and explosives, at the entrance to the mansion."

"No problem," I say, releasing the button, and the lattice gate opens inward.

I walk along a small cobblestone pathway lined with beds of fresh flowers and bluish lanterns, apparently turned on at night. A gorgeous green lawn with flowerbeds on either side. One of the Sentinels follows me at a safe distance, aiming its deadly weapons at me.

The unpleasant sensation of having a machine gun ready to make a sieve out of me, and a rocket launcher capable of cooking my insides into a meat stew without a problem, are staring into the back of my head.

The other two Sentinels wheel on the paving stones in the neighboring lanes. Everything here is so well-maintained... How many caps and slave labor did it take to do this? The construction robots could have done that, though.

After walking along the path to the mansion, whose courtyard I unwittingly admired, I climb the steps and head for the exquisite double—seemingly armored—dark-brown doors. They swing open, and I am greeted by a butler in a slave collar. He is dressed in a standard black tails with a white shirt.

"Let me search you before you cross the threshold of this house," he says in a polite tone.

"Yeah, no problem."

After being searched, the butler escorts me to the office of the Father of the Steelmane family.

By the way, the inside of the mansion looks new. There's not a hint of the apocalypse that's happened. It's just like the Luxury hotel, if not better. The paintings are old but intact, the plants are alive, the furniture is in excellent condition, and the curtains are clean and beautiful and pleasing to the eye. Almost everything is in harmonious shades of gray and blue. Here I notice only one guard, a unicorn in a tight-fitting outfit.

"If I notice," she begins, "that you're using some suspicious spell, I'll turn you into a pile of ash."

I nod.

Climbing up the massive spiral staircase to the fourth floor, the butler shows me Robus's study. He enters and politely tells me to wait here. By the way, I don't hear a sound from the cabinet. Either it's the perfect soundproofing, or Robus has already sizzled the butler with a look for letting someone in who is not assigned.

A few seconds later, a dazed butler-slave emerges from the cabinet. At least he's alive. So that's the first scenario after all—soundproofing.

"You didn't have an appointment, did you?" he asks, very worried.

"Really?" I smile. "Of course I had an appointment. By me," I say and walk past him into the cabinet.

I see not only Robus and his advisor Haley Blue there, but also some kind of pegasus.

A pegasus?!

Oh, I remember. Cherry told me that Vanhoover once discovered a pegasus Stable.

Nevertheless, it is strange, because the butler reported that the head of the family has no guests at the moment. The unfamiliar pony is dressed in a repair jumpsuit of a blue hue, which, however, is not particularly soiled. His fur is the color of iron, and his mane is thick and short and midnight blue with barely noticeable silver strands brushed back.

Stylish.

Robus, Haley, and the red-orange-eyed pegasus look me over with amazement and a dose of curiosity.

"Good day, Robus," I make a small respectful bow, then turn to the councilmare. "And Mrs. Blue," and then to the pegasus. "And..."

"Troy Steelmane," he says, looking at me in surprise.

Steelmane... so he's a blood kin of the Family.

"Nice to meet you, Troy. Yes, I know," I turn to the Father, "that I didn't show up at the appointed time, but I needed to talk to you about something specifically. My property was stolen from me a few days ago, and I know your family is involved, based on eyewitness accounts."

"Your name is Daniel Evans, right?" he kindly clarifies.

Robus's surprise evaporates: he now regards me with curiosity. He himself is dressed in an unremarkable business suit: a gray jacket, a blue shirt, and a lead-colored tie. It was about the same color as his sumptuous attire when he visited the Council. Then he seemed to me to be a good-natured and kindly old pony who looks at everyone like foals wanting more caps for his needs and games. Now I could talk to him in person. Because I barged in here uninvited, there's a good chance I'll be kicked out of here. Lucky if I'm alive.

"Yeah," I reply briefly.

"Well, you fooled my butler, and that's why you got through security quietly. You think you can so brazenly break into my property and then walk out quietly?" Robus asks. There is no note of anger or malice in his words.

"No, of course, until I get my property back. Then I can leave quietly," I say, looking into his eyes.

"And you're no slouch," Robus laughs, suddenly dropping his formal tone. "You may have come to me unexpectedly, and without proper courtesy or standard etiquette, but you were not afraid to do so. I like that. If you want something, you take it without hesitation. So what are you accusing me of? But before I answer, I'm gonna ask you to sit down. There's no truth in hooves, after all," he smiles.

I sit down in the chair in front of his desk. Troy is sitting in another chair to my right.

The cabinet looks impressive. There are expensive paintings of picturesque landscapes, old vases with elaborate but lovely patterns, two exquisite swords on the wall, lots of fancy new furniture, a matching soft dark rug, and a statue of some majestic prewar pony in the corner.

"I've come to return my vertibuck, called 'Venture,' which was brazenly stolen from me," I say bluntly. At the word 'vertibuck', Troy's calmness is replaced by a touch of unease. "I've gotten on your trail, since according to eyewitness reports, the vertibuck landed in your territory."

"Really? And we just recently got a new vehicle..." Robus turns to Troy and looks at him questioningly. "Son, you said you found it on the roof of a building in the Wasteland. Why is this pony claiming to be his vertibuck?"

"Well..." the pegasus falters and blushes slightly. Son? It turns out the butler wasn't wrong about him having no guests at the moment after all. And he's a pegasus... Robus took a Stable pegasus as his wife? "His... No, he's just a random passerby who decided to claim it as his flying transport. He just saw it and wanted to take it away!"

His manner of speech seems somewhat arrogant.

"Sure," I interrupt Troy. "Tell me you didn't find that vertibuck near the ruins of Red Spark, on the roof of a three-story building!"

The dark gray pegasus worries even more.

"Troy, is this true?" Robus asks in a serious tone.

"Yes..." the pegasus mutters quietly. "I'm the one who brought the vertibuck to Vanhoover. By myself."

"And how did you know about it?" I ask. "I didn't fly it up to Vanhoover itself."

"On the day of the Council, a caravan belonging to us spotted a flying vehicle landing near the town. It was reported to me. When your vertibuck flew toward the Crater, I followed it alone. When it landed, I waited a moment for you to leave, and then found myself near the charming bird... I mean, the vertibuck... and began to figure out her control system. It was difficult, but I managed to control her. It's just superb that such a huge metal construction can fly so fast! I've seen photos from before the war, but I've never seen anything like that in real life. Such graceful shapes that can cut through the airspace with ease."

He says this with such enthusiasm and admiration about Venture... But she's mine! He may like this bird, but I had my eye on her first!

"I'll ask for my transport back," I say kindly.

"I'm afraid it's not that simple," Robus says, sighing heavily, returning his polite businesslike tone. "You can't prove to the others that it belongs to you. You must have found it yourself somewhere in the Wasteland. So even if it did belong to you for a while, most ponies need it more than you do alone."

"Even so, I am its last owner."

"I understand," the older pony politely interrupts me, "how you're feeling right now, but you also understand that a working flying machine has marked new opportunities for us. Griffons and pegasi can't fly without breaks, even with special wagons. Vertibucks, on the other hoof, protect the pilot and don't make him strain his wings, in difficult weather conditions this is especially useful, and they can transport passengers or things anywhere in a short period of time."

"What about me? It's my find, after all," I say indignantly.

"You want us to pay you?" Robus asks. "Then we can part quietly."

"I wish you'd just give my Venture back. I know that vertibuck is important to you, and not only you, in quite a few ways. Maybe if I can find the blueprints for a vertibuck or some other flying vehicle, you'll give my Venture back?"

"Perhaps," the elderly gray earth pony reflects. Then the Father turns to Troy. "What do you think?"

"It would be easier to work from the blueprints than to take it apart, but it's still useful to see how it all works, too. And we're almost through taking the vertibuck fuselage apart..."

"What?!" I almost shout, with the urge to pounce on this thief.

This is my property! How dare they?!

"Chill out," Troy hastily hooves up. "It didn't hurt your baby. We only managed to get the top clothes off. And in general, I've already got ideas on how to make it more refined and yet better, more practical. So if you get me the blueprints for a vertibuck, I'll return your beautiful Venture as good as new, and with a new 'outfit', too. What do you say?"

Improved Venture... As reparations for moral damages.

"Not bad, as long as she doesn't get cranky when she comes back during the flight, which will cause me to crash. So if you hurt her in any way, you know I'm going to get you from beyond the grave, understand?"

"Done," the pegasus replies confidently, smiling slightly. "All the more reason she needed gentle... I mean maintenance. From the looks of it, it hasn't been done in about two hundred years. So consider it another reward when you come back with the blueprints. We won't do anything wrong, but we'll help her come to her senses. Cheer up. And with the blueprint, I'll give her a full recovery therapy."

"I'll take your word for it. But where can I even find these blueprints?" I'm puzzled.

I have a feeling it won't be easy at all.

"Beyond the Crater," the pegasus begins, and I almost roll my eyes at the mention of the place, "there's a pre-war airport named Northern Soul, a few kilometers east of it. We'd have groped it a long time ago, but it's still hampered by the security system, which will turn to ash anyone who claims their spot, I mean base. You can tell by the tightened security that the airport belonged to the military, which means there were probably warbirds there, too. So there's a good chance that's where the blueprint is."

Perfect! A malfunctioning security system. What could be better than that?

"Yeah," Troy notices my annoyed expression, "it might be difficult, but you can do it. You mentioned that you were in the vicinity of the Red Spark ruins. If you managed to survive there, the airport won't seem like such a challenge; but keep in mind that it's not far from Red Spark, near where a powerful megaspell fell. So there's high levels of radiation in some places."

Radiation again, huh?

"Couldn't one of the experienced mercenaries or a King have been sent?"

"No one wants to risk their lives for the blueprints. So believe it or not, you're my only hope."

"All right, you'll have the blueprints."

"Excellent," the pegasus smiles.

"I have one question: why did you confess to stealing the vertibuck?" I ask. Robus answers for him.

"If you want true success, you'd better do it the decent way. Then you'll have the respect of those around you, because you chose the hard way."

Now it made sense why Lemon was sure they wouldn't use raiders to attack Waterfall's farms and caravans.

"That sounds strange," I say.

Ouch... I seem to think he's a wimp trying to do things honestly, or that it's weird for a rotten town where every Family only looks out for their own interests.

"I know what you're thinking. In Vanhoover, just about everyone succeeds in a dirty way, that's why it's easy. Anyone can do it. Respect goes to those who succeed without resorting to simple and cheap methods—that's what few masters in Vanhoover can do," the Steelmane leader mutters with a touch of grandfatherly admonition to the young, forgetting again his polite businesslike tone.

He's thinking outside the box, and yet—brazenly using me to get his hooves on the blueprints.

"You'd think it was a decent method to blackmail a property owner to get your way," I say, smirking.

"I definitely like you," the smoky gray pony smiles affectionately. "Noticed it after all. Even though it looks like blackmail, you're doing it for everyone's benefit, and in doing so, you'll get your vertibuck intact, and slightly improved, too. If you wanted to, you'd get caps for finding a working vertibuck, but in that case we'd easily dismantle it for the good of the city. And then we'd be quietly parted."

Robus makes it clear to me that if I don't bring the blueprints, I won't see Venture. He threatens me, but doesn't do it directly. He must make it clear to the person he is talking to. He has an interesting method.

"No, my property is not for sale. But I wonder how much you would pay for a working vertibuck?" I ask curiously.

"About three thousand caps," Robus replies.

So little?! The Waterfall family would have paid eight times that much to eliminate the raider problem. By the way, it's necessary to go to them for a talk, in the process of which I'll get a lot of caps, which I still need to carry away somehow. And that's a lot!

Totally forgot about that because my bird was stolen.

"Not impressed. For what is dear to your soul cannot be measured in caps."

"That's true. You don't seem to be chasing caps, I see. Sometimes it's interesting to look at those who don't care about caps in life," he looks at me warmly.

"All right. I'll leave you to it. Thanks for not kicking me out of here," I say jokingly. "Have a good day."

After saying goodbye, I leave the manor and head toward Lemon, reading the newspaper on the bench.

I don't know if I'll get Venture back when I get the blueprints, but at least I tried. And I got to meet the head of the family and the Son in person; but I didn't have much luck with Haley, the counselor. The whole time we were talking, she was just observing and making conclusions. Robus seemed too good-natured to me, maybe he was hiding something serious. Although he has an interesting motivation in the form of a hidden threat.

Who inspires my confidence is Troy. Even though he stole my vertibuck, he confessed to it and promised to give it back if I got something for him. Oh, and there would be a bonus. Maybe the Father just pretended he had nothing to do with it and blamed it on his son. Or was it all just a trivial game with masks, so that I could leave the mansion quietly and peacefully? It's quite possible. I'd left their territory in peace. I don't think they'd let me back in.

In that case, I have indeed been tricked. That's a clever idea Robus had, I didn't even realize it at first.

It's too early to look ahead. I don't know if I should worry about that, but I made it out of the mansion in one piece, which was good, considering that I was an intruder.

Well, at least I knew where my vertibuck is. Or rather, who has it. I have important things to do in the meantime: I have to stop by the Waterfall family, get Bluerise settled here, and take a walk to Northern Soul, which is full of mad robots and ghouls in pre-war armor. I've got a lot of stuff ahead of me.

Lemon looks happy that I'm coming back safe and sound. She can hardly keep herself from hugging me.

"Shall we go to a restaurant?" she asks, looking at me impatiently.