Fallout Equestria: Man out of time

Chapters

Thunder and Lightning Pt.1
Thunder and Lightning Pt.2
Why now?
Nightmares, living and dead
The Caravan
Caravan Life
Filling the cracks
The Mind is a Minefield
Shattered minds

Thunder and Lightning Pt.1

Thunder and lightning.

It flashed all around me through the bars of the cage I found myself in. Rain flooded through the bars and made mud under the cell, causing me and the cage to sink slightly into the thick liquid dirt below. Small shocks zapped me every now and then from the old, rusted, car battery hooked up to this particular cage. Thankfully the slavers were stupid enough not to put something under the cage, so most of the voltage just went straight into the ground. I didn’t have any cushions or bedding, just a shitty, poorly welded-together cage out in the middle of Old Appleloosa in the pouring rain. FUCK! How the hell did that fucking griffon not find me in the three days I was scouting a safe path around this fucking place. I stopped for one day and took a small nap. Then I was gonna head back. That’s when he finds me, drugs me while I sleep, and drags my ass in here. I tell you what, if he caught me awake, I would’ve ripped his beak out and shoved it right up his... *BANG*

The loud gunshot in the distance suddenly interrupted my train of thought. You learn to distinguish gunshots from thunder when you’ve been out here in the wasteland long enough. It can save your ass sometimes, something these slavers never understood with their lack of brainpower. Or they were just too lazy to bother. As time went on, I could hear more gunshots ringing out. I started following them as they slowly moved through the camp. With how spaced out it was, it sounded like just one pony was trying to be stealthy and muffle their gunshots with the thunder and sneak through the camp. Their timing was god-awful, though.

As I followed the gunshots, keeping my eyes keen on any changes in the environment. As I scanned the area towards the gunfire, I saw a door open in a rinky dinky shack and a floating revolver poked out coated in magical green energy. Followed by a short and relatively tiny mare. I would have taken her for a filly if she wasn’t trying to be sneaky and crouched down. She darted her head left and right until I saw her gaze fall upon me and our eyes locked. The one cage in the center of old appaloosa, away from all the rest. No guards are to be seen nearby. She could probably tell something was fishy about me or this scenario I was in... Or both.

I then saw slaver above where she stood atop a guard post they used to make sure I was still ‘here.’ He wore a battle saddle with a lever action rifle and stared at me. I looked at him and back to the mare. I took my finger and pointed upward, not saying a word. Watching both the slaver and the mare look up was funny. The slaver looked up, all confused. The mare saw him as she looked up and lined up a shot. A second later, a lightning book streaked across the sky, and she fired. Timing the gunshot with the thunder perfectly for the first time I had heard all night. The shot struck the underside of the slaver’s chin, and he tumbled off the tower and hit the ground with a thud. She turned back to look at me and gave me a nod of thanks, and I waved her over. She was hesitant but slowly sneaked over, keeping an eye everywhere around her as she approached.

Once she was close enough to speak to, I asked, “So... You come here often?” and I gave a slight smirk.

She looked so confused I managed a chuckle. “What? No?! Im here to recuse ponies!”

“A more noble cause there is not,” I replied, getting to my feet, Sinking slightly in the mud. “Look, I got people I need to get back to, plus this place is crawling with murderers and slavers. Say you get me out of here, and I help you not die. Sound fair?”

She looked starstruck that anyone had even bothered to offer help. It seemed like she had actually come alone to this place which made me want to help her more because she was an idiot coming alone. But she was wasting time standing there staring at me.

“Come on now! We don’t have all night! It won’t take them long before they realize that poor bastard isn’t back yet,” I said urgently. Pointing to the dead pony over yonder.

She snapped out of her confusion and levitated out a screwdriver and bobby pin. Thank god she was a unicorn. Electricity is a bitch. And unlocked my cage in record time. Almost faster than the actual key did. As soon as the gate opened, I ran to the dead pony and stripped him of his lever action. I needed a gun, and this was the closest one. He also thankfully had something silent, a large bowie knife. He didn’t bring a whole lot of ammo, either. I mean, he was just checking on me like he usually would and never needed a lot anyway. I jerry-rigged a makeshift rifle strap out of the leather the saddle was made from, slung the rifle over my shoulder, and kept my knife at the ready. It was horribly unbalanced, too heavy in the blade but ill make do.

I regrouped with my savior as she sat around a corner of a building, and I slowly peaked around the corner, her doing the same. There were two ponies with battle saddles and lanterns trotting towards us. I noticed the mare lift her revolver to take aim, but I quickly pushed it away and whispered.

“Hey, I don’t want to bring every raider down on top of us. Let me take these two.” She looked at me like I was stupid. Which was fair, but it didn’t stop me. We needed to do this right, I have a promise to keep, and people need me.

I readied my poorly weighted knife holding it by the blade as I prepared to throw it. As soon as I saw the nose of one of the ponies, I hurled the knife into his face. Running as fast as I could behind the blade, tackling the other one to the ground. I didn’t even see the other one fall to the ground yet. I cupped my hand over the ponies mouth and wrestled him into a lock. Mud and rain flew into my face. Preventing his escape or making any noise as his muffled screams came through my hand. My elbow dug into the back of his neck as he lay on the ground, struggling to get free.

“The knife! Get me the knife!” I whisper-yelled as I felt his teeth dig into my hand. I grunted and pressed my elbow harder into his neck. I leaned into the pony stallion’s ear and whispered. “Keep biting me, and I won’t end you quickly. I’ll silt your throat and let you bleed out.” He stopped biting down as hard, But I could still feel the teeth.

I looked at my companion to see what was taking so long. Only to see the knife handle float toward me. I removed my elbow and gripped the handle, quickly thrusting it deep into the back of the Stallion’s neck before he could wiggle free. I felt his body go limp, and the muffled yelling from him ceased. I stood up and sheathed my knife. I grabbed one of the dead ponies by the hind legs and began dragging them down a dark alleyway nearby.

“What are you doing?” My companion asked me, surprised. Following me as I sat the body behind a ruined trashcan. I guess seeing me so unceremoniously handle a recently deceased was new to her.

“We are trying to sneak through a slaver settlement and not cause a massive firefight. Don’t you think of one of the other slavers here finding a dead body in the middle of a street to be kind of alarming?” she quickly understood my point and agreed to help me drag the second body into the alleyway. We continued through the narrow alleyways of Old Appaloosa. Avoiding slaver patrols as best we could. Silently killing those we couldn’t.

“Do you not feel bad killing these ponies?” The sudden question as we sneaked about caught me off guard. I didn’t take pride or joy in killing anything, as a matter of fact. I hated it. It went against a lot of my people’s values back in Valen. Killing others should be only out of self-defense if all other options have been exhausted. But in a world like this, we have to do things we never wanted to do and cross moral lines that we never needed to.

“Yes, and no,” I responded. “The wasteland is a rough and cruel place, We all half to do things we never thought we’d have to.”

She pondered that for a minute before responding. “But for you it seems almost, natural.”

“Look, ill be more than happy to talk to you about it after we get out of slaver territory, okay? Just know that the actual act of killing I don’t like. But the individuals that I do it to, most of the time do, in fact, deserve it.” After that, she didn’t say another word. She seemed deep in thought as we snuck around.

After some time, we made our way to a multistory barn where the slavers had made their base camp. They ate, slept, and did many untold foul things in there. I knew just from overhearing guards talking near my prison about some rather, unruly things.

“Wait, I thought you were helping me free the slaves?” My companion asked as we sneaked towards the giant barn. A piece of Beautiful music emanating from the inside with a fantastic female voice accompanying it.

“I am. I just don’t know where they are. So where else to figure that out than slaver HQ.” I replied, sneaking towards a balcony side entrance and boosting her up to the next story. “Plus, I wanna get my gear back. It has some rather sensitive data stored on a device that could really cause harm to a lot of ponies if it fell into the wrong hands.”

“That makes sense.” She responded, helping me up with her telekinesis. “What so important that could hurt so many?”

“Nonya”

She cocked her head, confused. “Whats Nonya?

“Nonya fuckin business. Now shush, we’re going in.” She scoffed and went in.

Once inside, we found ourselves overlooking the main interior of the barn. Tabled strung about in front of a well-lit mini stage. Slavers were gathered in groups of three-four, eating whatever slop was in the bowls. Most wore armor and their weapons on battle saddles, save for the few unicorns who had their guns lying against the table. On the stage sat a rather beautiful mare with a charcoal grey coat and white mane with stripes of gold and red. She was the source of the majestic music as she sang into the microphone that rose from the floor.

I knew her, sorta. She made sure I was alive in this hellhole. The raiders were leaving me in that cage to starve until I gave up the contents of my duffle bag. Which was enchanted not to allow anyone other than me to access it. Whenever she walked by my cage, she would always through a half-eaten muffin or some form of leftovers which kept me going. I didn’t know her name or that she could sing this well. All I knew was she was the resident medic and was nicer than most. My ally was entranced by the mare, like she recognized her. I’ll have to ask about that later.

I scanned the ponies in case any of them had any pieces of gear. Mainly my wristpad, which held the sensitive data I hoped stayed secret. My personal firearms were also on that list. My automatic rifle was one, and my sidearm, which was best described as a hand cannon, was my second. The rifle wasn’t as important to me as that hand cannon. It was a powerful eight-shot revolver that me and my father worked on together. It was more sentimental to me than most of my possessions.

A select few wore small segments of my armor, pieces of the main plating on the forelegs or the sides of their chests. It seems they divided the armor amongst themselves when they brought me in. Or fought for it. It angered me that such foul ponies should be wearing such armor that’s so strong and made of a very scarce resource such as Element Steel. But they honestly couldn’t do much with it without a proper forge.

I heard hoofsteps to my right. I panicked and jumped up to come face to face with a much larger stallion than the last. He opened his mouth to yell, but I quickly cupped my hand over his mouth and wrapped my arm around his neck in a headlock. He was much stronger and started bucking like a wild bronco as he thrashed me around. He slammed me against a nearby would with a loud smash that caused some of the ponies below to question what was going on. Muffled yells came from his muzzle as I held firm. Desperately trying to keep us from being caught. I tried to pull out my knife only to have it thrown from my grip as he wildly thrashed about.

“Go! Get out of here!” I grunted as quietly as I could as the Stallion bucked wildly, causing him to lose footing as we tumbled over the edge towards the ponies below.

We landed on a table a group of slavers were eating at, throwing their bowls of food back into their faces. The Stallion’s neck snapped upon impact in my grip, causing him to go limp as I landed on top of him. I was dazed after the impact. I slowly got to my senses and looked around me. The slavers at the table were covered in the slop that was in the bowls, their expressions of shock and anger as they stared at me. My heart sank into my stomach as I looked to see every set of eyes on me, including the mare on stage. She seemed to be the only one afraid, I didn’t know if she was scared for me or of me. The barn was dead quiet.

“So, what’s for lunch, fellas?” I snarked. I heard several guns cock as Slavers sat up and readied their guns. I saw one unicorn mare near me levitate my hand cannon out of a holster and point it at my face, pulling back the hammer with her magic.

I acted quickly and pushed the barrel away as it fired into the slaver behind me and took hold of a knife on the table and stabbed it deep into the mare’s eye. Causing a shriek of pain as she tumbled backward over her chair. I held firmly onto the Hand Cannon as I rolled over her, several more gunshots firing off. I kicked the table upwards as I landed on top of the dead mare, blocking several bullets. I removed the holster from the mare as quickly as I could, realizing it was the same holster I made for the gun in the first place. Plus, it had the ammo for the gun in eight-round cartridges in sleeves that rounded the belt. I saw two extra cartridges before I rolled under a table for cover. I strapped on the holster hastily before having the table flipped off of me as several slavers pointed their weapons at me.

I fanned the hammer of the gun as I fired several shots, dumping the last seven shots into the ponies in front of me. The bullets struck true, putting gaping holes in the slavers. One fell, firing off his automatic battle saddle wildly, striking more ponies that were encircling me. I scrambled to my feet and ran for the nearest cover I could see. Which was an overturned table. I dove behind the table as Multiple shots whizzed past me. One grazing my chest, shooting pain through me. At least these ponies were lousy shots, but their numbers were gonna do me in if I didn’t get out of this place.

I heard a metallic clank on wood as a dark green apple hit the wall in front of me and bounced between my legs. Good god, these slavers were fucking insane as well. I grabbed the grenade as quickly as possible and threw it wildly over my head back into the crowd of raiders. A loud boom went off shortly after it left my hand. I really hoped that one mare on stage fled the scene. I heard the screams of several ponies as shrapnel and fire were flung in every direction. The blast blew the table I was lying against and in turn, myself against the wall with an audible thud. The pain of the table smashing into me as I hit the wall hurt like a sledgehammer to the back. I hit the ground on my hands and knees. I desperately looked around for a door to get out of this horrid situation and spotted the same set of double doors that was the building’s main entrance. I climbed to my feet and ran as fast as I could toward them.

I slammed my shoulder against the doors as they swung open. I was back into the raging thunderstorm as several slavers ran up the main road. Fuck, now Im caught between a rock and a hard place. I got twelve shots left and over several dozen ponies behind and in front of me. I did have a lever action rifle which had about a dozen bullets as well, but it didn’t help much. Maybe I could ask nicely if they could line up and make it easier for me. Dammit, how was I gonna get out of this one? I looked down at the gun in my hand, then at the ponies both in front and behind me.

For the first time in a long time, I felt… Powerless. Nothing I could do right now could save me. I couldn’t fight without dying in the process. Although I could take a good bunch out with me. I couldn’t run. Ponies were always naturally faster than me. I couldn’t hide. They had already spotted me and if I tried to hide, they’d see me do it anyway.

“Well…” I sighed, loading a fresh cartridge of bullets into my gun. “Guess it’s finally that day, dad. The day I leave this world behind.” I spoke, looking up to the clouds, somehow believing my father was listening up there. Somewhere. I heard the shouts and swears of ponies as the stomping of hooves grew louder.

“I’m sorry I couldn’t keep my promise, Twilight. But I have faith Romulus will see it through to the end.” I held my gun to the advancing ponies. I was always willing to die, But I had ties that kept me going. I promised to do so much but couldn’t keep it. I hated myself as I always did… I guess im not so special after all.

I was suddenly yanked from my spot in the open, coated in magical green energy. I flew through the air as bullets raced past me, One striking me deep in my left thigh, causing me to yell in pain. I flew through a doorway and was dropped on the floor with a thud. I heard gunshots outside the small room and screams of mass confusion. Someone said something about a ‘devil in the sky?’ I don’t know, and I couldn’t check as my second-time savior threw several filing cabinets in front of the door with magic. That and I had a bullet in my leg.

I gripped my thigh as the bullet hole oozed blood. Whenever my leg moved, the pain was unbearable with the bullet stuck inside, scraping against tendon and bone. I grabbed a nearby piece of leather barding and put it in my mouth. And with great restraint from my lizard brain, I dug my fingers into the bullet hole. I screamed through the leather as I bit down. Pushing deeper into the hole until I felt the hot metal of the bullet around my fingers. I gripped the bullet as best as I could and pulled, feeling it press against everything with pain and agony as I pulled it out. It was near the entrance when I yanked hard, trying to get it over as quick as possible. Tears streaked down my face from the pain. The bullet came loose with a large expanse of blood accompanying it. I needed to seal the wound before I bled to death.

I looked around desperately for something flammable. My watery vision made it hard to see. As the pain faded, I realized my companion was talking to me the whole time. I guess I never noticed through the pain.

“UH, I don’t know what to do! What do you need?!” She sounded scared and concerned.

“Something that can burn skin.” I groaned. Tearing off bits of my shirt and pressed into the wound to slow the bleeding. She looked confused but pulled up her leg to go into her inventory sorter on her pip-pug. Her expression shifted as she looked through every item she had. Like she just couldn’t find what I was looking for. I looked around the room while she searched her things. It was the town armory. On one wall was a massive reinforced metal wire cage. Inside was a small militia worth of firearms, weapons lockers, armor, and so on. Inside I also saw my duffle bag, safe and sound. My helmet hung off of one of the straps, and the two lenses resembling eyes were dark grey. Signifying a lack of power, Small tufts of black hair were near the bottom of the helmet. Like someone tried to force it on and left behind some stragglers.

“Im so sorry, I... I don’t have anything that can hold a flame other than matches.” My companion levitated out a pack of pre-war matches, sounding defeated.

“I can work with that.” I snatched the matches out of the air and plucked one of the packs with my teeth before grunting. “In the meantime, see if you can get that door open. I need the gear in that bag.” I gestured with my head towards the armory. She nodded and noticed a nearby terminal. Using her pip bug, she quickly got to work.

I spat the match into my hand and laid the pack down on the floor. I concentrated on the match and pictured a stable flame. If I was gonna make this work. I was gonna have to take a risk and use magic. I stared intently at the palm of my hand where the match lay. Slowly, a glowing orange rune appeared around the match. Small but stable. I looked back over at the mare see her entranced on the terminal. Oblivious to my actions. With a snap of my fingers, the match ignited into ash, and a steady flame floated slightly above my palm. The heat resonated on the skin of my palm. I took a deep breath and prepared myself for the next part of this procedure. I quickly removed the blood-stained shirt bits and firmly pressed the flame against the wound. The burning pain that ensued was surprisingly less painful than digging out the bullet. I was just thankful that my ally threw together a makeshift barricade in front of the door made of ruined filing cabinets, old shelves, and a table. Allowing me to perform this crude medical operation. After a few moments, I could smell burning flesh and removed the flame from its position. What was left was a solid chared scab where the bullet wound used to be.

“At least it’s not bleeding anymore. I’ll have to have Romulus look at this later,” I mumbled to myself. I heard the click of a lock and turned my head to see the armory door slowly open. The grey mare smiled at me as she opened the door fully with her levitation.

“Damn, you’re almost as fast as Spyglass. Can you hand me that bag so I can finish this mess?” She did as I asked without hesitation. I quickly sifted through the pocked until I found a roll of bandages and a stimpack. I injected the stimpack into my leg to help dull the pain and tightly wrapped my wound in bandages. I lifted myself onto a nearby stool with the help of my friend. I sat there and rested. Listening to the sounds of ponies trying to buck down the door as the pain lessened with time.

“If you don’t mind me asking, what’s your name?” The question was kinda out of nowhere, but understandable. This pony freed me, and I helped her all without an exchange of names or even a proper greeting. I wasn’t opposed to trusting her. But her hacking skill and a pipbug reminded me of someone I didn’t have a good history with. So suspicion was a given.

“Riley, you?”

“Littlepip, There were some logs on the terminal I wanted to look at. Are you gonna be okay here while I take a look?” Littlepip smiled.

“Go right ahead. Im just gonna put on what’s left of my gear and get situated. After that, we need to come up with a game plan.” She nodded in agreement and went back to the terminal. Putting in her earbloom and listening to the first log.

I, on the other hand, was putting on what little armor was left of my set. Which were the gloves, boots, and helmet. The helmet was simply powered down due to its lack of a wearer, so that was good. But my glaring lack of protection everywhere else on my body really bugged me. That’s when I noticed the two dead slavers on the floor. I had nearly tripped over one when they finally caught my attention. Was I really so used to dead bodies that I don’t acknowledge them anymore? They both had very nasty shotgun wounds on their heads that just oozed blood all over the floor. I looked to my ally and noticed her shotgun, among several other weapons on her back. She definitely was somepony worth keeping an eye on.

The dead slavers wore some basic and crude leather barding which could be put to a better purpose than protecting the dead. I stripped them of the leather barding, and with a little effort. I was able to make some basic armor out of the two combined bardings. “Better than nothing, I suppose.” I took some water and snacks out of my bag and caught up on my severe lack of eating over the past several days. Mainly old granola bars from before the war. But when you were as hungry as I was. Anything tasted like heaven.

Suddenly my companion turned away from the terminal in a rage-fueled stomping fit, gritting her teeth as she stomped around in a circle. She was grunting and mumbling swears under her breath that were quite foul. Whatever was on that terminal really upset her. I opened my mouth to ask what was wrong when the sounds of gunfire outside were deafened by a loud boom as the door exploded in fire and shrapnel. The shockwave from the blast knocked me off balance, and our makeshift barricade went airborne except for the table, which caught maybe an inch of air and skidded across the floor with violent screeches. Sweeping out my legs from under me and landing on my face and chest, causing my already wounded leg to scream in agony. Which was better than being where I was, as a filing cabinet flew right where I was standing before. The other cabinets slammed against the walls and landed back on the floor with loud thuds. One directly impacted the terminal, causing it to explode in sparks and a small flame on the inside of the monitor.

In my dazed state, I subconsciously drew my hand cannon and brought it around to face the smoldering doorway. My vision was blurred from my watery eyes, and I could only see a hazy outline of the doorway through the dust and smoke. I quickly took off my helmet and rubbed my eyes. Trying to clear them before any slavers came into the room. I finished and aimed my hand cannon once again. And I froze upon seeing a rust-colored pegasus stallion with a black cowboy hat fly stepping into the doorway.

“Calamity?” I grounded under my breath, unable to be heard. He quickly scanned the room and stopped on littlepip, who was stuck under a filing cabinet. Missing me entirely. He flew over without hesitation and helped her out of her predicament. Of course they were partners! No one was foolish enough to attack this place without backup. But a pegasus of all things? Calamity mentioned a few times that he wanted to wipe out these slavers. But we were in a high-danger area, and that was a discussion for later.

I stumbled to my feet. Which caused the pegasus to finally notice me. “Riley? What are ya doing here? And where’s the rest of ya special armor?” Calamity asked, handing littlepip a roll of bandages for a cut on her hind leg.

“Well, I WAS supposed to be scouting the upper ridgeline over to the northeast and got caught in an unfavorable situation involving a griffon. As for my armor, among other possessions, have been spilt amongst the slavers.” I responded, throwing my duffle bag over my shoulder.

“Well, I hope you don’t plan on leaving us just yet. Me and littlepip here are gonna rescue the slaves here and could sure use a helping hoof.” He asked.

“So I’ve been told. I’ll do what I can and clear the way from the shadows since Im lacking in the protection department. But I, unfortunately, don’t know where the rest of the slaves are kept. I will ask that you keep an eye out for the fancy wristpad I always wear. That thing is more important than you realize.” I asked, hobbling over to the doorway. Peaking outside to check for danger.

“Sure thing, but you sure you’re good? Ya got a pretty nasty limp there.” He asked with a hint of concern.

“I’ll manage,” I responded before ducking into a nearby alleyway.

Author's Note

Hi! you've made it this far! I hope you have some criticism whenever you get around to finishing what I got so far. Cause I really need it!

Thunder and Lightning Pt.2

I saw the saddle lanterns of three slavers light up the small offshoot as they ran past the alleyway I was hiding in. The entirety of Old Appaloosa was in alarm, and I was doing my best to stay hidden. Keeping my word of taking out groups of two in quick assassinations from the shadows. My stealthiness wasn't my best strong suit, but with the amount of chaos I found myself surrounded by. It was easy to be "missed" by passing slavers. Not to mention the raging thunderstorm was making it harder for everyone to do anything. I was still picky and observant with my targets. As I mainly kept an eye out for those wearing my gear. I know that seems selfish, but with how squishy I am compared to the guns these ponies were packing. I needed at least a majority of my armor back.

I had already managed to get a few pieces back in the time I was sneaking about. I had acquired most of my right arm's worth of armor up to the shoulder pad and most of my left leg's worth of armor. Things were finally going my way. I was gaining gear and was taking out slavers best I could. Of course, the sounds of gunfire amongst the settlement were a good indicator that my allies were still going strong, so that was a plus.

I climbed atop a flat-roofed building along one of the side roads and scanned the surrounding area, looking for my next target. My helmet's night vision setting made it easier to spot ponies in the open but kept fluctuating under the mass of lightning strikes in the air. Every flash from the lightning caused my helmet to glitch and occasionally power off. Ever since the Elementals abandoned this world, what was left of the elements became unstable and wild. Lightning that normally wouldn't cause these issues was now causing mostly anything electric to go on the fritz, if the lightning was strong enough. It's not just the lightning, either. Normal changes in the earth would happen more often and, in most cases, more violently. Caravan routes have shifted and changed so much over the years due to fractures in the earth cutting roads in half or rockslides causing mass destruction. Now, the elements were simply too unpredictable.

My gaze stopped on a lone stallion running through a long alleyway that wrapped around to the main barn. Most likely a shortcut they used to get around faster, but tonight, it would be their demise. I lept from one roof to the other and immediately regretted that choice when I landed and felt the pain from my wound resurface violently. I dropped to one knee and grabbed my thigh, massaging it gently until the pain dulled.

"Yup, not doing that again," I mumbled as I climbed down from the roof and ran into the alleyway via one of its many offshoots. I turned the corner and ran straight into the stallion I had spotted earlier. Our heads collided, and we both stumbled backward. I heard something clang to the ground and was only surprised as my helmet protected my head from the concussive blow. As the pony was dazed and was rubbing his head. That's when I noticed what hit the ground.

I looked to find my white element steel gladius lying in the mud just before the stallion. He must've been holding it before he ran into me. I sprung to action at a moment's notice and dove toward the weapon. Grabbing its handle and continuing into a roll as I smacked into the stallion knocking him to his haunches in his dazed state. Blade in hand, I gripped the stallion's head with my free hand, held it against the ground, and brought the blade's tip to his throat.

"I'm gonna ask this once. Where is my wristpad?" My voice was low and tried to sound threatening. The stallion stared at me in short disbelief, which turned into a small smile.

"What does it matter to you? There's too many of us here for even you to handle by yourself, mister 'trade master.' You may as well give up now." his cocky voice just annoyed me.

"I'll take my chances," and I pushed the blade deep into his throat. Afterward, I checked his saddlebag for anything useful. The only thing worth nabbing was the sheath to my gladius. I hooked it back onto its rightful place on my belt and gave the blade a few swings before putting it away. Perfectly balanced.

I heard the clopping of several hooves approaching from another offshoot and dove for cover behind a massive pile of debris that was once a backside of a house. I saw the lights of their lanterns illuminate the area as they came around the corner. There were five of them in total. They stopped upon seeing their dead comrade lying in the mud, blood pouring out of the wound in his throat.

"Godammit!" one of them cried out, inspecting the body further. "I knew we shouldn't have fucked with the Caravan! They're picking us off one by one!"

Another one walked over and punched the other in the face with one of his forehooves. "Get a hold of yourself, dammit! If the whole damn Caravan were here, they wouldn't be as sneaky as this. They would run around guns blazing until they found their precious trade master. This is just our escaped prisoner being a coward."

"Well, he's doing a pretty damn good job! I say we should just count our losses and get the fuck outa here!" another mare said, looking around franticly in a panic.

The mare got a hoof to the face as well. "And face the wrath of that damn thing along with Redeye?! Hell no! We have a job to do. Let's find this fucker and get it over with before-" They all stopped and looked up as a massive shadow passed overhead. I too, looked up to see what the sudden unusual darkness was. I nearly gasped but kept it down as a whole fucking train car levitated overhead, enveloped in magical green energy. I was shocked. When it came to levitation, more mass meant more strain on the mind. That's why most use the laws of physics along with telekinesis to do such feats as I saw before me with little strain. Such as using a large pole for leverage or even pushing it along floating cylinders for a brief moment. Or a large enough group could manage something like this. But ponies didn't really use magic this way. As they preferred feats by the one over feats by the many, like many great mages I've read about.

I looked back to the slavers, who were also entranced by the sight, utterly oblivious to any stealth attack. I drew my gladius and lept forth from the shadows. My wrath was quick and clean.

I continued onwards, running through the alleyways trying to follow this flying train car. It seemed to just fly straight and didn't have any foreseen destination. Nonetheless, I followed. After clearing that large group from before, I managed to get the other complimentary pieces of leg and arm armor. All I needed now was my front and back chest guard. That and my wristpad, which was still my number one priority. I had to take a turn at the end of the alleyway and saw a pony rapidly approaching as they ran towards me. I drew my gladius with a swift slash toward the pony's neck before they could get a shot off. I continued running, not looking back as I heard the choking fade into the thundering rain.

The train car slowed to a stop above a fairly large one-story building. The wood was beyond rotted, and the pillars holding the overhanging ceiling looked like they could give away at any moment. The windows were shattered, and the little paint that was left was peeling away. The large letters that made the billboard-esc sign over the build once had large letters bolted onto it, spelling 'Sheriff.' the only letter left was a large S that swung down by one bolt and hung in the air, swinging with the wind from the storm.

Outside the sheriff's office was a fresh crater with blood and gore coating the interior and several dead guards around it. In the epicenter of the crater, I saw the lightning reflect brightly on an object heavily covered in debris. Before I had the chance to investigate the object. The ground shook as I missed the train car fall out of the air, crashing through the sheriff's office. Sending debris flying in all directions. I fell onto my rear, unable to keep my balance. Dust engulfed the area and blinded me. Only for a moment as my helmet corrected itself and projected outlines of several ponies through the dust. Most of the ponies were young, and most of them were colts or fillies. They sat inside cages that were inside the office. The only ponies outside the cells were my two allies, Calamity and Littlepip, and the same unicorn that was on stage at the barn. I guess she's with us now.

I stood up and dusted myself off, wiping the dirt from the lenses of my helmet as I stepped slowly around the train car that now sat inside the sheriff's office. The first thing I was was a large hoof extending out from under it, with the glowing blue light of my wristpad on it. Without a second's hesitation, I dove onto the ground, mud splattered onto my helmet as I stripped the device from the appendage. I strapped it onto my left arm where it should have always been along my left gauntlet. I flipped it open, showing the two screens similar to a laptop, only miniaturized. The sides of the two screens had a few knobs and buttons for different uses that the screens couldn't fulfill. The bottom one acted as a digital keyboard, and the top was the display. The top screen showed a lock with chains. Apparently, they were so careless trying to hack into the thing they triggered a system lockout. Amateurs.

I worked my magic and a few moments later I had full access to my datapad. The first thing I did was check the stored data on its drive. If any of that was tampered with, the whole Caravan was compromised. Overrides for specters and access to blueprints of weapons to advance for the time we lived in. I gave a loud sigh I felt I had been holding in since they shoved me into that cage. As they never even got past the initial access lock. I put the device into recalibration mode as it was all out of wack, focused on a pony body with... wait... was that an alicorn? I looked over at my allies, Littlepip was passed out, and the others barely acknowledged my presence since they both had their own wounds to tend to. I had questions for them later.

I stood up and returned to the small crater, sliding down to investigate the shining object I had seen a moment earlier. I dug through the mud and water already pooling at the bottom of the crater, and I pulled out my chest piece, both the front and back plate, out of the mud. The last piece of my set, it felt heavier than normal. I turned it over a few times in my hands, and a large chunk of pony flesh fell out of the bottom and slapped into the mud with a disgusting sound. Blood oozing from its orifices. I gagged heavily and barely managed to keep down the minute amount of food within me. Blood dripped down from the inside of the chest piece. I looked down at the hunk of flesh and realized it was the breast of the poor bearer of my chest piece. The bloodied stumps of the head for forelegs were obvious now that I looked at it. The armor succeeded in protecting the wearer, at least what it was covering.

"I am not putting that on until I wash it. That's fucking foul." I said to myself, hesitantly hooking the armor piece onto my bag and returning to my allies.

I sat quietly at the table with my newfound allies in a train car as it rumbled slowly up the hill. Littlepip and Calamity came prepared when they wanted to rescue slaves when they brought this train. My companions were sitting at a table in the same train car, talking about something. I myself was just working on my datapad and getting it as best I could to how it used to be. While daydreaming of course. It was my second-best coping mechanism since waking up from the cryopod. It was my only other true escape from the hell that was this world. That and music were my go-to's. DJpone3 has been the light at the end of the tunnel for me and my suffering.

While I was tinkering on my wristpad, littlepip was the first to initiate a conversation. "Is that some sort of Pipbug?" She asked, eyeing my wristpad curiously.

"No, but it's similar in purpose and made from a few parts of some broken Pipbugs I've found on my travels. It has much more data storage and does ten times more than any normal Pipbug." I explained, showing the device on my wrist to the curious mare. Not removing it from its spot on my wrist. "Plus, it's optimized so it's not as bulky as a Pipbug." I pointed out the drastic size difference between her pipbug and my device.

"That's actually quite impressive." My device impressed her, so I decided to show off just a bit.

"Not to mention, was I get it synced back up to my helmet. I can do the majority of its functions through the visor. It's quite complicated, really."

"Wow," she almost whistled. "In all my time and practice with Pipbugs, I've never seen something like that."

"No, I won't make you one," I chuckled, predicting the question before it was even asked. Getting a chuckle from her as well.

"Oh well, I didn't really need one anyway. I don't wear a helmet, and im quite comfortable with my Pipbug anyway." She shrugged.

"I would recommend you start wearing one." I started. Changing the topic. "I know most of the helmets you find nowadays can be uncomfortable with larger manes like yours. But it can save your life in more than one way. One being a sneaky fucker with a bat or gun coming up behind ya and just." I slammed my fist into my palm and made a smacking sound with my mouth. It seemed to get the point across. The expressions on Calamity and Littlepip's faces proved it.

"I'll think about it." She responded.

"I'll pass. Messes with my line of sight." Calamity said, waving a hoof as if brushing away the idea.

The door to the train car opened getting all of our attention as Velvet Remedy, our new medic who had insisted on treating my leg even though I told her not to worry about it, walked in and sat down next to Calamity. She and the rest of the group talked amongst themselves about the slaves they rescued while I continued to work on my wrist pad. I took out a flathead screwdriver from my bag and popped open the entire thing allowing me access to the device's innards.

"Excuse me, um, can I ask your name? It seems only fair that we know your name if you're accompanying us." Velvet asked, breaking my focus on my device. Thankfully I didn't break anything.

Before I could respond, Calamity took over for me. Seeing I was busy and he already knew me. He decided to introduce me. "That there is Riley, the trade master. Or at least one of the many names he has. He runs the most extensive and biggest trade caravan in the whole equestrian wasteland. If you're looking for something, his people probably have it. Hell, even ditsy doo orders shipments of stuff from him to sell herself."

"Really?" Velvet said, looking me over. "He doesn't seem the business type. He gave me the hardened criminal type." Wow, ouch much.

"You'd think that when he's outside his Caravan. He only leaves with small groups to go do scouting missions to new settlements or to scavenge for goods. He's a hardworking individual, just like most folk. The truth is that he has been on the worse side of the barrel more often than not." Calamity explained.

"Aint that the fuckin truth." I chuckled, closing up my wrist pad and letting it reboot.

"Eyup. I've been doing business with him and his folk ever since they first showed up in new appaloosa. And Ill I have to say is out of all the folks in the wasteland. You can trust them for quality and protection. I haven't regretted any purchase so far. And they make protection contracts for some of the other caravans." Calamity's words hit home. Glad that ponies outside the caravan actually think well of the business I do. It was a given, but sometimes I get my doubts. It's Ponies like him that assure me that Im on the right side morally.

"Well, I guess it's good we have him as an ally then, hmm?" She said, looking at me.

"Of course," I said without hesitation.

Throughout the conversation, both prior and current. Littlepip had this look on her face like she wanted to ask me something. But every time I noticed she was about to say something or wanted to. She kept silent. She almost seemed afraid to ask. Or perhaps the question just wasn't worth asking. Either way, she had something to say.

"You got something on your mind, Littlepip?" I asked curiously.

"Oh, it's just back in old appaloosa. Before we went into the central barn, we had a short conversation. And you wanted to finish it after we got out of harm's way." She responded nervously as if she was treading on dangerous ground. I recalled the conversation quickly in my head and understood the question before she even asked it.

"The wasteland is cruel and unforgiving, like I said. It makes even the most innocent and whole-hearted individuals crack and change in ways they never thought they would. Most try to cling to the hopes that things can be different or can be better. Most die with those beliefs or go clinically insane. Like raiders and slavers that lost their good-natured souls to the demon that is this land. Killing, raping, and stealing to satisfy their own hunger fueled by corrupted passion. Or the very same slaves that died praying to the goddesses to save them. Hoping that things would change for the better. It's the sad truth to the world as we know it." My rant shook my party's souls. I could see it on their faces and in their eyes. Velvet looked mortified, almost wincing at my words, refusing their truth. Calamity stared out the window, he knew my words carried truth, and he hated it. But did not argue against it. And littlepip, was simply lost for words. She couldn't believe what I was saying. I could see it on her face. Her mouth hung open as if to speak, but she couldn't find the words.

"However," I announced loudly, shaking everyone loose from their thoughts. "As per the nature of all sentient beings capable of independent thought. We evolve, change, and adapt to the world so we may survive. This world is cruel, so we must stare that cruelty down with a stare that finds the cracks we can exploit. So that we can find a way to live in a world void of natural powers. Some have a drive that forces that change. Some form of purpose drives them forward. Some simply wish to live out their lives with what little peace they can find. Others are driven by a goal or promise of a better tomorrow and use the powers at play to make those changes. Whether for the better or for worse. But these changes always come at a cost, as such an unforgiving world does. Some lose their sense of judgment, and killing becomes second nature. Or perhaps other such acts of foul and unusual punishment of the such become regular and familiar. I will tell you that slavery wasn't that popular at all back in the past. Now you can pretty much see it everywhere." I leaned forward, crossed my arms, and planted them on the table holding me up. Looked at Littlepip, the look of innocence that was cracking. I thought deeply about how much I trusted her before continuing.

"Now I know your question before was why it's so easy for me to kill. The truth is that... It's not. Never has a life I've taken not stuck with me over the years. Nor has it gotten easier to move on or commit the act. But the world we live in calls for it. As such, I've adapted to what the world requires of me to do what was required of me. And even though Im still working to achieve what I need. I still have lines I won't cross. It's what separates me from the horrors of this land." I paused for a moment before smiling widely. "That and Im filthy fuckin rich!" I laughed, slapping my hand on the table. Calamity joined me, which caused a chain reaction of laughs from everyone.

After a few moments, everything settled down. I still had one last thing to say that would hopefully give the young mare something to think about. "Now, the true question for you is, What is your drive? Your goal? Where are your lines drawn? And how far are you willing to go?" I sat there silently, waiting for a response.

"That was four questions," Littlepip said, tilting her head slightly.

"baaah, you know what I meant." I sighed, standing up and walking towards the door. "Im gonna go get some air before we go over this mountain. Hollar if ya need me." I finished before opening the door and heading out.

I stood overlooking the grand expanse of land in front of me. The ruins of the wasteland stretched before me. Scorched earth and burnt trees among an ever-expanding sea of grey and brown. The sky was unseen through the never-changing cloud blanket. Among the horizon line as I looked out, I swear I should have seen cloudsdale floating where it had always been. My vision flashed as the sky turned a grand firey green as an enormous green mushroom cloud erupted, as the flying city seemed to only to disintegrate under its wrath. I heard the screams of dying ponies falling from the sky and the low rumble of a loud boom. The once great forest that expanded below the mountain was now lit ablaze by green balefire. My heart pounded with my head as the nightmare unfolded before me. Then Rainbow dash hovered in front of me, half her body charred and burnt, her burnt wing nothing more than a burnt husk as she flapped in front of me.

"why didn't you stay? Why didn't you do more?" She said, with a deep scowl on her burnt face, as she disappeared into ash.

I ripped my helmet off and punched myself as hard as I could in the face. My metal gauntlet cutting my face and drew blood. I looked up to see the horrific sight gone back to the wasteland. Cloudsdale nowhere in sight.
I sat down on the flatcar and tucked my knees into the fetal position, and rested my chin on them.

"I did do so much more for all of you than I probably should have; you just wouldn't listen to me. My warnings of death and destruction fell on deaf ears." I whispered, my eyes feeling wet. The cut on my face was still spilling blood down my right cheek.

I heard a ding from my wristpad; I pulled my arm around to gaze at the device. It was a message from Romulus, my right-hand man, regarding my Caravan. He ran things while I was gone, and most of the time while I was there. I just told him what to do in the most basic sense, and he went above and beyond.

"Sir, I know you went radio silent over a week ago for most likely good reasons. But you gave me orders a long time ago to ensure I give you a 'heads-up' every time we reached one of our stops or stopped mid-travel. So I am sending you this to let you know we just arrived in new appaloosa. We're unpacking everything and getting the trading posts set up as you read this. No sign of Calamity, though, He is typically up our asses trying to buy and sell things. Plus, he made a rather special order with a spyglass that he needed to pick up. Otherwise, it's going into the trade pool. Other than that, everything is going swimmingly. I do hope you come back soon, though. The ponies with us are always more nervous when you are not around, especially the young ones. Romulus out"

As I finished reading his report, I smiled and looked up. I was looking forward to seeing them back in new appaloosa. Romulus was a dear friend from my birth; he was close to my father as his personal adviser. But my family treated him as one of our own rather than as a tool. Yes, he may have been a robot, but he was more than that. He was made by Merlin, the first king of Romulus, who named the city after him and served the royal family for over 5000 years. He is the only being made with an artificial soul from a human mage, not the elementals themselves. That, mixed with the hyper-complexity of his AI processing chip. Makes him one of a kind. He has free will but chooses to serve rather than act of his own accord. Which is something he still, in 5000 years, never explained. But I never pried into it. It's his life, and he can share what he wants.

It hit me like a rock to the face that I had never reported to him my status in over two weeks. Good god, how has he not sent a fucking strike team after me!? I quickly wrote: "good. Im on my way back to New Appaloosa as we speak. I will give you the full report in person. Keep an eye on the train tracks."

After I sent the message, Sounds of gunfire and incoherent yelling broke out from the front. "Fucking, what now!? I grumbled, jumping to my feet and climbing to the top of the next car. Running across the roof to the next flat car. On the ground next to the train, I saw the dead bodies of the pull team race by as the train began speeding up. Fuck, that's not good. I hopped the gap to the next car as I then heard gunshots behind me towards the rear of the train. I stopped and looked back, seeing Littlepip on the roof of a train car a ways down. I trusted that she and the other two could handle whatever was happening back there and continued to the front of the train.

I came upon the flat car just before the train's engine to see all of the pull ponies dead, with six raiders shoving their corpses off the train. That disrespect of the dead made me furious. I dropped down to the flat car, drawing my hand cannon. Before they could grab their guns, I unloaded all eight shots, fanning the hammer as I ripped the ponies apart. After the onslaught, only two were left. I had missed them barely. One was a unicorn with a pump action shotgun aimed at me. I ducked and rolled to a corpse of one of the raiders I felled, grabbed it by the throat, and held it up, blocking the shot. He desecrated the dead, some doing the same to him seemed like justice. My belt hissed as a new cylinder of eight bullets popped out. Held by a small metal arm an inch and a half away from my hip. I unloaded my gun, pressing the button that ejected the cylinder, letting it fall to the flat car, and rolled away. The raider fired another shotgun blast into the dead raider's corpse as I held it steady, walking forward slowly. I flipped the gun in my hand and hooked the new cylinder onto the small hook of the firearm. I smacked the weapon against my thigh as the cylinder popped into place.

Out of the corner of my eye, I saw the other raider pony with a twin pistol battle leap to my side weapons ready to fire. I instinctively threw the corpse at him, knocking into him as his battle saddle fired wildly, as they both fell to the floor. Using my now free hand, I cocked the hammer and fired at the shotgun pony. It struck him in the chest, killing him, but he managed to fire another shot in his final moments. The wild buckshot struck me in the chest, sending me back a few steps before I regained my composure. My chest cried in agony as something cracked from the power behind the blast. I grabbed my chest and heaved. Armor is only so good until the concussive force gets you. I noticed the other raider push his dead friend off of him and begin to try and stand. I rushed, and full force kicked him as he got his footing and was sent off the train that was going alerting fast. I heard him scream and grunt as his voice faded. I looked around to see if more raiders were at the front of the train. When I could confirm, the front was clear. I checked my self-diagnostic tool on my wrist pad. I got it from a destroyed pip bug and reprogrammed it for my body. It flashed several alerts on my chest. Saying I had four cracked ribs, and several more bruised.

"ugh fuck me, no wonder it's hard to breathe," I grunted, Pulling out a stimpack and injecting it into myself. It relieved some of the pain, but the healing would take time. I made my way to the boxcar I lept down from, climbing back to its roof. As I got to my feet, I saw a rust-colored pegasus dive out of the air with a... THAT FUCKER! Calamity was being chased by that same griffon who drugged my ass. Rifle in his claws, firing at Calamity, who couldn't get a good shot off with this fucker tailing him.

"CALAMITY!" I shouted as loud as I could, making my chest scream in pain. He turned to look at me, dodging shots. I raised my hand, twirled my finger in the air, and then pointed to the open flatcar. I then ran to the opposite end of the flatcar and readied myself to sprint. As he dove for the open flatcar from the side, he seemed to get the message, the griffin hot on his tail. I watched them come in as I timed it. I started a full sprint as they got close and, with the perfect timing, let Calamity fly past as I tackled the griffin out of the air with a grunt. Both of us landed on the flatcar below in a mess of feathers and grunts.

"Im gonna cleave your beak off and shove it up your ass, you son of a bitch!" I yelled, punching him in the face as we wrestled on the flatcar.

"I'd like to see you try flesh bag!" He growled with a grin, returning punches. His voice was deep and grimy. Like he hadn't cleared his throat in a while.

I kicked him off me and jumped back onto him, setting my knees on his front arms as I threw punch after punch into his beak. Causing blood with each blow. Before one of my punches made contact with his face, his beak shot up and hit my chest. Causing more pain from my cracked ribs as I lost my balance and grabbed my chest reflexively. The griffin took advantage, threw me off, and did the same thing I did to him. Only this time, he wrapped his talons around my throat, clenching tightly. Choking me. I grabbed his arms with my hands, trying to pull them away but couldn't with the total weight of an adult griffon behind it. I started punching and thrashing wildly as my vision started to go red. The increasing grin on the griffon's face filled me with rage. I reached for my gladius and drew it, stabbing it sideways behind the griffon's beak, and twisted my arm as I was showered in blood with the violent removal of the griffin's beak. His grip loosened, and I pushed him off me. He desperately tried to stop the flow of blood by covering the gore-filled wound on his face, choking and coughing on blood. I located the beak on the flat car and made true to my promise.

I was walking away from the still living griffon. I wanted to let him suffer in his final moments like he made me suffer. I hated him. I turned to look at the griffon once more before opening the door to the boxcar. The sounds of gunfire ceased, making me believe the fight was over.

As I looked at the suffering creature, my mind flashed with a memory of my father and me. He had taken me on my first hunting trip. We went with old-school tools as part of a tradition in our family. Bows and arrows. I had just shot an arrow into a six-point buck. We had tracked it down after it fell from exhaustion and blood loss. Heaving, it lay on the ground, an arrow sticking out of its side. My father kneeled beside me, putting a hand on my shoulder.

"a damn fine buck, son," he said, his voice calm and wise. Like a gentle guardian. "now for the final test," he handed me a knife. I knew I had it finish it off. I walked over and raised the blade above the deer. I closed my eyes, brought the edge down, and plunged it into the beast's heart. As it went limp, I opened my eyes and screamed as I saw my father with a knife in him, dead on the ground instead of the deer. I looked to where my father should have been. He sat kneeling with a complex elemental rune in his hand. He closed his hand, breaking the rune as the illusion faded. Bringing the deer back.

"Listen, son," his voice stern and serious, "I didn't enjoy that any less than you did, but it's something I have to do to teach you the value and truth of every life in this world. ALL life is equal. The value we give individual lives over others is nothing but an illusion to make it easier to take life. It doesn't matter if it's a deer, a king, or a blade of grass. Life is all the same, and there is nothing we can do to change that. If you need to take a life, you must understand you are taking something that is equal to yourself, no matter how much you hate it or love it. If you see a life suffering, help as though it was you. If you can't save it, don't let it suffer. That is the elemental of the earth's greatest lesson."

The memory faded as I returned to my body, Still staring at the griffin who seemed to accept his slow death. The large pool of blood around him dripped off the flat car's side. I drew my hand cannon and pointed it at the suffering creature. "elements forgive me and the suffering I've caused," and I pulled the trigger.

I opened the door to the train car just before the caboose to find Calamity and the others. Resting and treating wounds. All eyes gazed upon me, drenched in blood.

"Yeesh," Calamity said, cringing, "the hell happened to you."

"I don't wanna talk about it," I said, stepping forward only to get almost thrown into a wall from a sharp turn the train took, going dangerously fast. "is someone gonna hit the brakes on this fucking thing before we go flying off a fucking cliff?"

Velvet and littlepip looked at Calamity, who nervously rubbed his mane with a weary smile. "I may have kicked off the caboose, which had the brakes."

I never facepalmed so hard before in my life. "why?" I asked, thoroughly disappointed.

"Well, the raiders were making moves on the slaves we rescued, so we all got their attention and put the slaves in the caboose. Kept 'em safe and away from the fight." Calamity explained. It made sense, and my disappointment faded. He had good intentions but didn't quite think it through.

"Okay," I said, thinking, "what's the plan?"

The three ponies discussed who Calamity should fly to safety first since he was the only one who could safely leave the train. I made sure to make it clear that I wasn't going until they were all safe. As they talked, the train took another turn I didn't expect and flung me to the right. I heard glass shatter as I was thrown through a window. My rifle strap caught on something as I slammed back into the train. I was tense as the only thing keeping me from death was a leather strap. I thought quickly and drew my gladius, struggling to keep it in my hands due to the wind. I stabbed it into the train car and got a good grip. I needed to hold on until Calamity got everyone to safety.

I felt the train hit another turn, and the side of the train lifted, wheels leaving the tracks as the turn nearly took the whole train off the tracks. I saw magical green energy coat the entire train as it held it steady. After the turn, the wheels fell back into place along its tracks. Then it hit another turn, but this time I was lowering to the ground as the other side lifted. The train car's roof ripped off with screaming metal and cracking wood as it scraped the rocky cliff wall that passed by. The same green magic held the train to the tracks as I was hanging a few inches from the ground. Any lower, and my spine is gone. The train tipped back over, setting itself on the tracks again.

I pulled out my gladius and stabbed it in higher, pulling myself loose and climbing the train. I was tired of dangling on the side of a train. As I approached the top where the roof had once been, I heard a loud crash as the train went airborne, tearing from the tracks. The last train car and the one I was on flicked upward as it, too, came off the tracks. Sending me flying, and my gladius flying out of my hand.

I felt something hit me as I flew through the air. I thought it was a piece of debris from the train, but it grunted as it hit me. Then, as I started falling, I locked eyes with littlepip, who was falling with me. I acted without thinking and grabbed her, pulling her close as I raised my other arm to the cliff we were descending towards. I flipped my hand up to face my palm towards the cliffside. A symbol resembling a hook popped on my HUD as a barbed hook fired from under my wrist. Latching itself into the rocks. I grabbed the wire with my hand, still holding littlepip in my other arm. The wire tightened and yanked hard on my arm. I felt something pop in my shoulder as my arm went limp, and we swung towards the rocky wall of the cliff. My back smashed into jagged rocks on impact. I had unconsciously angled myself to take the brunt of the blow. I screamed in pain. My arm had obviously been dislocated and something must have broken in my back. The pain was exhuasting. I stopped screaming and bit my lip holding back tears of pain.

"FUCK" I Yelled as we swung in the wind. I looked down at littlepip in my arms, who was looking up at me in concern. I tried my best to hide my pain and asked, "you good?"

"yeah, You?" she nodded, looking down at the fall we would take if my wire had broke.

"I've been better," I grunted, the pain still agonizing. "God, Calamity is slow, isn't he? He didn't even need to drop velvet off far; why the hell is it taking his ass so long?"

Littlepip looked back up at me and said, "The train was probably going so fast he couldn't catch up. Plus, I think landing on something that fast isn't easy."

I thought about her words for a moment, "yeah, fair enough," I agreed. "by the way, nice job keeping the train on the tracks for as long as you did. Saved my ass from becoming a blood smear."

She smiled at me, clearly exhausted just hearing about her feat.

"Well, yall look comfy," I heard a familiar pegasus say as Calamity hovered next to us with a wide smile.

"shut up," I responded, annoyed, "here, take littlepip up first, and be quick. Im in a lot of fucking pain here."

He wasted no time getting littlepip on his back and flying to the top of the cliff. Quickly diving back down for me. He hovered beside me as close as he could. "now, I don't know how much your kind weigh, so this might be harder for me." he said as I climbed onto his back.

"im 180 without the armor, so do the math from there, I guess," I said as we began to ascend, the wire still hanging from my limp left arm. "If you can do the math, that is," I chuckled, also getting a chuckle from Calamity.

"Good one, but that's surprising that you weigh less than littlepip, and you're so much bigger than her and at eye level with me." He stated, clearly oblivious to the differences between pony and human biology.

"when it comes to ponies, you guys' bones are heavier and bigger to support your quadripedal stance on top of stronger muscles. Which means you need more food to power your body. So that makes you guys just naturally heavier and, in a word, 'beefier.' I explained, "We humans are, surprisingly, sixty percent water. So we drink more water and eat less food, unless were fat. We are, in general, weaker biologically than ponies other than height. It's nothing im ashamed of." I could tell Calamity wasn't too interested in a discussion on biology. We rounded the cliff edge, and I saw Littlepip sitting down, resting as velvet came running down the train tracks towards us. Calamity set down next to littlepip, and I stepped off. Weakness of the last week and a half hit me as I fell to the ground with a metallic thud, yelling and groaning at the impact as pain flooded my body.

"Fuck," I groaned as I saw velvet appear, looking down at me.

"oh dear, where does it hurt?" she asked worriedly, her horn glowing as my helmet slipped off my head.

"everywhere," I coughed, spitting up blood.

"ugh, I can't help you with all this armor on. Calamity, help me take it off," she said, looking over at the pegasus as he trotted over. I didn't want them to take it off but I couldn't argue. I could barely move at all.

I felt the individual pieces of armor come off. I was even sat up to get my duffel bag and rear platting off. But it was when my chest armor was taken off, and the shirt with it was my hearing met with several gasps.

"What?" I groaned, looking down at my chest. Other than the several scars from blades and bullets over the years, it Was the expanse of purple as a massive bruise stretched across my chest and now onto my back.

"Oh shit, that's not supposed to be that color," I groaned, letting my head hit the ground, my vision fading as a wave of tiredness swept over me. "I have some medicine in the bag." I managed to mumble before everything went black.

Why now?

I sat upon a grassy hill overlooking the bustling town of ponyville. Ponies trotting to and from buildings and simply living their lives. The blue sky overhead with pegasus flying about, a few clouds dotting the sky. Small critters ran about in nearby fields or trees.

Beside me, nose deep in a book about elemental magic, was my closest friend since arriving in Equestria, Twilight Sparkle; her dragon companion spike passed out a few feet away. Me and her had a love for knowledge and were total nerds. Once I told her I had come from a world with a completely different way of using magic, She wouldn't stop bugging me for details. Luckily for her, I loved talking about it and teaching it equally as such. I'd been in Equestria nearly four years now, so we had covered quite a bit.

"Hey Riley, I have a question," she asked, laying the book in the grass with her magic.

"go for it," I said, fixing my gaze upon the purple unicorn.

"in this book, it keeps saying something about being 'Unbound,' but it doesn't have a chapter or page actually discussing the topic. Is there something im missing, or is there another book?" She asked.

I chuckled briefly, "No, you are not missing anything. That book focuses on the actual magic of the elements. Not the steps leading up to it. That particular topic requires a very unique book called the 'Unbound Arcanum.' Sadly, that book is not stored in Romulus's hard drive, and they were in very short supply back home since only around 1,000 copies were made."

"Oh," she responded, slight sadness in her voice. "that seems like an apparent oversight if something is referenced in a multitude of books but is only covered in one book with a limited supply seems inefficient."

"that's where you'd be both right and wrong," I responded, "the topic of the term 'unbound' is short and doesn't need its own book for it. Even its section in the unbound arcanum is only a few pages. But the arcanum is more than just a book for that topic. It's a magically infused binding that collects knowledge from the world and creates its own pages to hold that knowledge. Between the covers of that book is an infinite library on all topics from magic, to cooking, to mining, to the properties of a grassy null!" Twilight was practically foaming at the mouth as I described this unlimited pool of knowledge.

"On top of that, as people made discoveries, the book would automacily write the following pages to store that knowledge. That's the reason why so few copies exist, because the magical prowess and strength to make such a book is impossibly hard to achieve. Most if not all the copies were made by Merlin, the greatest, first, and most powerful mage in our history, our Starswirl the bearded, if you will. And have been maintained and passed down through the generations." I finished, and Twilight was astounded, entranced at my words. But quickly shook her head to regain focus.

"Okay, back on topic, what is 'unbound.' what does it mean?" she asked.

I smiled. This was one of my favorite subjects, brief as it was. "To be bound is like being chained to the ground and being able to float. You can only do so much before the chain restricts you. To become unbound is severing the chain and letting your soul flow beyond the confines of your body and mind. You can see and understand so much more unbound than you ever could bound. The process of becoming unbound is as simple as it is tricky. You must either pass an elemental trial of one of the four main elements and have one of the said elementals bind you. Gives you a deeper understanding of said element and gives you a much larger energy pool of said element. Or you can have someone who is already unbound do it for you by entering your mind and severing your chain. My dad unbound me when I was seventeen. About 20 years earlier than I was supposed to be unbound, but I was a fucking prodigy." I explained. I stopped Twilight right before she was about to ask a slew of questions. "there's more."

"When You are unbound, your soul unlocks its hidden potential, a hidden magical ability that you couldn't have ever known without being unbound. It could be as simple as passive self-levitation or as powerful as naturally understanding ancient elemental." I finished now, allowing Twilight to ask questions.

"What was your magical ability?" She asked, which caught me off guard since that's not what I expected to be her first question.

"Well," I started, somewhat hesitant. "Mine was one of a kind and had never been seen before but was incredibly unique in the eyes of other mages. They called it soul searching." I looked down to the town of ponyville once more. "What do you see when you look at all the ponies down there?"

"I see the happy ponies of ponyville going about their day," she responded.

"Well, on top of that. I see hundreds of multicolored flames. Each being unique to the pony is belongs to. I cant not see it as I can't just stop seeing with my eyes. But I can choose whether my vision can focus on it or not, like having it sit in the background until I decide to focus on it or not."

"Wow," Twilight said, Amazed at the natural ability.

"It's now limited to ponies, either. It's in animals, trees, hell, even in the grass we sit upon. Although minute and missable, it's still there. Anything that is alive, I can see as a form of energy that matches a soul." I added.

"what does my soul look like?" she asked, gazing at me with that twinkle in her eyes. I focused my vision, the rest of the world becoming blurry as Twilight's flame became more prominent than her physical body.

It was a large purple exterior flame with a smaller interior pink flame with a speck of white at its core. Tiny sparks resembling stars flew off the flame like ashes. The flame gave off an energy as all soul flames did. Feeling intelligent, powerful, and passionate. With a hunger for knowledge similar to my own. I focused back on the normal world and relayed the description to Twilight. Who seemed satisfied with my findings.

"It seems like such a beautiful gift," she gave me a warm smile, But it was quickly replaced with concern as a frown grew across my face.

"not entirely," I said in a hoarse tone. "I can also see when those souls ignite. I see and feel when colts and fillies are born, and when those flames die..." I trailed off on the last part. Twilight was starting to understand, but I decided to continue, "when a creature is born, it's a good thing! Don't get me wrong. It sends a wave of positive energy as new life is being made, like a musical note or song. But that isn't the part that bugs me. When something or someone dies, it gives a final... how do I put it? Echo, of the soul in its final moments that's louder and more prominent, impossible to ignore. Depending on how that being dies determines the echo. It can be peacefully in their sleep. It's like a low musical hum that's peaceful and quiet, and then it fades. But if their death is violent, like when I stepped in during your brother's wedding up in canterlot and killed some of those changelings. It's LOUD, it's VIOLENT, they scream in agony, and I feel it! No matter how many times I hear it. It never gets easier to see." I finished. I hated that part of my 'gift.' but there was nothing I could change about it. But I hated it nonetheless.

Twilight was shocked. She had never known what I saw constantly happening in the world. I curled my knees up and wrapped my arms around them, resting my chin on my knees. "you could imagine how I felt seeing my family go so violently back home." I choked, my eyes watering.

I felt something lay against me as Twilight curled up next to me. Trying to comfort me. "do you want to talk about it?" She asked, trying to be supportive.

I thought about the horrors of the war back home, and the mass death I witnessed from the cataclysm bombs. "No, I do not, not yet," I responded, letting a tear trickle down my face.

There was silence for a moment before Twilight continued, leaning into me. "then I'll be here whenever you're ready, as a good friend should."

I jerked up, breathing hard, as I found myself back in the equestrian wasteland. I looked around to see Velvet and company sleeping around the remains of a campfire. We were in a cave somewhere, near the entrance, so the smoke didn't build up inside. My chest swarmed with sudden pain at my hurried movement, which forced me to fall back onto the back with a thud, which caused more pain. Causing me to groan in pain. "fuck" I mumbled.

I laid there looking up at the top of the cave. Hell It wasn't even much of a cave once I looked at it. Barely went deep at all. I thought about the rainbow dash 'vision' and this last dream I had of a memory with Twilight. I rubbed my eyes, getting the eye booger shit out of them. "Why does this shit need to flare up now of all times?" I whispered. I looked down at my chest, nicely bandaged and wrapped in a blanket. At least they cared about me in some regard. I saw my armor hastily strapped to my duffle bag on a rock near Velvet, still dented and fucked up. It wasn't covered in blood anymore. She must've cleaned it. I guess, at the very least, she cared.

A thought popped into my head. I focused on the flames in each of the three ponies. Their souls, just because I was curious about something. I was shocked that Velvet's flame was eerily similar to Fluttershy's, just color differences to match Velvet's coat and hair. Calamity's was similar to that of Rainbow dash, more of a bronzish gold mixed with yellow.

Littlepip's caught me off guard, as it was a large pure white flame. I gave off an essence of pure willpower, hope, curiosity, and selflessness. That last one scared me. Id never felt or seen something like that before.

"Now I NEED to keep an eye on you guys," I whispered, forcing myself to my feet. I walked over to my bag slowly to avoid aggravating my chest. I dug around as quietly as possible until I found both my wristpad and a stimpack. I put on my wristpad and ran the self-diagnosis. My broken ribs had been set back in place and mended with magic, the bruised ones still bruised. My dislocated shoulder was fixed, but the muscles were still sprained. There was a crack in my lower spine from hitting the rock wall. I didn't know it was that bad. Thankfully that had been mended as well. I injected the stimpack's contents into my chest, the injector making a low hiss. I looked to the rest of the ponies to see if I had awakened them. Only to get a loud snore from Calamity. The bruised ribs alerts began to lessen in severity. As the pressure in my chest dissipated along with the pain in my arm. I found a shirt in my bag and put it on. I walked just beyond the cave entrance just to see where we were.

The cave sat just beyond a large canyon. One we were most likely going to be traveling through. Im was confused on why we didn't just keep following the train tracks since they led back to new appaloosa. Plus, we probably should've caught up with the caboose since it was full of... FUCK. I got on my wristpad and immediately shot a message to Romulus.

"Romulus, shit hit the fan on the train tracks. Right now, there is a caboose of a train filled with over 50 rescued slaves with minimal protection and supplies. I need you to get a team down those tracks and pick them up. They won't last long."

I waited a few minutes for a response. Romulus was fast to reply since he didn't need sleep.

"Understood. Im getting a team ready to go in 20. What about you though?"

"im going to be a little late, but don't wait for me, keep to the caravan's schedule. I will ask you, however, to leave my normal set of armor with the usual stuff. This scout armor got all fucked up in a few ways."

"Understood sir. I'll leave behind one of the jeeps and a few specters to ensure the gear isn't tampered with. Is there anything else?"

I looked back into the cave, seeing my new companions. Low on food, water, and medicine. They had done so much for me, but after all this, I was just going to join back with the caravan and give them a discount the next time we came around. That didn't sit well with me for some reason. I had barely known these ponies, yet I had become attached somehow. More so to the designated medic of the group, Velvet.

"Leave enough food and water for three grown ponies and a full medic saddle. Make sure it's a high-grade one too, not the shitty ones. Also, leave Calamity's order as well. I'm traveling with him as of late."

"hmm? Has the lonely soul of Riley Serpitus Damascus finally made some friends? :)"

"shut up, Romulus. Im repaying these ponies for the care they've shown me the last few days, alright?"

"im just having some fun, sir. I'll have everything ready for you. I must get back to tending the caravan now."

"Alright, Romulus, don't blow a circuit."

I heard my stomach growl like a starved tiger. I felt my mouth dry as sandpaper. I totally overlooked my basic human needs for living. I returned to my bag, pulled out my two canteens, and gulped half of one. Conserving the little water I had. I looked at what I had for food. It was primarily canned stuff from before the war. I took a can of beans and placed them in the still warm ashes of the fire. Warm beans tasted better than cold beans.

As I opened the can of beans and began to eat. I noticed Littlepip kept tossing and turning like she couldn't get comfortable. I plucked out a single bean and threw it at her, Landing on the back of her ear, which twitched at the sudden impact as her head jerked up and looked around franticly. Only to stop on me with a smile on my face. She opened her mouth to try and speak, But I stopped her by putting a finger over my mouth and pointing a thumb at both Calamity and Velvet, who were still asleep. She got the message and closed her mouth. But still glared at me.

"If you're having a hard time sleeping, don't try and force it. It just makes it worse." I whispered, scooping another spoonful of beans into my mouth.

"What did you even hit me with?" she whispered. Scratching the back of her ear, which had taken the hit.

"a bean," I responded, shoveling another spoonful of beans into my gob.

"Why did you hit me in the ear with a bean? I was trying to sleep!" she yelled in a whisper.

"'emphasis on 'trying,'" I responded, swallowing. "there is a difference between actually sleeping and trying to force yourself to sleep, which doesn't work."

She let out a low sigh. "did you need something at least? I know Velvet had to work really hard to make sure your ribcage was okay."

"I want you to do something better with your time than trying to force yourself to sleep when your brain clearly doesn't want to," I said, still munching.

She seemed so confused. She tried to find words but just sat with her mouth hanging open.

"Look," I smirked, "I know you're the stable dweller that popped up near ponyville. And the medic is the other one. It's not hard to see, not to mention you both have pipbugs even though she doesn't want hers." I leaned forward, my face getting serious. "I know why she left the stable, but not you. You said on the train that you boringly left to save Velvet, but then you did some rather interesting things once you saw how fucked it is out here. So, I ask you, what do YOU want? What do you want your actions to accomplish in the wasteland? What does your heart want?"

She was surprised on top of confused now. I had utterly blind-sided her with that question, or rather questions. She didn't know how to respond from the looks of her expression. Then her eyes suddenly narrowed like she had picked up on something.

"Why do you want to know something that personal?"

"I need to know how much I can trust you. What you must understand about this world we live in now is that ponies who do good deeds like you do have a plan. A list of things they need done that can turn them into something bigger and nastier. Redeye started out the same and now look at him. I want to know, RIGHT NOW, if you have a secret plan. Because ponies of a naturally good nature are rare. That's why I keep trading with new appaloosa rather than cut ties with it since it deals with slavers and redeye. It's because ditsy doo lives there." I responded.

"Wait, Redeye was like me? And if the only reason why you trade with new appaloosa is ditsy doo, then why hasn't she joined your caravan yet? it seems right up her ally." Pip asked immediately

"Well, not exactly," I pondered for a second, "redeye did do good deeds but only to get on many ponies' good sides. Gained a lot of trust with people, including myself. Got people to owe them favors and all. Then turned and backstabbed them, myself included. I lost a lot of good ponies that day. Some of them are still alive in the slave pits in Fillydelphia. Gained his massive empire in the name of some fucking ascension or bullcrap. I don't really keep tabs on his goal. Just his people who leave that accursed place and hunt them down." I finished, anger rising in my voice.

"as for disty doo, she has her own reasons," I said, voice softening. "There isn't a time I haven't come to new appaloosa without giving her the same offer to join up with us and do a lot more good all over Equestria than where she's at. She always respectfully declines, saying she's built up relations with everypony in town and that leaving would mean a, how did she put it, betrayal of the town and would do more harm to the town overall, which I understand. She is the go-to pony for literally everything, and her packing up and leaving would hurt the town A LOT. But I got an offer that she can't refuse this time." I finished with a smile.

Nightmares, living and dead

We walked through the narrow walled canyon that lay beneath what used to be Cloudsdale. It's no wonder the area looked so familiar. Scattered pegasus carts, pegasus skeletons, Cloudsdale billboards. It baffled me how I didn't recognize it before, probably because it was the dead of night. Thankfully after me and Littlepip's long conversation the night before to try and take my mind off the dream I had about Twilight. She had been more than willing to ask me questions as we walked. Velvet had given my chest a once over before we left and insisted I take it easy. I had told her multiple times that I would be fine. Stimpacks increased my immune system healing and recovery drastically for a short period of time. Because nothing knows how to heal your body better than, well, your body. Still, she insisted on me not exerting myself.

Calamity was not concerned about me at all. Not that he didn't care, he just said that im one of the toughest, most sturdy things in the wasteland and that id been through the worst. He wasn't wrong. I did manage to tank and balefire egg from a balefire egg launcher one time and one time only. Which put me in a coma for like 2 months. Unfortunately, it also used my spare the dying talisman from my old royal days back home in Valen. It ruined my power armor as well, like beyond repair ruined. I guess id be dead if I didn't have it, but shit still hurt. Calamity was more concerned about looting all the destroyed shit he could so he could try to sell it back to me when we got to new appaloosa and my caravan. Which made me smile when I thought about it, the irony.

But we stopped when we came across a somewhat familiar delivery wagon. I remembered it as ditsy doo's old delivery wagon before the war when she delivered mail, then war supplies throughout Equestria. The rest of the gang was keen on investigating the wagon when I wanted to keep moving. Saying that an area such as this is much too dangerous to linger. But my words fell on deaf ears as they went anyway. I stayed with them, of course. Being alone in this area is a death sentence. I stood watch. Not wanting to be caught off guard. After a short discussion about Calamity and the pegasi with a tad bit of looting. I noticed a large amount of movement on my E.F.S in my helmet. All white dots made a sea of moving white, around our position.

My E.F.S was much different than most other pip-bugs. It was very tethered to me precisely than generalized like most. Rather than just saying shit was allied or friendly, it gave precise readings on hostility. So this sea of white was neutral, but could turn hostile. It didn't take long for my eyes to spot the MASSIVE hoard of zombie ghouls. They outnumbered us heavily, like several hundred to one. Thankfully there was a gap in their hoard that we could take to try and escape. Littlepip also caught wind of everything on her own E.F.S. Since she snuck out of the wagon with Velvet in tow.

I witnessed one of the ghoul ponies pick up their heads to look at me. One eye rotting as it gazed at me, the other eye completely gone with a gaping hole showing the interior skull. It gave a horrifying shriek as it charged me, causing the rest to frenzy.

"RUUUUUN!" I yelled, dashing for the gap in the hoard.

As I ran, the others in the group quickly shot ahead of me. It dawned on me that as a human on two legs with less horsepower than a pony. I was falling behind fast. I pushed my legs as hard as possible, but the ponies were still faster. My chest pounded as my sides hurt like hell, the pain from the ribs also taking effect. Thank god my duffle bag had a feather-light enchantment, so it weighed like nothing. I could hear the zombies breathing behind me as adrenaline shot through me, giving me that little extra boost to stay ahead of them. For maybe five seconds before one tackled me to the ground.

I was violently yanked back into the hoard with a near thousand growls, and groans as the loud clanging of teeth on metal filled my ears. My armor was protecting me from their ravenous bites, but I couldn't get away. I flipped myself onto my back, my duffle bag giving me a little prop up as I drew my hand cannon and fired randomly. "GET THE FUCK OFF ME!"

My gun was quickly knocked away by the swarm of ghouls trying to gnaw through my saving grace. Through my helmet, I saw ghouls and only ghouls. I punched wildly, throwing ghouls away with stunning strikes from my fist. But each one I hit was replaced by another blood-hungry ghoul. I heard gunshots ring out from Calamity's battle saddle in between the swarms of growls, but it made no noticeable change in the onslaught. I thought and tried every possible way to escape this situation, But nothing worked. 'Fuck I have to use magic if I wanna live. This is gonna suck.'

I closed my eyes and thought of the elemental rune for fire from my studies back home in my head. I focused as I had, like every other time I cast magic, feeling something drain from my body as my mind surged with elemental energy. My body slowed to a still with exhaustion. I thought of a violent explosion of flame erupting from my body as the rune activated within me. Suddenly with great power and range, A nova of fire erupted from my body, clearing a large sum of the ghouls from my position, their bodies turning to ash instantly. I desperately tried to force myself to my feet but could only manage a crawl. I heard what's left of the ghouls approaching me, their growls of hunger growing louder. I used whatever elemental magic I had left to force my body up and run. It was more of a jog, but it's better than crawling.

I injected another stimpack into my chest, giving some of my strength back as I returned to a run, but unless I grew a second set of legs, I wasn't going to outrun these ghouls, and I certainly couldn't cast a spell like that again.

"Please tell me I still have it," I hoped, reaching around my back and digging my hand into an exterior pocket of the duffle bag. I gripped something round as my mind did backflips with joy. I pulled out the grenade with glowing orange windows to the very violently swirling insides.

"I sure fucking hope this works," I said as I pulled the pin and dropped the grenade. I didn't throw it back; I just dropped it. Three seconds later, I was hit by a powerful blast that rocked my insides as I flew forwards at a violent speed. Gaining a surprising amount of distance and altitude as I flew past Velvet and Littlepip. In the short glimpse I got of them as I flew past, they were shocked at my sudden appearance. I began to descend, and my foot caught a rock, causing me to slow quicker, and my upper body began to tumble downwards. Using the momentum, I tucked in and did a parkour roll as I hit the ground, springing back to my feet and continuing to run with the speed I gained before slowing to my standard sprint.

I came upon a large wagon meant for transporting many ponies at once. I wasted no time jumping through one of the destroyed windows into another roll and lept through the other side. I ran and took cover at a crashed pegasus military convoy. Beyond it was an outstretch of nothing, and considering the two explosions I've caused, I think we could take the remaining hoard. I hope.

I saw Calamity mount the top of the wagon shooting down the other side where I couldn't see. Velvet came running around the other side. And littlepip tried to mimic my maneuver but had her rifle strap get caught on the window. Fuck. I couldn't risk firing my hand cannon to free her from this range. If my hand cannon was built for anything, it wasn't ranged accuracy. Instead, I drew my rifle with its four remaining bullets and swapped it to a single fire. I missed her entirely with the first two shots. As Velvet dived into cover next to me, I finally managed to hit that stupid fucking strap with the last two. She dropped to the ground a few feet below her, losing her rifle unfortunately, as she ran towards us. Diving into cover with us.

I was surprised as a violent explosion of blue and purple light disintegrated the large pony carrier. The magic of the explosion consisted partly of sky elemental magic, it was unstable, but I could use that magic with a bit of pony magic tinkering. I held out my hand, palm facing the magic cloud as it glowed and using my mind. I created a sizeable white rune with a center circle. Out from that circle spewed several straight and curved lines. The whole rune spun slowly as the cloud of magical energy was sucked into the center of the rune. Gathering in a large ball the size of which that could fit in my hand. Glowing blue and purple and crackling with energy as more energy flowed into it.

Once the cloud was absorbed into the rune. Three lines shot out from the center into three smaller circles. The unstable magic flowed down those lines into the circles as decently sized bolts fired from the smaller circles in rapid bursts of three. Striking the hoard of ghouls that the others were barely fending off. Disintegrating them into magical dust. I held my hand cannon in my other hand, firing when I could and reloading thanks to the module in my belt with one hand. I gotta be honest, I looked badass. The battle came to a swift end when Littlepip managed to repair one of the pegasus gattling laser turrets in the convoy and turned it to fire on the remaining ghouls.

I stored the little bit of magical energy in a much smaller rune that floated next to me. I also took the liberty of taking the gun off that laser-gattling turret. I needed it for a certain... project... We took a small break to catch our breath before we got the FUCK out of that canyon. Only when we were safely beyond the canyon's dangers did someone finally speak, which happened to be Calamity, who stepped in front of me.

"Okay, now what in the hell was all a' that?" he demanded, "from wat' I know only unicorns can do magic like that, an' you ain't a unicorn."

"Calamity!" Velvet yelled at him, getting between us. "If it wasn't for whatever that was, he wouldn't be standing here with us! You shouldn't interrogate him about something that saved his life!"

"I am thankful! But I get a Lil' on edge when it comes to the supernatural, such as somepony other than a unicorn using magic. The last time somepony other than a unicorn used magic like that, we had a war with zebras, and that caused all a' this!" he pointed a hoof to generalize the wasteland.

"And?" she asked. "That was well over 200 years ago! With how much you preached about him on the train. Im surprised how suddenly you don't trust him. Not to mention he also used that magic to help us."

"I do trust him! Just... GAH," he stomped around in a circle, mumbling under his breath.

"Is it about the enclave?" I asked finally. "you don't want the enclave to find a way to use magic like that?"

His ears shot up, and his eyes widened as he whipped around to face me.

"thought so," I nodded, understanding, "I can't talk about that particular magic in the open, even though most of the wasteland loves me and what I do. I do have enemies, and I don't know if they're listening. But I can say with 100 percent certainty. There is no way for anyone other than me to use that magic. All I can say is it's the magic I learned from my homeland before Equestria." and I walked past him. Continuing onward. Effectively ending the conversation.

As the sun faded away and slowly gave way to the night, we happened upon a farm. Everyone seemed interested in every minute detail about this place, like the three oddly placed fence posts outside and the smoke billowing out the chimney. These were fair things to notice, but they didn't see what I saw, like the massive buildup of magical energy inside the barn that I did make mention of. No one seemed to care other than Littlepip. However, she said we should make sure that if there was anyone living here, we should make sure it wasn't raiders. Which we all agreed upon.

Thankfully when we did try the door, we weren't met with a gun in our faces but a pink filly. Well painted pink and rather poorly painted, I might add. Even as she practically fucking worshiped pinkie pie making a 'museum' for her. But to be honest, it was more of a shrine. She wouldn't shut up about her. Like yeah, she's pretty cool and all, but like sheesh. she wasn't that good, and I knew the woman! She insisted we stay the night and gave us the most cramped room she could have for four people, one person, three ponies. Sorry I keep making that generalization.

The others were talking about this new position we found ourselves in. I set up a make-shift hammock in the upper corner of the room to give the rest of the ponies some more room to move.

"she doesn't seem right in the head," Calamity said, pointing a hoof to his own head to signify some form of craziness.

"Because she isn't, something must have happened," Velvet added, pacing in the small space.

"you're telling me," I added, taking off my helmet and setting it on a nearby nightstand. "especially when a unicorn gets her horn shaved off." All eyes in the room were instantly upon me. Like I said, something fucking demonic.

"don't tell me I'm the only one who noticed the nub of a shaved unicorn horn on that little girl? she has her hair covering it, so it's hard to see, but to anyone perceptive enough could've seen it," I asked.

The ponies erupted into a discussion. Theorizing and questions about this new discovery. But Velvet never took her eyes off me. She seemed concerned about something.

"Velvet, you look like I got a dagger in my neck. What's up? I asked. Hearing the other two cease their conversations to listen.

"I helped mend the ribs in your chest, worked for a while to ensure I got it right and didn't mend the bones wrong. But I don't remember your skin being that pale." She responded with worry.

I raised an eyebrow. "Huh?"

"Actually, I see it now. He looked more... tan before." Littlepip said cocking her head and squinting. Calamity doing the same before agreeing.

I walked over to a broken mirror on the wall. I'll be damned. My skin that was usually quite tan was fucking white as shit. I took off my forearm gauntlet and looked at the skin to find the same thing. I touched my pale skin to find it colder than usual. Still warm to the touch but not as warm as it should be. Then I remembered a very crucial thing that caused my shock to fade into a frowning realization.

"Don't worry about it,"

"what do you mean 'don't worry about it? You clearly know what's wrong, or else you wouldn't be doing what you are doing now!" Velvet stomped.

"It's not... ugh... it's just... hold on." I stuttered as I checked the window of the room overlooking the farm. Then closing the drapes.

"I'm missing a good portion of blood, enough to cause drastic changes in my skin color. Don't worry, It's happened before. I'll be back to normal in a few days."

"WHAT?" Velvet gasped, "Are you bleeding? When did this start? How could you tell me not to worry? Now Im worrying even more!" she panicked and started checking my body for injuries, patting down places, and hitting a few spots Id rather not be touched, which in turn caused me to slap her hoof away.

"AYE, watch where you patting lady! Take me to dinner first!" I added, causing her to blush and cringe as she turned away.

"oh my goodness, Im so sorry! I didn't know! I..." She apologized profusely while Calamity flopped onto his back and laughed.

"Stop and breath a sec, okay?!" I stopped her. "it's fine, just don't go frisking people randomly, okay? You're a medic, and I respect and understand the worry, but that's just not appropriate. Try and keep your inner Fluttershy under control, aight?" She nodded understandingly. Calamity's laughter ceased as he got back up, wiping a tear from his eye with a sigh.

"As for injuries, Im fine." I took a moment to think about how I would approach this topic. I didn't want to outright say how my magic worked. It's a very close secret that only one other pony alive knows. And if someone like redeye found out, that you can turn living matter like blood and skin into magical energy, it would be catastrophic. That and it comes out at a higher power than usual. If you turned a whole person into magical power and just detonated it, it'd be like a small nuke went off in a ten-mile radius. As much as I trust these ponies, even after only knowing less than two days, I couldn't risk it. There are things people are willing to do that can break even the most unbreakable people.

"When I combine pony magic and my magic, it can sometimes have unintended backlash. A magical loss of blood happens to be one of them." I lied; I hoped they bought it. Velvet's eyes narrowed at me. She knew something was up, but nodded in understanding.

"Well, in that case, I don't want you attempting any more magical stunts like that again. Doctors orders." She ordered sternly. Letting a small smirk slip in.

"ha, you'd be surprised how often im told too by Romulus." I looked out the window towards the barn and the massive gathering of magical energy. "AIGHT," I said, moving towards the door and grabbing my helmet on the way. "Im gonna go figure out what the fuck is in that barn. There is no need to have that much magical energy in one place." I grabbed the doorknob to find the door had been locked.

"that little shit," I whispered. Turning back to the other. "Our host locked us in. Luckily for us..." I Rounded on the door and kicked it as hard as I could. Sending the age-worn door off its hinges. "I got a key."

We worked our way outside to the barn, which was also locked from the inside. Littlepip said she saw Pinkiebell go in there earlier. I insisted on trying to kick the doors open but was stopped by all of my party member's protests. Which I crumbled in submission too. I respected them enough to fall in line with their plans at least. However, we quickly realized that the barn door was locked with a large wood plank latch. Thank god I didn't try to kick it in; I would have broken my leg. Littlepip couldn't pick a piece of wood. With her lack of telekinesis, we couldn't move it anyway. She was too spent magically to perform even basic levitation.

I snuck away to try a different entrance to open the door to the inside. I was a man of action and didn't like sitting around. I went around the back of the barn to find an old window on the barn's second story, broken from age. I got a running start and jumped up the wall, barely grabbing the edge of the window and pulling myself up. I pulled out the broken glass, letting it fall to the ground below, not wanting to make a lot of noise on the inside, and climbed in. The second story was clearly used to store duplicate pinkie pie knick-knacks and collectibles that didn't have a place in the so-called 'museum.' In the gaps of the floorboards, a dim light of a torch or lamp was on the floor below. The room I was currently in was darker and dusty as shit, But I could still see. Not that hard when my helmet's still glitching HUD highlighted things in the dark.

I worked my way around the room, trying to find a staircase or a door to one at least. I managed to find a door behind a giant cardboard cutout of pinkie pie. Which was creepy as hell to look at. I opened the door to a small hallway with another door and a staircase at the end leading down.
I tried the other door and peeked my head in to find a food and water storage. There was at least a few months worth of food and water stored up. How much was still safe to eat was to be seen. Closing the door, I Heard conversations from the room below. Muffled, but I could tell it was Between Littlepip, Velvet, and our host.

How the fuck did they get in already?

I slowly made my when down the stairs trying to listen in on the conversation. I turned the corner at the bottom of the stairs, and my heart sank. There weren't many things in the world I was genuinely afraid of. I've seen some of the most horrifying things, things that would leave you scarred for life and change the way your mind works in the worst ways. The wasteland was constantly hitting me with curveballs left, right, and center. The first thing to actually surprise me recently was the alicorn in old appaloosa. Besides that, not much caught me off guard, except the fucking undetonated balefire bomb in front of me.

I was heaving hard, and my head felt light as I stared into the swirling mass of magical energy. I was terrified. The nightmares of souls of the masses being cleaved like a scythe through wheat as these things wiped cities off the map raced through me. The lives of my closest friends were ended by the superweapon in front of me. As the terror took hold, I dropped to my knees, slowly falling back onto my rear as I panicked and scooted back fiercely until I hit a wall. My eyes did not leave the bomb. I was sweating so hard it felt like I'd just taken a shower. I was lost in my own fear.

I felt something touch my shoulder, causing me to flinch as my sight broke from the bomb to whatever touched me. I found myself looking at Velvet, who held a heavily concerned face. My gaze drifted to the tiny foal who was our host behind her. She had clearly been crying. My fear changed drastically into rage as I shot to my feet.

"WHERE DID YOU FIND THIS?!" I yelled, catching everyone in the room off guard. The little foal was too scared to speak now.

"I ASKED YOU A QUESTION, YOU LITTLE SHIT, WHERE DID YOU GET THIS FUCKING THING?!" I somehow got louder, stomping toward the foal. Only to have Velvet step in front of me like a wall. Her face shifted from concern to fierce determination mixed with anger.

"THAT'S ENOUGH!" She yelled, stomping a hoof. "The poor girl has been through enough already! She doesn't need anypony yelling and cursing at her!"

I tried to calm myself but was only able to regulate my tone. "You... have no idea... what this is, do you?"

"No, I don't, but-" She started only to be cut off by me.

"THAT IS A BALEFIRE BOMB!" I shouted, pointing to the deadliest weapon known to pony kind.

Her eyes widened as she slowly turned to gaze at the magical monstrosity.

"There are not many things in this world that scare me, but that..." I paused, letting fear creep back into my soul. "That thing is number two on the list."

The Caravan

It was morning now; I didn't know that Littlepip had also called new Appaloosa to pick up the rescued slaves as well. Hence why a mix of both my rescue team from the Caravan and wagons from new Appaloosa showed up outside the farm, slaves in tow. Hell, even Disty doo showed up as well, that makes one part of my trip easier. Spyglass led my small group of jeeps and trucks and had left it up to the ponies which group they wanted to go with went it came to where they wanted to stay. Needless to say, the majority stayed with the Caravan. But some did go to new Appaloosa, which I had no gripe against. It's their choice, and I respect it.

Im not going to lie when I say I had a slight mental breakdown after/during the conversation with Velvet. Seeing a balefire bomb that close up just destroyed me. I never figured out where the little one got it from. I don't think I cared that much, to be honest. I just wanted the thing gone. That's why I had to intervene when Railright, who also showed up for some fucking reason, wanted to take it.

"Oh hell no!" I said, walking up to Calamity and Railright, who were speaking about the bomb. "There is no fresh chance in hell that you of all the factions are gonna take that fucking thing."

"why not?" Railright asked, clearly confused.

"I know you do trade with Redeye's people, and I know he's looking out for something to give him more 'leverage.' You know how I operate, so no, there's no way you're taking it." I made sure my point got across with my body language. Calamity saw what was starting to unfold and decided to go elsewhere.

"Well, this farm is still technically in the jurisdiction of new appaloosa, so anything here is also ours to lay claim to." He sounded real fucking cocky, like he had just won the discussion and started walking away. Spyglass was listening in on the whole thing, so when I looked at him and gave a slight nod, and returned it. He knew what was about to transpire.

"You misunderstand, mister Railright," I said, raising my fist to be even with my head. He turned back to face me. As I heard several guns cock from my fellow specters, railright's men from new Appaloosa started to panic and pointed their guns back at the mechanized soldiers. Two came to my sides to aim at railright. "When I say you're not taking it, I MEAN IT. I do not negotiate when it comes to nuclear superweapons."

Railright was absolutely baffled, along with everyone else here. The only ones without a gun pointed at them were those in Littlepips company and Disty doo. And even they were tense.

"Spyglass! make sure that bomb isn't armed and load it up." The tall slim specter with a large obsidian glass eye wasted no time and took three specters with him into the barn.

"you do this, and you're not welcome back into new Appaloosa either. You know that, right" Railright asked.

"I know," I responded. "DISTY, FRONT AND CENTER!"

It only took her a few seconds to come over. She nodded in acknowledgment as she sat down in front of me.

"Look," I started, dropping to one knee. "I know you have your reservations with new Appaloosa. But I know you're taking in the young filly over there, and Railright said it himself that Appaloosa isn't that safe anymore with what Littlepip's group did over in old Appaloosa with the slavers. So I am making a new offer to you. I will give you a few specters to run your shop in new Appaloosa while you are not there, and you can take your business on the go with us on the Caravan. And I know you know that my Caravan is the safest place for any children. Raiders and Slavers know better than to mess with us. So what do you say?" I reached out a hand for a handshake. Disty doo was deep in thought and somewhat shocked at my newest offer.

"What makes you think we'll let your metal men stay in new appaloosa after this, let alone let her back in if she does go with you?" Railright was getting pissed now.

"because most if not all of your town loves her, And if you ban her from returning, then you're going to lose your job and get thrown out. And I know you are too stuck up and stubborn to let that happen." I replied with a smile. He lowered his head, knowing that I had a point.

Disty Doo scribbled something down on her chalkboard and faced it towards me in her mouth. "I could come back whenever I want?"

"Certainly, sometimes, when the Caravan is in certain parts of Equestria, it might take some time to get back. But for the most part, if you ever want to go back and run the store for a day or two, I'll send a small group with you to ensure your safe arrival."

She thought for a few more moments before wiping the board with her hoof and scribbling something else before turning it to face me again. "can I paint them? also, tell them to lower the guns." She then pointed to one of the specters nearby.

I lowered my fist, and the specters returned to a passive stance. "I don't see why you couldn't paint them."

She was so deep in thought, her one eye rolling back. As a businesswoman, she was considering a lot about this deal. She sat there for what felt like hours. I then thought of something I didn't want to use as bribery, but when it comes to having Her being there across Equestria and her doing the deliveries to new Appaloosa instead of myself. I decided just to try it. As much as I hated their trading partners, I didn't want to leave new Appaloosa hanging in the wind.

"Ugh, I didn't want to throw this into the deal. I'd rather do it as a kind gesture. But I do think with some hard work, elbow grease, and a little luck. I could get your voice back."

Her ears shot up, and her eye rolled back into place as she stared at me in shock. She quickly wiped the board clean and wrote hastily enough in big, bold letters on the thing. "REALLY?!"

"Well, not yet. Im still refreshing myself and Romulus on the ins and outs of pony anatomy and testing things. Suppose I wanted to replace a human tongue or voice box with a cybernetic replacement or just a full-on metal one, I could. But since there are only ponies here in Equestria, that knowledge is really just a reference point. Which is better than nothing, and it is possible to do it, just given time. The only variable I've yet to account for is the 'ghoul' part. But considering if you figure out the baseline for a normal pony. Ghouls should come naturally."

She thought for just before replying via her board. "okay, but I pick the specters and an equal amount in pony staff. A balance is always needed..." she ran out of room and had to clear the board again. "And I want you to keep making your deliveries to new Appaloosa."

I leaned in close, gesturing her to come closer as I whispered into her ear. "that's kinda the reason why I want you in the Caravan so badly now. You show up and make the deliveries on the rounds since mister stuck up prick over there banned me. But you can get in no problem. Despite new Appaloosa's trading partners, I don't want to abandon them."

I stood back up. She understood now and reached out a hoof with a smile. We shook as the deal was made.

We rode back to new Appaloosa to pick up the stuff Romulus had left for me. Also, Disty Doo needed to pack a few things before heading out. The jeeps I had in the Caravan weren't all that impressive technology wize, at least in my eyes. Littlepip was absolutely entranced by them. The low hum from the electric engines underneath was the only noise they ever made unless the mounted swivel turret on the back of a few of them was firing. The main parts other than the frame and engine were reinforced by scrap metal and bits of element steel when I was able to make it. It wasn't complicated. It just took time to make it. On top of them not having roofs to allow for maximum space. As for how we powered these jeeps, the engines themselves never precisely ran out of power. We just had to stop sometimes and have either a few ponies or specters tow them for a little while, letting them re-fill. I figured out a way to make static electricity on a mega scale, using friction in the engine with conductive metal ball bearings. These engines can run for three days straight without stopping for a few hours to recharge. It was great, but most of the time, we'd stop and make camp at night. Give out pony friends a rest.

As for the specters that drove these vehicles, they never talked unless talked to. Or unless checking on a pony who tripped and fell and making sure they were okay. They had narrow heads with glowing blue lights that resembled eyes. The main bulk of the bodies were rigid and fine cut rather than round or smooth. Thanks to the custom hydraulics, they could lift a lot more than most. They ran on batteries that the jeeps would charge at night so the ponies could walk less during the day. Amongst the advanced machinery were also ponies, besides our new additions to the Caravan. They had been there for a while. I didn't get many permanent members pony-wise till my Caravan made it to Tempony tower for the first time, and DJpon3 started practically preaching about the work I do. Then at each stop in a town or even on the road, we've gotten new members ever since. They were the faces of trade, even though the whole wasteland knew my Caravan. They still didn't fully trust the tech. So having ponies be the first things they saw really helped morale-wise.

I was sitting passenger in the lead jeep. Spyglass was behind the wheel. While Littlepip and the gang were in the back seats and the small bed that stretched out the back. We moved most of the gear and such to other jeeps so they could rest their aching hoofs. Railrights ponies were toward the rear of our current position, they couldn't keep up with our jeeps, and we needed to form up with the rest of the Caravan. Disty doo was in a separate jeep with Silver Bell. That was her actual name. She was doing her best to be a mother figure for the little filly. It made feel warm inside that some ponies in this shithole of a world were still good enough to be better than the rest.

"Riley, were you really gonna kill everypony back there?" I heard from behind me as littlepip broke the silence that fell upon us since we started moving.

I shifted in my seat, resting my left arm across the top of it, which was still sore from it being dislocated a few days prior, now facing the small mare behind me. I leaned my head to look behind her to double-check that none of Railright's people were in eavesdropping distance.

"Of course not!" I started, "what you gotta understand, Littlepip, is that when it comes to shit like THAT." I stopped pointing at the balefire bomb strapped down to a jeep. "I don't fuck around. I have a reputation that goes back fifteen years with this Caravan. I know a lot of ponies, and a lot more know me. And some of those ponies could do nasty things with a weapon like that, mainly Redeye. What you saw back there was nothing more than me using that reputation to my advantage, no more, no less." She nodded in understanding.

"HOWEVER," I started again, "I did have to take into account that me and Railright haven't exactly seen eye to eye on many things. We butt heads more often than not. In my opinion, he shouldn't be leading anything other than himself. He's grown too comfortable in his position of power, and it's going to his head. So he tends to have his temper use that power poorly. There was a good chance that he would have shot first back there just out of reaction to his anger. One thing is for sure, I wouldn't have shot first back there, but if I was shot at. That would've ended very poorly on all sides."

The small mare looked off in the distance. Her eyes gave off hints of fear. Probably thinking about how tense that situation really was, before turning back to me. "You said you have a reputation. What kind?"

"Well," I tried to figure out how to start this story. "Starting as a trader, All I had was Romulus as a partner, like four jeeps, and a dozen specters. We got hit by raiders A LOT. We quickly got a nickname early on called the 'immortals.' We got that name because we, simply put, wouldn't die no matter how many bullets we got shot with. When in reality, the raiders were sloppy, I had a super tactical computer as a best friend, and wear im from, im a bit of a genius. In the first year starting out, raiders had hit us so many times that we had more bulletholes than actual bullets. Then Redeye happened."

"What do you mean redeye happened?" Littlepip asked.

"Redeye wasn't always what he is now, lil'pip," Calamity jutted in. "at first, he was one of the wanderers of the wasteland before accumulating what he has now."

"Bingo," I said, shooting Calamity a finger gun. "he was the first pony to join up with my Caravan and set me up with my first route. If there is anything that Redeye is, it's charismatic. He smoothed talked so many small settlements into trading with us that we boomed in power the following three years. Me and him shared more than a conversation about how things could change, but one things for sure, he was very interested in my tech. It's all he ever asked me about, but one of my internal policies is that I never share my tech with anyone other than me. Keeps dangerous things out of bad ponies hoofs. After a while, things started to hit the fan." My face deepened into one of regret and sadness.

"What happened?"

"Well, put simply, Redeye got ballsy and showed his other side. He tried hacking into a terminal we had in the Caravan to steal the tech rather than try and get it usually. Which lead to a whole mess of bullshit." My face went stern with anger as my hand gripped the seat.

Littlepip waited for me to continue before I looked at Calamity. "What have you heard about 'The Shattering'?"

"Well, I know it was when things between you and Redeye went to shit. But I don't got a lot of details on it. All I know it was when Redeye got a kickstart to his operations up in Fillydephlia, and you lost a chunk of your Caravan." he tried to explain, but he hasn't been outside of this part of Equestria a lot. So he didn't know much.

"Your not wrong, It was a time, roughly 2-3 months, id say, when Redeye shattered my Caravan and what it was into two groups, one of tech and the other of ponykind. It was a miniature war that took place up in Fillydelphia. He used my resources to kickstart his empire, like you said Calamity, and tried to leave me for dead. Kill us from the inside rather than the outside like the raiders did. But we didn't get the nickname 'Immortals' for nothing. We fought till we didn't have any more gas in us and then some. We eventually just had to leave and let Redeye get away, but I made sure personally that he didn't keep any of my tech. We went to Tempony tower for the first time shortly after our last altercation with Redeye. We were broken and barely kicking. DJpon3 was the one who put us back on our feet. He and Tempony tower gave us all we needed, and I made the most important deal ever with that place. It's our main trade stop and more. Since then, we've grown bigger and bigger to where were are today."

"Wow." Velvet said; she'd been listening in the whole time. The other two seemed to agree with her, and It was one hell of a story.

"Yeah, Im a stubborn bastard," I grunted as I returned to a front-facing position in my seat. "I refuse to die, and even time isn't gonna get me for a while."

"What do ya mean by that?" Calamity asked with a hint of suspicion.

"truth be told, Im relatively young compared to the rest of my kind...' I blanked on my age, surprisingly. I never really cared up until right now.

"forty-two, sir," Spyglass said, his deep robotic voice refreshing my mind. "forty-two by time at least, mentally, I'd say you're up in the hundreds. You've seen much more than most in such a short period."

"Thanks, spyglass; it makes me feel better that im still as young as ever," I groaned sarcastically.

"What do you mean young?! You're damn middle-aged!" Calamity nearly yelled. I laughed hard at his remark. I turned to face the group again, rubbing a tear out of my eye. Before realizing he was serious, the other two were heavily confused and concerned.

"Oh, right. You guys don't know human lifespans." I chuckled.

"How long do you yall live for to say that forty-two is young?" He asked, absolutely baffled.

"Well, Originally, we lived to a hundred if we were lucky and took care of ourselves. But after a big event that caused our lives to be extended far longer than most. We now live upwards of 500 years." Jaws... dropped. And it was fucking hilarious.

We arrived back at new Appaloosa shortly after. I hopped out and asked the trio to follow me. I told them I needed to give them something. I made my way to the entrance of new Appaloosa and could see through the main gate that there was still a lone jeep inside with three specters around it. On the small bed of the jeep were two flat rectangular crates I assumed were the Items I requested. I stood at the gates and whistled loudly, catching the specter's attention. I Waved my hand, signaling them to come over. They scrambled into the jeep and quickly made their way to the gate, stopping in front of me. The specter driving the jeep leaned out the driver's side, leveraging his metal body on the door with his robotic arm. "orders, sir?"

"Get the crate full of supplies open, and get that customers order out here as well." The specter gave a small salute as he and the other two muscled the flat crate half the size of a pony and laid it on the ground next to the jeep. One grabbed the lid and pried it open with its powerful arms, showing the strength of its robotic arms. Inside, the crate was divided into three sections. One was full of food and water, enough to last more than a few days. The second section had two of the distinct ministry of peace medical boxes stacked to the brim with medical gear. The third was a labeled bronze box with a note on it. I picked up the note and read it.

I hope you don't mind, sir, but I used my monthly freebie on young Calamity. I have talked with him on many occasions, and since he was our best customer since coming to this side of Equestria, besides disty doo of course, I wanted to throw a special deal in with his order of battle saddle parts. I manufactured a long-right equipable scope capable of up to 20x magnification. I figured it would be a kind gesture, at the least. He should know how to put it on. He is quite capable of firearm service and repair, so it should be no trouble.
Romulus.

"That old piece of hardware never ceases to make customers happy, does he," I whispered under my breath with a smirk. Turning back to the rest of the ponies. "right, I had my people scrounge up some supplies for yall to take with you wherever you're heading next. Since I have more stops to make with the Caravan, this will be where we part ways, for now at least." I waved a hand over the box of goods as I stepped to the side. "consider it payment for helping me out back at old Appaloosa and afterward. There's enough food, water, and medical to last you guys a while out there."

"Oh, we couldn't, your too kind," Velvet said, looking over the stockpile of goods inside the crate.

"What do you mean 'we' couldn't?" Calamity asked, trotting over and packing food and water into his saddlebags. "I never pass up free supplies, you might, but Id never miss out on free stuff."

"Yeah, because I sure as hell and ain't taking it with me even if you didn't want it. So take it please, I insist," I said, noticing Disty doo trot past with two specters in tow. Guess she chose those. And flashed her chalkboard at me. "I gotta pack a few things, be right back."

"Thank you, Riley, this helps a lot." Little pip said, walking over to me, looking up as I stood taller than her.

"Hey, it's no big deal. Some ponies out here say no good deed goes unpunished. But you do something for me. I always repay that kind of thing. If you ever need anything, just give me a call." I stopped and reached out my left arm, flipping open my wrist pad and offering the plug to her. The plug matched her pip bug. she quickly understood what I was offering, plugged it into my pad, and downloaded my tag. As a bonus, I gave her a direct message line to me. It seemed only fair that something that could tune into the radio could send basic messages.

"OH SWEET! my package is in here!" I heard Calamity yell as he opened the bronze box full of battle saddle parts, and some round cylindrical object wrapped in a note.

I bid farewell as I got the rest of the jeeps together and waited for Disty doo's return. I also took the liberty of ditching my dented and fucked up armor in favor of my usual set. Unlike the scout set I used to wear, this was much more comfortable and didn't have full plating. Instead, metal sheets of Element steel melded into cloth. Like a mix of a shirt and plating. Much more flexible and still able to stop low and some medium caliber rounds. Much more concussive resistant, and the helmet was way better overall. The scout helmet had two eye sockets that glowed blue. This one had a T shape on it that glowed blue. It had all the bells and whistles of the old one and more, such as a built-in radio, access to all the stuff in Romulus's hard drive, and direct contact to any specter I needed since I had memorized all their serial numbers. It had so much more but aren't needed to be mentioned right now as it would take all day.

She returned within the half hour with PACKED saddle bags. I had her and Silver bell ride with me in the lead jeep. I drove this time round and kicked on the tracker that had the position of the main part of the Caravan, and we were off.

The wind rushed over my head as we flew down the main dirt road. The small gage on the dash read forty M.P.H., we were making a great time. Silver bell had fallen asleep curled up in Disty's lap as she sat passenger side. Disty seemed happy looking down at the foal, but I could see something in her eyes that just didn't look right. Like there was something she wanted to know but simply hadn't asked yet. Another few minutes passed before I heard her fumble through her saddlebags and pulled out her chalkboard. I heard her scribbling away with the chalk before she slid it across the dash so I didn't have to take my eyes off the road.

"why was I the one you wanted to recruit so bad? Out of everyone else at new Appaloosa, why me?"

It was a question I wasn't expecting, yet I had multiple answers. "Well, I have numerous reasons. First off, you are one of the best sales-ponies I've ever seen. You've bartered more out of me than most of Equestria, so having you in our Caravan leading our trade with the locals alongside Romulus would be a significant improvement. You also always have a way of making people smile, including myself." I noticed a smirk on her as I continued. "that kind of positive energy is in short supply across the wasteland. I want to bring them that joy, but I'm not exactly in the same league as you. So why don't I just bring the joy to them literally."

She seemed content with those answers, but I could still feel her looking at me. Waiting for me to continue. She wrote on her chalkboard again and slid it to the same position. It had one word. "but?"

I sighed. "There are also some, personal reasons as well."

She cocked her head at me, that clearly caught her attention. She waved a hoof, insisting I go on.

I took one hand off the wheel and slowly lifted my helmet off, and placed it in the spot between our two seats. I looked over at her with the most sincere look I could muster. "You're one of the few living tethers to the good days, before the war."

Her eyes went wide and then softened. I could tell she too, was reminiscing. I turned my gaze back to the road as I continued. "There isn't a day goes by where I miss those times, those ponies. I had a good life, a peaceful one where I didn't need a gun or a knife on me at all times. A time when I was the guy you go to when your tools break, or you need me to fix a wagon wheel or something. I miss having my forge down in ponyville, and I was just that helpful guy that ponies could rely on." I, too, was reminiscing about the good old days.

"I miss my friends especially. They were the closest thing I had to a family back then. They all had their moments where they really came through for me in some way mentally." We both sat and just relived the good times from before the war. She and I were two of the few who knew those times and lived them. Even though those days were long gone, to me, they were still as fresh as ever. I did freeze myself in a cryogenic pod for a good 200 years, just a few weeks before the first bomb went off. So when it came to how long it felt vs. how long it had been. It was overwhelming. Even though I tried so hard to make sure those bombs didn't go off, to make sure Equestria didn't repeat what happened in my world.

"I really did try to stop it from turning out like this," I said after what felt like years. Disty turned to look at me again. "I tried so fucking hard..." I felt the anger rising within me. My grip tightened on the wheel as I continued. "I tried every avenue, every tactic, every strategy, to get both sides on the same page about that fucking war. And I got SO FUCKING CLOSE!" I gritted my teeth as I said that last bit. I punched the dash with my free hand, denting it. "BUT NO, they had to be so fucking stubborn and stuck up in their ways to not see what was going to happen until it was too late, ignorant bastards..."

Looking at Disty from the corner of my eye, I saw her giving the most heartfelt expression. At least, that's what I thought it was. I was thoroughly pissed at past events now, no longer reminiscing. So much death, the destruction of a world and everything in it. I had seen it all before, and I couldn't stop it. I was more angry than at myself for being so fucking incompetent than anything else.

"Uh, sir, I know it's not my place to second guess your decisions, but I did want to point out that you are pushing seventy miles." Spyglass's voice from the jeep's dash radio cut through my anger like an axe through old wood. I Checked the speedometer, and sure enough, I was damn near going seventy. I shoved my emotions into a dark corner of my mind as I eased on the brakes slowing down to a solid thirty. Letting the rest of the jeeps catch up, then returning to forty. I picked up the radio mic off the hook on the dash and held it to my mouth. "Sorry about that. I just had one of my memory flare-ups. Im good now."

I let the mic rest in my hand on my thigh as I awaited a response. "Understood, sir. We should be coming on the Caravan shortly."

"10-4 Spyglass." I hooked the mic back into place on the dash. Looking back over at the pegasus ghoul next to me. I never noticed that Silver bell was awake. I assumed I woke her up when I punched the dash. "sorry about that." Disty waved a hoof, telling me It was alright, but I didn't feel okay all the same.

We sat in silence for a while after that. I stared out the windshield at the road, overlooking the grey and bleak wasteland. I started to feel my eyes get heavy but didn't note it. My vision got more blurry as what felt like years crawled by. Until it just went black. Something hit me hard in the shoulder causing pain to shoot up my arm as the usually smooth road turned rough and extremely bumpy. My eyes shot open as I quickly saw that we were drifting off the road. I grabbed hold of the wheel with both hands and promptly moved the vehicle back onto the road.

"S.I.R.! what was that? Are you okay?" I heard Spyglass over the radio again.

I picked up the mic again, "IM FINE, just gimme a sec." I returned the mic to its spot and propped my knees against the wheel. Making sure it didn't move. I reached down to the cup holder, unscrewed my canteen, and doused my head in ice-cold water. My drowsiness fled me as my sensors shot awake at the cold embrace. I took a few gulps before returning it to its cup holder and rested my hands upon the wheel, water dripping from under my chin. I looked over at my passenger to make sure she was alright, which she was. Just looked slightly scared.

"Sorry again, I really need to sleep when we get back to the Caravan. I need it, and I know it. I still don't look forward to it." I heard chalk scribbling as a familiar chalkboard popped into view along the dash.

"Why not? Sleep is great!"

I chuckled. "you're not wrong. It used to be great."

"used to be?" I read on the chalkboard as Disty slid it back across the dash.

I sighed loudly. "it's more of a chore now to keep myself alive more than anything. I haven't had a good night's sleep in, twenty-ish years. The nightmares I have to make sleep something I dread. It's why I force myself to stay awake for up to three days at a time. Even though humans need a minimum of seven to eight hours of sleep a day."

I looked over at Disty, who was both shocked and scribbling furiously. I put a hand on the chalkboard, stopping her.

"Don't worry. I am getting better." That was a lie. If anything, my mental state was going down the fucking toilet over the years. "I used not to be able to go to sleep willingly at all. Id go a week and crash and pass out for two or three days before repeating it. So yes, I am improving." Another lie. The only reason I could go to sleep by my will is if I took one of the pills that make me so tired I pass out. Thank you, Romulus.

We rounded the cusp of a small hill, and I saw the rest of the Caravan in all of its glory. Unlike most Caravans or convoys that travel in a line one behind the other at high speed. I preferred to have it as a mobile camp. Grouped up, moving slowly but at a decent pace. We had a system for organizing where each vehicle should go. Anything with a gun mounted on it stayed close to the edge with less important gear stashed within.
Along with more armed personnel, most of which were specters, some ponies insisted on standing guard. Some with battle saddles and sometimes a complete set of power armor.

We had more than a few sets since we did scavenge some old Ministry of Wartime technology buildings since other scavengers couldn't do it without getting killed. Too many traps, turrets, and the occasional sentry robot. We found some incomplete sets in the mid-testing phase, took them, finished them up, and boom. We got power armor. Depending on what area we traveled through, we would bust some out for the guard ponies just in case we met hellhounds or a fucking deathclaw.

As you move inward, you see much larger vehicles with large amounts of stored goods. Four, to be exact, the M.O.V. in the center of them, mimicking the number five side of a dice. Around those storage units were our more 'personnel' section. Where ponies and specters alike had mobile workshops, armor stations, chemistry stations, and all manner of crafting areas to make goods on the go. Unlike most traders who don't see the value in junk that you find most of the time in the wasteland. We repurpose it into other goods. I could see anyone other than us not buying some scrap metal, wood, flint, sulfur, all that shit you see everywhere out here. But to us? That can make bullets. Yes, my Caravan can turn junk into bullets. We can make more than just bullets, too. We make all kinds of shit out of garbage. Did you find some rusted lawnmower blades, Old cr123 batteries, and a busted motor? Good news! We can turn that into a flying sawblade of death! Just as an example, of course.

Among the workshops were our civilian transport, or as the ponies prefer, along with myself. Pony transport. Little mobile homes are towed by jeeps with more robust engines with bunks, kitchens, and bathtubs to keep everyone happy. Alongside those mobile homes were our medical specters with medical jeeps in tow. Painted with a red cross, both on the jeep and specter, and were much more sleek and friendly looking than most others, with much more freedom of movement than the stiff movement of the other ones. besides Romulus and Spyglass, of course. The jeep's rear beds were loaded with medical supplies, and some of the jeeps also had medical ponies. Being much less common in the wasteland meant they were essential to us. Certain ponies didn't want to be operated on by a specter. So those ponies who were medically trained were always treated more critically than others.

The same jeeps in my smaller group dotted the area around the edge of the large group. Most with more extensive beds extending out of the back with a large gun mounted atop a pole that could swivel 360 degrees manned by a specter. Other vehicles I called 'Vales' were less common but could still be seen about the Caravan as bulkier and fully enclosed. Much larger than the jeeps. Six doors on the side for personnel with a maximum capacity of six ponies or eight specters. We usually use them for extra storage since most ponies don't mind walking but just need short breaks here and there. The rear of the Vale would either have mounted bullet-proof lockers for quick access storage or would have a gun rack so if anyone was inside could hop out and grab a gun. The roof had a mounted twin-barrel heavy gun with armor panels extruding from the sides. This gun also swiveled 360 degrees but fired slowly with more power.

The four large storage vehicles sat on treads rather than wheels. They were too heavy all the time to use anything else anyway. Large open beds several meters long met with a large cockpit at the front where two specters sat in driver and passenger seats. The beds were packed with tied-down trade supplies. Such as food, water, medical, bullets, and not dirty clothes. You name it, and it's on one of those fucking things. We call them 'Mules' since they carry most of our shit. We had a fifth one in the rear of the Caravan, but the bed was much more expansive and was more of a social hub for the ponies to mingle and rest while on the go. I tried to make that area as comfortable for the ponies I had under my care as I could. I set up a bar and kitchen behind the cockpit of the thing where ponies could grab a drink or a bit to eat. Put up a few tables that were bolted down, so they didn't fall off when we went up inclines. Benches that were also bolted down. I just tried to make it nice. The ponies seemed to like it, at least. They called it the 'canteen,' which was a name that I enjoyed heavily.

The center and heart of the Caravan was the 'Mobile Operations Vehicle,' or M.O.V. for short. It was where Romulus and I planned our travels on the go for the Caravan and was the only Vechule with two stories and a roof you could walk on. It was the largest fucking thing in the Caravan. But It mainly was where I lived. Inside was fully furnished, had carpeting, and held numerous accounts of my past. I could count on my right hand alone how many ponies had been inside that fucker. Stocked with a kitchen, bathroom, and upstairs bedroom. And a fully working, metal smelting, gun making, fucking forge that sat on the back of the beast. It even had one of our few working bullet presses in there.

Since I lived there, it might seem like I put myself above everybody else. You'd be incorrect. I had that thing built and running before the Bombs even dropped, hell before the fucking war even. I used it as a mobile home as I traveled Equestria in my earlier days of arriving here. I even took it to the Crystal Empire when that blizzard was still there. Course, the Crystal Empire disappeared again when the war started, along with Cadence and shining armor. And the other ponies don't know I had this thing before the war. All I did was put the forge on the back of that big bitch and called it a day. Those big ass treads didn't aren't there to look pretty dammit! Granted, they were dirty as hell and weren't pleasing to the eye anyway. But still, things held all that weight like fucking champions.

I honked the jeep's horn as we Aproched the Caravan from the rear. Catching the attention of several guards, pony and specter alike. I picked up the mic once again.

"Romulus, you there?"

An enthusiastic and formal male voice. At first thought, you'd think it was an actual person, but one thing for sure, it wasn't.

"Ah! young master Riley! Welcome home, sir! I hear your horn bringing up the rear. The drivers should be opening the gap now."

As If on queue, the drivers of the vehicles on the rear of the Caravan opened up a gap so that the rest of the group and I could slip in. Slowing down to the whopping seven miles per hour, the Caravan usually traveled that slow when ponies and specters were walking. If not, we usually pushed twenty. Being grouped up like this makes it hard to move fast, but we get our routes done all the same.

I drove my jeep carefully through the Caravan as I kept talking to Romulus.

"Good to be back, buddy. Hey, we got a little over thirty used-to-be pony slaves that need the usual welcoming party. Think we could stop a second and get em situated before we keep moving?"

"Certainly, sir! We'll get them sorted out and be back on the road in a jiffy!"

I heard the loud boom of the main horn of the M.O.V. blaring out across the Caravan. Signaling the other Vechilves to hiss and stop. I followed suit and stopped next to the M.O.V. and hopped out. I looked back at the other jeeps in my company as ponies and Specters greeted the new arrivals with warm smiles, food, water, and medicine. Which they gratefully accepted.

"Ah, there's the hero of the day!" I heard Romulus from above call out. I looked up and saw the extremely advanced specter with bright blue eyes waving down at me from the M.O.V. roof before hopping a ladder and sliding down with great speed.

Romulus was more than another specter in the bunch. He was uplinked to every other specter, terminal, anything that was chipped in the Caravan he was connected to no matter what. When I said he ran everything, I meant everything. His model was more human-like besides his triangular head. His square blue eyes had little white dots in them with shutters that opened and closed. Giving the feel of real eyes. His body was the sleekest and most well curved out of all the specters. He also had full coverage from his internal components vs. other models that had shoulder or rear knee joints showing. On top of his head were two pointed rods that angeled acutely, moving and shifting like ears or radio antennae. Weirdly enough, he chose to wear clothes, I asked, and he said it just felt right. I never questioned it after that. He'd been with me since I found his A.I. chip stowed away among my personal belongings when I first got to Equestria. One last birthday present from dad, I suppose. He once served my kingdom back home, running a lot of manufacturing and being a service available to all the people. He was a living relic of my last LAST life. I didn't see him that way. He was the closest thing I had to a biological family. And I saw him as a brother.

He walked over, and I grabbed his hand as he stuck it out, pulling him in for a tight one-handed hug.

"Good to see you. You ancient piece of hardware!" I laughed as we broke the hug.

"Ahah, it's good to see you as well, you old ghost!" He joked, his head turning to gaze upon Disty Doo, who was getting out of the jeep as well. "Ah, and the young master finally managed to get the great Disty Doo to join us as well! It's a pleasure welcoming you aboard!" Romulus walked over and shook Disty's hoof, who gave him a warm smile at his remark.

"Now then," Romulus said, clapping his hands with a metallic clank. "We should get you properly Acquantied with the Caravan and its inner workings along with getting you your own place. But first," He turned to me. "I need to get Riley's full report from his scouting mission. If he needed to go radio silent got well over a week. It must have been for a good reason."

I raised a hand in protest, "As much as I'd want to give the report, everything is recorded on the scout armor helmet if you really need to know. Im tired and damn near crashed getting here cause I passed out behind the wheel. Im going to bed so you can get Disty all settled first."

Romulus was baffled. Even without a mouth, I could tell his mouth was open. "The young master wanting to go to sleep?! AND complaining about being tired?! It must be the dawning of an age!"

"Shut up, Romulus," I chuckled as I stepped up the small staircase to the door of the M.O.V. "Im going to bed. I'll talk to you more when I wake up."

"Farewell, young master! Sleep well!" I heard from Romulus as the door shut behind me. I didn't even turn on the light; I just sauntered through the dark, slowly stripping myself of armor as I moved up the spiral staircase in the corning of the M.O.V. I got to the second floor, which was hot. I kicked on the AC and stripped down to my underwear, and unceremoniously flopped into bed. I quickly downed some water and my sleeping pill before hitting the pillow, and was out cold.

Caravan Life

I awoke with a violent cough and was drenched in a hot sweat. One of my usual nightmares about Catasylm Bombs vaporizing one of the twelve kingdoms back home came back to haunt me last night. I rolled out of bed and hit the floor with a loud thud. I crawled to my feet and braced myself against a wall. My head pounded as I forced the memories away to a deep, dark place in my mind. Trying to focus on the now to put up a wall that separated me from the past. I struggled down the stairs and into the bathroom towards the back of M.O.V. The same heating and water talismans connected to the forge for quenching and heating were also connected to the bathroom. To do the same thing, give hot showers and a working toilet and sink.

I turned on the shower and gave it a moment to heat up, throwing off my underwear and jumping in. The hot water's embrace soothed my mind and body to a state of clarity. I actually could think now. I had managed to take and clean a bunch of different colored tiles from our travels and makeshift a half-decent shower from them, along with a not stained-to-shit tub. I sat and enjoyed the water for a few moments before cleaning myself. I tried to make a plan for the day to focus on. Hopefully, that way, I don't have and mid-day nightmares like back on the train with Rainbow Dash. First, I should see Romulus and get a report from him about what has transpired since I left to scout old Appaloosa a few weeks ago. Then perhaps I should also ask what we made caps-wise from our last stop at new Appaloosa. Then check what our next stops are and plan for those as well. After that, I plan as I go.

After drying myself, I finished up and wrapped the lower half of my body in a towel. I looked at the cracked wall mirror as something caught my eye through the watery buildup from the steam clouded the mirror. I rubbed a hand over my face as I realized I needed to shave. I had fast-growing hair compared to other people. I shaved literally a month ago, and now I got a homeless person's stubble growing back in. I hated facial hair, more so on my face than on others. I quickly shaved and then walked out. I turned on the light in the main room as three dim lamps lit the room in a soft glow.

The bathroom door sat next to a fireplace along the wall on my right, and a lamp on the other side sat in the corner atop a small table. In the center of the room, a long wooden coffee table surrounded by two couches. The table was pre-war but unaffected by the fallout, along with the couches. A recliner was at the short end of the coffee table opposite the fireplace. There was a short wooden lever on its side. I noticed the armor I stripped off myself last night was folded and stacked nicely on the recliner. Thanks, Romulus. On the walls were several pictures of landscapes from my home and Equestria. Some had Canterlot in the background or ponyville. Others had some of the other kingdoms from the table of twelve back home. On the shelf above the fireplace were a few smaller photos I took myself of a few beaches and lakes in Equestria and one particular picture of the dragon's crest. The tallest mountain in Valen, which held the temple of High Varengrad atop its peak. Home of the riders, Merlins sacred law-keepers of Valen.

On the opposite side of the room were two more lamps jutting from the walls. On the right side was a kitchen. A set of ornate cabinets lined the back wall with a stove along the same wall. A small island held the sink and a small overhanging table into the living room. Under that overhang were two chairs. I don't know why there were two. I never had anyone in here other than Romulus. I just had two. I used the kitchen a lot since most canned food sucked ass after 200 years. A small mountain of dishes arose from the sink. I really need to do those. A door across from the kitchen led to what looked like to any average person was a simple storage closet. But in truth, it was my personal armory. It was larger than you'd expect, Mainly it was where my ruined suit of power armor was. I've tried to fix it since the accident, but it's really just too mangled beyond repair. I need to make a new frame, and that was going to be a Long time before that happened.

I picked up my armor, the cold metallic fiber making me shiver as it touched my bare skin, thankfully I had a set of under-clothes to let it not touch my more sensitive parts. I got into a change of those clothes before putting on my armor. The bedroom was small, and the large king-sized bed took up half the room. It didn't bother me since I wasn't up here often. I Put on the armor but hooked my helmet onto my belt. I wasn't going to need it for the usual Caravan shores of the day. I also went to restock from my armory. Low on ammo in both guns, but I just left my rifle in there and grabbed hand cannon rounds, which I tried to use sparingly since I need element steel to make those ones. Personally, I was not too fond of rifles, and I don't know why. They just don't feel right in my hands. I liked BIG guns, though. Like a particular project that needed to be finished once I found the right parts.

I walked outside the same side door I had entered and jumped on the ladder beside it. We were driving pretty fast, but We had a small platform to stand on to get from door to ladder if needed. I heard the door shut as I climbed slowly to the top of the M.O.V. Once I hit the cusp and pulled myself along the ladder's final rails. I saw two specters with bolt action rifles and designs similar to Spyglass with the single eye, but instead of obsidian glass, it was a regular blue eye. They sat looking over the Caravan as we drove. Using the single mobile high spot as a vantage point, pacing back and forth along the long sides of the railing. At the short end overlooking the front side as we drove onward was Romulus with metallic fingers to the side of his head as he called orders and check-ins on several vehicles and guards. This man did all the micromanaging I hated, and I couldn't thank him enough.

I stepped next to him and crossed my arms, planting them on the railing as I overlooked the Caravan myself. I saw several open bed trucks beyond the Mules with working ponies at Workbenches and crafting goods to sell at the next stop. Or small families just waiting for us to go into walking mode, talking as we sped on. Romulus noticed me as he still gave orders. I could tell since he quickened his order giving and kept eyeballing me. I knew he wanted to speak, but I knew these orders kept the Caravan in formation, so I waited patiently.

Out of the many small pony-carrying vehicles I saw below, one stuck out to me. A very familiar pegasus ghoul on the back of a custom wide van with a retractable roof. With tons of goods and such stocked on shelves mounted on the interior walls of the van. The top was open, showing the two beds near the driver and passenger seats. Where two painted specters in Ditsy's colors sat. The sides of the van had the same painted colors but also had the words. "Disty Doo deliveries." I saw Silver Bell Sleeping in one of the two beds while Disty was taking inventory, Looking very happy in her task. I smiled.

"I'm glad you enjoy it, sir. That's some of my finest handiwork." Romulus said, copying my stance as he leaned on the railing. "It's nice having one of the nicest traders in this accursed place with us."

I nodded, "It sure is. Some people need that kindness." I thought for a moment before asking. "you made sure to get her that list? She will need access to our full span of resources to do her job properly."

"Of course, sir. I never forget a task." He almost sounded offended.

"all right, just making sure. How much profit did we make at Appaloosa?" I asked.

Romulus pondered for a moment as he looked through his records as he blankly stared ahead. His eyes lit up as several lines of code scrolled down over the lenses. "Im surprised you still ask, sir. Despite everything, we are still the Richest in the wasteland. We make Tempony tower look like a trailer park in terms of money."

"That's not what I asked Romulus," I said, solidifying my tone. "how much did we make?"

The scrolling text of code dissipated from his eyes as his pupils returned. "27,486 caps, taking in all income that we got."

"Good, go ahead and prep for a bonfire tonight. And cut that money into a fair amount for each pony in the Caravan. Im feeling rather generous, and we must celebrate a rather important new arrival." I said, pushing off the railing and standing up straight.

"Of course, sir! A splendid Idea!" Romulus's eyes sparkled in mimicked joy. "I will begin planning immediately!"

I smiled before continuing, "Make it a good one, Romulus. In other business..." I paused, turning around to see the large round table with a map of Equestria on it. Lit up underneath with a blue light. I tapped the table with my hand as a detailed hologram showed mountains, roads, small towns, other trader routes, And the main path of the Caravan. Names of significant landmarks such as Canterlot and Ponyville were also shown. Smaller symbols the size of coins were dotted across the wasteland. I ignored most of the map and focused on our path. "What's our next stop?"

Romulus moved to the other side of the table as he scanned the glowing purple path the show our route. "From the looks of it, sir. We should be stopping at the small settlement of White Tail Woods, then after that, we wrap around and hit another small settlement that we helped establish, Barkwin. Then we usually hit Junction R7 before dropping off the one package at saddle lake, but we can split the Caravan for that. Then we should..." A loud beep cut off Romulus as one of the small coin-size symbols lit up red with an exclamation mark. Catching both our attentions.

"What's wrong?" I asked with concern as Romulus tapped the glowing red symbol, Enhancing it.

"From the looks of things, sir. Something is trying to breach One of the N.R.R Time Capsules."

"WHAT?! I yelled. An N.R.R Time capsule breach is no laughing matter. Those things are supposed to stay buried secrets for a reason. "which one?"

"Experimental weapons development pod #94-3. Holds unfinished laser weapons technology, an un-tested enhanced combat unit, and several advanced combat specters." Romulus read as several floating holographic texts. Calm as can be. "I personally think it's nothing. The sensors on those things fire off at the first sign of change now. We've had a few false alarms while you were gone."

"WHAT?! Please tell me you at least checked those so-called 'false alarms.'" I asked, also pulling up the records of time capsule breaches.

"Well, about a few minutes after the alerts went off, they read back as normal. I wrote it off as a sensor misread since any shift in violent weather generally causes a bunch to go off."

"So you didn't check... gotcha." I facepalmed. Quickly regaining my composure. "Okay, so, three other breaches besides this one. Prep a squad to go with me to this one. And prep three smaller ones to investigate the other ones."

"Sir, I really do think it's nothing..." I held up a hand, silencing Romulus.

"I will decide that for myself, Romulus. Now do what I said. That's an order." I said with sternness as Romulus took a stance of understanding.

"Understood, sir. Shall I slow the Caravan to walking speed to prepare faster?"

"Yes, that would be helpful. Give the Ponies a chance to stretch their legs." I said, entranced by the logs for each of these breaches.

He gave a small salute as he held his hand to the side of his head, activating his radio. Walking back over to the railing. "Attention all units, slow to walking speed. Going to hike it out for a bit while we take care of some business."

I felt the M.O.V slow as the wind against my face ceased. I heard the low screeching of brakes from the Mules nearby, along with several other Vehicles, as they eased on their brakes. Romulus urged me to stretch my legs while he prepped my squad. I refused at first, but he insisted I check on Disty Doo at least. Which I reluctantly agreed to. A deeper part of me wanted to check on her, which I think Romulus somehow saw. I don't know. Romulus has a knack for doing things like that. Appealing to the inner part of myself. He also had a talent for pushing me out of my comfort zone.

As I walked alongside the slow-moving vehicles, I saw a young filly with an apple red coat accompanied by a yellow mane. Bouncing joyfully next to a specter holding a rifle, Standing guard as he walked at the same pace to the vehicles. The filly was peppering the poor bot with question after question about its inner workings and such. Unfortunately, the bot was in his guard program, so he didn't even acknowledge her presence. It only had its optics out for dangers and enemies. The filly was mid-question when she tripped on a rock and fell. For some reason, I instinctively ran over to the filly as she sat up, tears in her eyes. The specter kept walking on unphased.

I jogged over, kneeling down next to the filly. It was then I noticed her flanks were blank and that she was a little on the older side when it came to fillies. Yeesh, a late bloomer too. She was looking down at her left fore-hoof, where there was a minor scrape with a small trickle of blood oozing from it. I patted the filly on the back "Hey, you okay?"

Her head spun around to gaze at me with great excitement and shock. "OH, MY, GODDESS! Im talking to the Caravan guy! Oh no, what do I ask first? Oh geez, im blowing it!" She started breathing heavily, holding a hoof over her chest. She had a relatively firm grasp of speech if I had it admit it.

"Whoa! Take a breath and chill out! Let's make sure that gets disinfected first before anything." I paused, heaving her onto my left shoulder. She was surprised at the sudden elevation change. Once some of her weight eased on my shoulder, it screamed in protest. Shooting pain through my head. Right, I fucked up that arm. I switched her to my right shoulder, allowing her to steady herself as I looked for the nearest medical jeep. She was enjoying every second of this with squeals of delight. I spotted my target not too far away and began hiking over, weaving between other vehicles that were in my path.

"So, what's your name, young one?" I asked, looking over at the filly balanced on my shoulder.

"Oh, it's uh," she was so nervous talking to me that it was comical. I couldn't help but smirk as I returned my vision to front and center.Which somehow loosened her tongue. "It's Sweet Tart. Sorry, Im not exactly a pro with social skills when it comes to anything that isn't a machine." Ponies and their wonk ass names, I never understood it.

"Well, Sweet Tart, Im going to call you Sweetie for short cause Im not saying that whole thing every time." I could hear her squeal with glee. Sheesh, this girl is such a fan girl. I haven't had one of those since that one time I performed at Shining Armor's wedding!

"You said you work with machines, right? That's surprising considering your age." I was curious as to how someone so young could already be tech-savvy. Well, considering she asked that specter if it needed oil.

"Oh yeah! My mentor works for you guys over at one of the workshops as an inventor. He always says what he's doing out loud, so I learned a few things." Now, she was way more open on the topic of what I guessed was her passion.

"Really? Who?"

"Old Gearmane has the oily gear as a cutie mark, greenish-blue coat with the light blue mane and glasses. He isn't that old be he's been here a while."

I thought for a second before it clicked. "Oh yeah! I know him! I had no idea he had an apprentice. The last time I saw him, he was working on those gun drones, right? How's that going?"

"It's... going. He can't find a way to get the thing off the ground when it's holding ammo. It flies just fine without bullets but as soon as he puts five rounds in it. It won't even get off the ground. Do you not keep track of the ponies in your Caravan?"

"No, I do keep track. It's just my memory just isn't the greatest. That is why we have a database of everyone here. As for the drone, if he's still trying to put a big rifle on the thing. Of course, it's not gonna fly. Those rounds are too heavy on top of the kick from them. Your gonna end up wasting more rounds than you hit."

"THAT'S WHAT I SAID! But you know how stubborn he is! I keep telling him to use one of the infinite 9mm pistols. We never use that ammo and end up selling it anyway. But he just says, 'Nah, I can make it work.' It's so frustrating!" She was slightly pounding on my armor with her hooves in frustration.

"I'll go talk to him soon. The last thing I need that old coot doing is wasting all our good ammo trying to build something that won't work."

"Thank the goddess." By this point, we were upon the medical jeep I spotted. I heaved the young filly off my should and sat her on the rear bed. To my dismay, this one had a medical specter instead of a medical pony, as I hoped for. But Sweetie was excited to see the mechanical unit. So I shrugged it off.

"Hey, doc!" I called to the specter as it turned and acknowledged our presence. Jumping to action, it scanned the filly with a moving beam that went up and down her body.

"Okay, I gotta go, young one. I have a busy day, so try not to trip and fall again." I chuckled, ruffling her hair. She jumped and hugged me before letting me leave, which I returned out of kindness. I watched the jeep drive away slowly. I suddenly heard my stomach growl ravenously.

"Okay fucker, let's get some food first, then we go talk to Disty." I slapped my gut. I swear it responded with a slight growl before I began hiking toward the rear of the Caravan where the Canteen was. I quickly skimmed the large open steel platform pulled by a Large truck as Ponies sat at tables and benches. Talking about life and such, they munched on food that was better than most food from the can. As it grew closer, I stepped onto a small underhanging platform with a staircase. Climbing the stairs onto the Canteen. As I made my way to the bar, I was met with several hellos from ponies and a few hugs from some fillys.

Behind the counter were several shelves with bottles of booze held in place by my small metal cases bolted to the wall. The road gets bumpy, so keeping those things on the shelf was a priority. A string of color-changing neon lights hung along the ceiling, Illuminating the bar in a colorful glow. On the counter was a small grill with some corn and a few strips of rad-hog searing along it. The smell was quite enticing, making my stomach growl. Working the bar with their back to me, Was a Unicorn stallion with a dark brown coat, black mane, with a gruff mustache. His flank had two filled glasses of whisky clanking together.

"How's business Doubleshot?" I asked the Stallion as I sat at one of the bar stools. Crossing my arms on the counter.

The Stallion turned his head to see who had just spoken and smiled when he saw me. "Aw hell, if it isn't the trade master himself!" His voice was gruff and old. Something of an old sheriff in one of those old-timey western movies. I gave him a hoof bump as he greeted me. "It's been the usual today. Making money as we all do nowadays. I saw watcha did with those rescues yesterday. Nice work, kid."

"It's no big deal, really, just mean's more business for you, doesn't it?" I chuckled as I skimmed a menu he handed me. He gave his own hearty laugh in return.

"Heh, Yeah, I guess your right about that. Now, what can I get ya today son?"

"I'll take one of those corn cobs your grilling. Maybe you could wrap it in some of that Rad hog too."

"Yeah, I can do that for ya. Want me to pour you a glass of apple whisky? He asked as his horn lit up a dark bronze as one of the corn cobs levitated along with some of the meat.

"you know me too well. Yeah, go for it. No ice today, though" I slid a small pile of caps across the counter.

"you got it!" The caps flew off the counter into a small metal register drawer. A bottle of apple whisky lifted out of one of the metal cages and began pouring into a small glass.

I let my vision unfocus as I let my mind go adrift. Out of the corner of my eye, I swear I saw an earth pony with an orange coat and yellow mane wearing a cowboy hat, down a shot of whisky. But quickly did a double take and saw none next to me. I slapped myself in the face a few times.

"Make it two, actually. Hey, do you mind if I ask an odd question?"

"Sure, lay it on me." he propped his forehoof on the counter, listening as he put the two glasses on the counter in front of me. I grabbed one, not drinking yet, just swirling the liquid in the glass.

"Do you think if one person, just one person with the willpower to try everything they had to give? Do you think they could've ended the war peacefully? Without the bombs dropping?"

"Wow, you weren't kidding about odd." He looked off in the distance. His eyes were deep in thought. "I wouldn't know. I don't know much bout the war so I couldn't give a good answer. But I will say what I always say If you truly want something and you give your all trying to get it. Then I'd say it's guaranteed to happen. If someone really was dedicated enough to stop a war without fighting. im sure they could do it."

"Hmm." I didn't say another word as I downed the first glass in one go.

After I finished stuffing myself with food and booze, I made my way finally, to Distys Doo's new van. She had already let Silver bell start painting the inside while she already did her work on the exterior. It was a lot bigger on the inside than I saw from the top of the M.O.V. Disty was putting goods onto the shelves with price tags on them. Things like canned food, first aid, water canteens, bullets, and a little bit of everything. There was even a chalked board attached to a swiveling arm with a list of other services like armor stitching and refurbishing with the option for special orders or deliveries.

Silver Bell was on a bed in the back near the drivers with a box of pre-war crayons drawing on some old paper. The Painted specters seemed to stay the same, just looking more approachable. I jumped and grabbed a handlebar that jutted out from the back left wall of the van and propped my feet on the rear bumper. Hanging off the back of the van as it drove forward.

"Hey Ditsy, adjusting okay, I see," I said, giving her a wave as she greeted me. she grabbed her mini chalkboard and sat near me on a small cushion.

"Yes, very! The ponies here are so social! I never expected them to have such friendly faces on the go!"

"Oh yeah! If anything their more social on the road. They don't have to sell things. So they just hang out and socialize, or if they want to work, they go to one of the workshops on one of the jeeps. Somehow amid all the hell in this wasteland. I somehow made this Caravan a mobile hub of positivity, and Im proud of it."

She and I talked for a while. I answered questions about specific morale rules and how the Caravan works with its stops. Along with who to go to for what. Pretty much any gaps that Romulus didn't cover, I filled them. It was only when Romulus called me back to the M.O.V because something required my attention. He said it was something that was 'my ears only,' Which made me anxious. Because when something was usually my ears only, it was one of two things. One, It was about something Pre-fallout, or it was something rather personal. I would soon find out.

I reached the door to the Interior of the M.O.V where Romulus stood waiting. "Alright, Romulus, what's going on?" I was not looking for to this conversation.

"Let us go inside first, sir. It's a rather delicate topic." His robotic voice sounded worried. Not good. He opened the door and allowed me to go in first. "Please take a seat," he added, closing the door behind us as he turned on the light.

"Romulus, just get to the point already. You already got me not looking forward to this, so just get on with it!" I was frustrated, annoyed, and worried in a way. Did more capsule alerts go off? Did something happen to someone in the Caravan? As I sat on the couch, I was putting all the possibilities through my overthinking head.

"very well," He rubbed his metal hands together as he began. "I just recently finished reviewing the recordings and logs from your last, expedition." oh shit, "and I have more than a few concerns about your mental health." Crap, even though I wasn't expecting this conversation. I was not prepared for it in the slightest.

"Romulus, I'm fine. You know this."

"Not according to the scans from your medical unit," he retorted to my lie as the top of his arm opened and a small holographic screen popped up. Showing detailed readings of my brain activity over the last few weeks. It didn't look good at all with the multitude of alerts and bars in the red.

"Using this data and the brief recordings I've seen from the helmet. I've concluded that your PTSD, survivor's guilt, and overall sanity have reached such critical points of damage that it's evolved into something horrid."

"Romulus, If I were feeling at all shitty or wrong, I would have let you know by now."

"im well aware, sir." he sat down across from me. Letting the screen fade back into his arm as he stared at me. "That's why you are going to tell me. Right now. What's going on with you? As per my Programming, it is my duty to assist members of the royal family of Romulius in any way I can, You being the prince..."

"I am not the prince of anything." I hissed, gritting my teeth. I wasn't wrong either. My Former Title of prince went out the window the second the Cataclysm bombs dropped. And I hated it whenever Romulus brought it up, because all it did was piss me off for how useless I was back then.

"Even so, the royal blood of merlin courses through your veins, So it's in my programming and the soul He gave me to make sure you live as good of a life as possible."

"I don't have time for this." I was pissed off and stood up as I walked to the door. Then a metal hand pressed against my chest, stopping me. I looked to see Romulus staring me in the eyes. Before shoving me back to the couch.

"Im not letting you leave until you tell me." I stood up again and made for the door a second time. He tried to push me back to the couch before I grabbed his arm and restrained him. Pulling it behind his back and kicking him into a wall. Causing several pictures to fall due to the impact. Unfortunately, Romulus was still faster than me, especially when rage slowed my thinking. The speed at which he reared upon me and tackled me over the couch to the floor was incredible. He was trying to pin my arms as I thrashed violently, banging against his metal shell. Cursing and shouting at him.

"Sir, Please. I just want to see you Healthy again. Your overjoyed knowledge-seeking self that I knew In Valen. Not this hollow ghost trying to fix a broken world, destroying himself in the process."

*click*

The barrel of my hand cannon pressed against the underside of Romulus's head as I pulled back the hammer. His eyes went wide as he felt the barrel. He slowly got off of me, and I rose to my feet. Still pointing the gun at him.

"That Riley died when the Bombs destroyed everything I loved" I walked to the door, still pointing the gun at him as I opened it. Only then did I realize what I was doing. The regret that I felt as thoughts raced through my mind of me killing, basically, my brother. I dropped the gun at my feet and put both hands to my head. I looked back to Romulus, who stared blankly at me.

"Was it the Catacyllsm bombs or the Balefire bombs?" He asked. I walked out without answering. I made sure that the wall inside my mind stood strong, or else I may have to use that one bullet I was saving for myself.

Filling the cracks

Romulus and I didn't speak for the rest of the day after our 'altercation.' I hated myself for pulling a gun on him. The closest thing to an interaction we had after that was him handing me my hand cannon. I hesitated taking it but returned it to its holster in the end. It was something sentimental more than a powerful firearm. It was one of the few things besides Romulus that reminded me of my father. He and I had worked on it whenever his kingly duties had died down. But that was in the past, And I built a wall around the past.

I never thought about myself until after I stormed out on Romulus. Something was wrong with me. I recognized that before the incident. I just never truly acknowledged it, I guess. Considering the hallucinations and nightmares that have suddenly flared up in high amounts recently. Something changed, and I didn't know what. I always tried to focus on the here and now. Leave the past in the past. But for some reason, No matter how strong or how tall I built the wall around the past. Little snippets would always find a way to squeeze through. I swore I would put my best foot forward, but something kept grabbing me. Trying to pull me back. And having People try and do what Romulus just did. It just made the cracks more prominent.

I sat in a jeep with Spyglass as the sun started the go down and the Caravan pulled off to the side of the road. I told Romulus to set up a bonfire celebration in Honor of Disty Doo joining the Caravan. I didn't tell him to change those plans otherwise. I had my feet kicked up on the dash as DJpone3's station blared out over the radio loud enough to where the music vibrated through my body. I needed the music to drown out my thoughts. Music was one of the only things that could drown out my thoughts. That and gunfire.

As the song ended, there was a small burst of static that ended any further music as DJpone3's voice replaced the tunes. Slightly pissing me off.

"This is Djpone3 here. Coming back at all you listeners out there with some very special news. I just got word that our wonderful Wanderer on Wheels is again back on his routes! That's right, folks, after a near two-week disappearance. The Trade master of the wandering Caravan is back on the road, Bringing supplies to the less fortunate across the Wasteland! He was last seen heading out from New AppaLoosa. And if the record serves right, He should be stopping at a settlement in White Tail Woods. If you folks remember correctly, our hero of the Caravan Managed to set up a settlement just outside those wicked woods. So if any of you wandering traders wanna make some decent caps, head on over to the whitetail woods settlement!"

Jeez, He makes it sound like im a god returning to his subjects after leaving them for centuries.

"in other news, I've also heard that Disty Doo of the 'Absolutely Everything!' Store has joined up with our trade master on his rounds. I could guess that the Residents of New Appaloosa weren't too thrilled about that, but the store still remains open from what I hear. I guess Disty doo found a way to ensure her store stays open as she takes it to the open road! Also, our good-willed Stable Dweller Managed to clear out Old Appaloosa and free the Slaves kept there! Good riddance to those raiders, and enjoy hell! That's where you all are gonna be for a while! Once again, our Lightbringer shines down on the less fortunate today. I'd say she and our trade master should meet up sometime and exchange notes on being a good Samaritan. That's all for today, folks! Here are some smooth tunes from our wasteland favorite, Sweetie Bell!"

There was another slight buzz of static as the music began pouring out of the speakers again. Letting my mind go free from head-pounding thoughts. Only for a few moments, though, as Spyglass spoke to me for the first time since I sat co-pilot.

"Sir, permission to speak freely?"

I was surprised. Normally if Spyglass had something to say, he would just say it. Hence him revealing my age so quickly to Littlepip and her friends.

"Go ahead," I said, pulling a lever and leaning my seat back. I put my hands behind my head for extra comfort.

"I know it's none of my business, but as the second most Advance specter here and a spilt off from Romulus. I have to ask, Are you okay? Like really okay?" he was nervous speaking to me. Which was a first. I never coded such things into him. I wanted a High processing specter with minimal emotion. But surprisingly, His coding evolved as Romulus's did. Guess that's what I get for copying his source code into Spyglass. I didn't even realize I was glaring daggers at him, making him more nervous.

"It can be a simple yes or no question, sir! You don't need to go into detail. I know it's none of my business, But I guess Romulus is rubbing off on me in more than one way. I just need to hear it, I think."

I sighed loudly as I stared into the dark overhang of the cloud curtain above. Highlights of pink seeped through here and there as the sun went down. A drop of water smacked me in the forehead, causing me to flinch in response to the sudden cold smack. Then another and another, and soon it began to rain. I flipped a small switch with my finger that sat on the dash as the Jeep cover came out from behind the back seats. Enclosing the Jeep.

"Look, Spyglass. I have ways of dealing with shit in my head. And it works, but it's like a house of cards. Anything could topple it, if Romulus shared the 'incident' with you. That whole thing was me protecting that house of cards. It was a pure instinct reaction. Because when people or ponies try to get something out of me, that is more personal. It Causes things to happen that I don't want to happen, let's put it at that. Even talking about it does it. So put simply, Yes, im fine. As long as im left to my own devices, if that makes sense."

Spyglass seemed satisfied, "Understood, sir."

"I will say this, if anything happens, that's a bit too much for me. You can rest your circuits knowing Romulus will be first to hear it." That did it for him. He nodded as the radio cut out and Romulus's voice rang out.

"Attention, all units! We're going to be stopping for the night. Go ahead and pull off here. And set up in bonfire circle formation. Our Trade master has gifted us with a Bonefire Celebration in the name of our New face of Pony trade! Disty Doo!"

Spyglass pulled off and waited for the larger vehicles to pull into position before parking alongside one of the mules. This Jeep in particular, didn't have a turret. So we parked in the middle ring as a Vale parked on our opposite side. I brought my feet off the dash and hopped out. Jogging over to the Canteen as it sat across from the M.O.V. In the pouring Rain, Several Ponies were dragging out a tarp as specters set up large posts to hang the tarp over a center fire pit that both ponies and specters alike were setting up. I felt a hand on my shoulder as Spyglass came into view. The rain was still pouring down on us.

"Sir, You know Romulus is just worried about you. He really cares a great deal about you. Not just because you are the last of the Royal Family. But ever since, Merlin became one with the elements. You're the first one to treat him as a brother than just another, shall we say, Servant."

"I know that, Spyglass. Look, why don't you go help set up while I get presentable for tonight." He looked down to the ground in Defeat, Removing his hand from my shoulder. He nodded and began walking away before he turned his head back.

"He's been trying to talk to you about your health for a while, you know. He's been dropping hints and remarks, trying to get you to talk about whatever is happening inside your head. His recent attempt only confirmed more suspicions that something was wrong. As advice from a friend, I suggest you talk to him before his next attempt. I fear next time. It won't end so peacefully." And He walked over to the specters lifting a grand post into place, lending a hand. Leaving me to stand in the rain, alone with my thoughts.

Later into the night, once the tarp was up. It was angled, so the water poured off into a side ditch that went on for miles. We had lit the large stack of wood and other various burnable items ablaze for the bonfire. The Canteen had a front-row seat to the scene. Being Parked Longways near the great fire as Ponies bustled about with food and drink from Double-shot's bar. We used DJpone3's broadcast as a DJ, playing music loudly through large speakers on the several cars parked around the fire. Fitting, I know. Since DJpone3 had most likely turned in for the night. His collection of Pre-war music played uninterrupted throughout the night.

I sat in the bed of a jeep facing the fire. I had unbolted the passenger seat and placed it in the bed behind the driver's seat. I chuckled to Myself as Spyglass, and several other specters acted as waiters. Frantically taking orders and delivering food as Double-shot had recruited them to help with the overwhelming amount of ponies. He even grabbed one to be a second bartender. That way, he could run the grill more efficiently. Seeing Spyglass's new natural nervousness as he took and delivered orders made me laugh internally.

From across the way, around the left side of the fire. Romulus was with Disty Doo, making sure she wasn't overwhelmed by the other ponies. Although it was her celebration, we also didn't wanna suffocate the mare. She seemed fine with all the attention. It was like this wasn't the first time she was swarmed with positive ponies. For me, this was the first time anypony had been this happy with a big member since... Nope. Not even going to re-open that scar. Fuck Redeye and that front he put up. Bastard can die in a ditch for all I care. He deserves it after all the lives he took.

In that short spurt of anger, I didn't even notice Romulus gathering everyone's attention.

"Hey, everypony! May I have Everyponies attention for just a moment, please?" Im never going to get fully used to those phrases. Romulus quickly gathered everyone's attention. Even a majority of the Canteen and their eyes upon him. Giving Spyglass and Doubleshot a short break from the overwhelming amount of orders. Once he had the good majority of the ponies, he began his speech.

"I hope everypony is having a good time tonight! I know that it has been quite some time since we've had a good pow-wow like this!" His response from the crowd was indicative of everyone having a splendid time. The roar of applause and joy was deafening. Once again, my hope for a small community of happier and more passionate ponies was a hard-earned reality. Fifteen years in the making, to be exact. One of the specter waiters tapped me on the shoulder. I turned as he handed me the glass of apple whisky I had ordered about five minutes ago, Which I took and took small sips of as Romulus continued.

"Good to hear! Now I hate to take up everyone's time, But I do have a few words to say before the night continues. First, I'd like to thank our Caravan leader for making tonight happen. Along with splitting up our makings from our last big stop at New Appaloosa in honor of our new face of trade. Disty Doo of absolutely everything!"

The number of eyes upon me and the applause was a little startling at first. But I shook it off and raised my glass in acknowledgment. I nodded to Romulus for him to continue as I took a sip from my beverage.

"Second, is about our mare of the night herself. I would like to raise a glass to our new face of trade, even though I cannot drink," he gave a robotic chuckle before continuing. Getting some good laughs from the crowd. "But I know some of new are thinking things like 'Is the trade master retiring?' and to that, I will assure you. No, he is not. While we as a Caravan are welcome in a great many of the places that we deliver to along our route. Our companions, the specters, aren't the most welcoming sight to see first when it comes to the Caravan. Our trade master wanted at somepony to be the face of trade while us more mechanical units run the insides."

The murmurs from the crowd and sighs of relief were somewhat shocking to me. I didn't know some many ponies gave a damn about what happened to me. It put a few things into perspective for me until one pony by the Canteen shouted out to Romulus with a damn fine question.

"Wait, with how the wasteland views ghouls, Wouldn't having one as our face of trade cause some trade issues?"

This time I stood in response to the question, Catching everyone's attention very quickly.

"If anyone out there has any issues with a ghoul among our ranks, then they can kiss my ass before they can buy a damn thing off us. You either accept us and what we provide, or we can move on. We have the supplies needed to live. We Provide what we do out of the hope that we can build a better Equestria. Not because we are inclined to by some contract." The reaction from the crowd was understandable. Losing business was not something anyone wanted. But I had an ace of my sleeve for such a reaction.

"But I wouldn't get too startled when it comes to loss of income. Most settlements rely on our supplies to survive out here. So I wouldn't expect them to have anything more than some slight annoyance for a little while before moving on. As for the larger settlements such as Tempony tower, Junction R7, and the few others, we make our Deliveries to." I took a long sip and gave a wide smile. "Leave them to me. Like with New Appaloosa, Im sure I can find a way to 'settle' such trivial discussions." I took my seat once again, finishing my short speech.

"Well said, sir!" Romulus began again. "Im sure there won't be a drastic change in income in any case, as our trade master stated so convincingly. Plus, we still have Dusselhoof as the main arguing point for ghouls. But now, I'd say it's time for the joy of the night to continue. That's why our Trade master has volunteered to Bring back the 'Iron Legionnaires' for a song performance tonight!"

I spat my whisky fucking everywhere! I had made no such promise or even slightly mentioned such a thing! But with the roar of excitement from the crowd, it seemed that Romulus had just promised for me. I could swear I saw him wink at me from across the bonfire. You fucker, I knew you were planning something when you started the speech!

The Iron Legionnaires were a band me, Romulus, and Spyglass formed way back before even the war was a thought. Our first time performing was during a particular wedding up in canterlot after a changeling invasion. After that, we only performed a few times at other various events like the Grand Galloping Galla or the Summer Sun Celebration. But during and post-war, we had mostly discontinued the band until we brought it back for the Caravan. We made sure to leave out the pre-war stuff and lied, saying we had just made this band to bring some joy to the Caravan. Then the whole Redeye shit happened, and I haven't mentioned them since. It was a simple band, though. Spyglass was drums, Romulus was backup Guitar or rift guitar, And I was lead singer with my own Guitar. Plus, we all could harmonize our voices for group vocals. Yeah, I know. I was shocked as well when People told me I had a singing voice. But not for the music you'd expect.

So the confusion and shock when I heard Romulus say we were Performing TONIGHT and that it was MY IDEA was quite understandable. Even as I rummaged through my old belongings in the M.O.V to find my Electic Guitar, I could only smirk as I thought of Romulus's genius in using the ponies I cared about and the soul of my Caravan to peer pressure me into performing. Like I said before, he knew how to appeal to the inner part of me. But now that I was committed to this by social expectation, I realized I hadn't rehearsed a song. I hadn't made one. Hell, I didn't even know which one to do out of the few I did know. Fuck, I need to figure this out quickly, or else ima look really stupid in a few minutes.

I climbed the ladder with one hand as I held the Guitar in my left hand. Im pretty sure that if I tried climbing the ladder one-handed with my left, it wouldn't end well. Romulus had cleared the top of the M.O.V and unbolted one of the railings on the long side by the time I found my Guitar. The only other thing on the roof was the map table, that and the two massive poles and the other long side of the vehicle. Protruding out of the corner railings held up the other half of the tarp keeping our gear nice and dry. Spyglass was setting up his drumset while Romulus went and checked all the microphones. Which were hooked up to the M.O.V speakers, along with some jacks for our guitars. Where the hell were we storing all of this musical shit this whole time? And why was it not in the storage manifest? You know what, fuck it, I don't care enough right now.

"Here, let me help you get all set up, sir." Romulus walked towards me with one of the Guitar jacks. He took the Guitar, but before he could plug it in, I grabbed his arm.

"You know you're a mother fucker right?" Even though he didn't have a mouth, I could see it on his face. He had the biggest smile on his stupid face.

"Very much so, sir."

"you know I haven't played the Guitar in like ten years, right? I don't even have a song rehearsed or anything. You literally put me in the worst situation."

"Ahh, you'll figure it out! Just like you always do." he shook free of my hand and plugged in the Guitar. There was a small pop on the speakers, and he did a quick test across the strings to ensure it was all hooked up. The speakers responded loudly, and the noise was heavily out of tune. It silenced the crowd's murmur below as everyone went silent. I snatched the Guitar out of his hand.

"Gimme that! I may be rusty in playing, but I know how to tune it. And turn down those speakers until we're ready." Romulus nodded. He walked over to the map table and turned a nob on the control panel. It was like that whole episode earlier had never happened for him. I mean, I was glad he wasn't making a whole ordeal about it but like, Really? Bygones just like that? If I were in his place, I wouldn't have talked to me like ever again.

I fiddled with tuners until It sounded correct over the speakers. Now at least if I didn't have a song ready, it would sound right.

"Spyglass, you all ready to go?" I heard Romulus ask behind me. I heard a few bangs of the drums over the speakers sounding powerful as ever, before he responded.

"Ready to go!"

"Sir, how you looking?" I knew he was asking me. I didn't want to respond. I laid my Guitar on the floor and stepped to the edge looking out over the crowd. I saw ponies in the Canteen, in jeeps and vales, a good bunch gathered around the bonfire. I never realized just how many ponies had joined my Caravan. I understood that the Caravan was big and we had to travel slow. But This was the first time since Redeye's betrayal that I truly took in the Caravan as a whole. I saw old faces and new ones. I saw just how many more vehicles we had added to our numbers since then. Some are rougher and made with recycled scrap. Others are sleeker and made with element steel. I saw the significant number of Supplies Stored on the Mules compared to what little we had when we crawled into Tempony tower so long ago. I saw how far we had come since Redeye. I saw the Disty Doo. The greatest good thing to happen to the Wasteland among everything I built. I was proud of all the work I put into this Caravan and how it's turned out so far, despite the Hardships. It was right then it clicked on what song I wanted, And I was going to have to write it while I sang. Well fuck me, I guess I liked doing it the hard way.

I turned to face my band. "You guys set in B flat minor?" They quickly changed some things on the instrument before responding in sync.

"Now we are!"

I walked back over to my Guitar and picked it up. "look, Im going to be winging it here. But you guys know how I work better than most. So Im trusting you both to give me the stuff I need to make this shit work, all right?"

They bother nodded, Spyglass raising his sticks in preparation. Romulus had his pick on the strings ready to go. I looked at the microphone on its stand. I unhooked my helmet off my belt and put it on. Connecting to the speakers via the helmet. Then I unceremoniously kicked the microphone to the side. It hit the ground with a thud that blasted over the radio. Catching everyone's attention below. I stood to the edge as everyone looked at me. A little bit of stage fright crept into my head but was quickly shoved aside as I readied myself on my Guitar, pick in my right hand.

I began as the Powerful sound echoed over the Speakers as I slid my left hand over the strings. Setting the Tone for the song, it was proud, powerful, and Uplifting with a hint of reminiscence. I went on only for a few moments before Spyglass set in the beat with his sticks, and Romulus followed suit. His Guitar was more bass filled and sat in the background as mine took front and center. But the Tone stayed the same, Just louder and more powerful. That's what my preferred style was, A good hard-hitting song that could rock the soul to its core. That's the power of rock and roll.

We went on for a few seconds, getting used to the beat and allowing me to prepare the first set of lyrics that came to mind, which derived from memories and events throughout my life in the Wasteland. I was right to trust Romulus and Spyglass. They knew when and where to chime in. Probably because I broadcasted to them what to do via neural sensors in my helmet and its built-in radio.

When I awoke, the World was so dark
Woah-oh
When the old World used to be so bright
Woah-oh
and everyone in this whole damn land
Woah-oh
Was Preaching friendship and peace
Woah-oh
Now the World's poisoned and burnt
Woah-oh
The Ponies are divided and poor
Woah-oh
How can one mere human, redeem this broken World?

Bombs Rained Dowwwwwn
Ponies fleeeed
Running Foooor, Stable Doooors
Some turned feraaal, some turned Greeeen
The rads poured ouuuuuut
The elements fleeed (go!)

I saw the Peace, yeah I really did
Woah-oh
So I focused on what they really need
Woah-oh
brought food, water, medicene across the land
Woah-oh
preached we could do better, some agreed
we put together Jeeps
Woah-oh
Made Vales and packed the Mules
Woah-oh
Now we've come so far
since Redeye broke the peace

While Romulus and Spyglass kept the pace, I got caught in the moment and let out one hell of a guitar solo. It felt raw and from my soul. For once in a long time, I was pushing pure passion through the strings of this guitar. Before I pushed that passion into more words. Paying no attention to the screaming crowd below.

Bombs Rained Dowwwwwn
Ponies fleeeed
Running Foooor, Stable Doooors
Some turned feraaal, some turned Greeeen
The rads poured ouuuuuut
The element's fleeed (go!)

Now we staaaand
stronger than beforrrrre
bonds forged, through trade and looove
Lifes still hard, But its betterrrrrr
through the liiiives
of the Caravaaaaan.

We ended on a grand final note that carried on for several seconds before fading out. It faded into the screaming crowd below as the cheers and stomping of hooves. I looked over the expanse of ponies as some form of weight was lifted off my shoulders. The wall in my mind sat stronger than ever, and I felt proud of myself. Mainly the fact that I wrote a song as I fucking sung it! I also felt really tired. Not sleepy tired but working hard tired. I gave a bow and turned towards my band. Romulus sat his Guitar down against Spyglass's drums as he came up to me.

"Brilliant, sir! That was Simply Brilliant!" I grabbed him by the shoulders and yanked him in for a hug, which he returned after a few seconds of hesitation.

"Sorry for earlier. There is a lot of shit in my head that im just not ready to sift through yet. I got a wall inside this old noggin keeping it all back until im ready." I broke the hug but kept my grip on his shoulders. "Thank you for this, though. It really helped clear the current shit bothering me."

He stared into my face before giving a response. "It was my pleasure, sir."

I smiled and walked past him, patting him on the back. I shot a pair of finger guns at Spyglass. "Damn fine work on that beat, Spyglass!"

"T-Thank you, sir!" His nervousness still showed prominently. I gotta look at his code sometime cause now it's so bad I think it might actually be a bug.

"Where are you going now, sir?" I heard Romulus say as I got to the ladder.

"Im gonna go work in the forge. Im definitely done with the Soicalitys for tonight. Plus, I need to make something to replace my Gladius since I lost it after the train crash." I started going down the ladder before I called back out to Romulus. "Also, make sure that shit was recorded! I wanna hear it, dammit!"

He gave a nod, and he began talking to the ponies again over the microphone. I didn't really pay attention. I was happy with the night ending there for me. Plus, Romulus held everyone's attention while I slipped into the forge. He knew better and didn't want me to get swarmed right now. Even as I lit the fire and started melting down some leftover Element steel. I hoped tomorrow was going to be a much simpler day and this trip to a time capsule would be just a senor error like Romulus said. But another part of me had a feeling something was in store tomorrow. Something, big.

Author's Note

This is my first attempt at a song in my Writing ever. I've been wanting to do this chapter for a long time since I first started it over on Fanfiction. SO any feedback to improve the piece would be great. I got the inspiration from The Offspring's song - 'The Kids Arent alright.' Im thinking about calling it. 'Things turned out alright.' Im not sure yet.

The Mind is a Minefield

The hot, humid air of the Forge was unrelenting. It made my body sweaty and oily. My chest shone like a freshly waxed floor. My hair was patted down from the moisture. Beads of sweat dripped down my face and off my chin with each swing of the hammer in my hand. I had to take off my shirt a few hours in just to keep myself somewhat cool. I decided to Produce this new blade with the folding steel method. Which always took longer to finish and was much more exerting on the body. But considering I still had a while in my three-day timespan before I needed to pass out again. I had all the time in the world. Plus, I wanted to take my time while forging this new blade.

I had taken into account the future though, when deciding whether or not I made another Gladius or a different Blade entirely. Now I know the wasteland is more heavily focused on gunplay, and most times having a blade or close-quarters weapon was more of a 'just in case' tool. But my People and my culture had blades like swords, axes, and such all throughout our history and culture. As we turned the Wheel of progress and developed our technology, we still brought the way of the blade with us. Merged it into our way of life. When guns first came around, it wasn't the question of whether we could pair a sword with a gun. It was the question of whether you could pair a gun with a sword. The answer was yes, obviously, but it took practice and training to perfect such a technique. Something which, as a royal back home, was forced upon us. I didn't mind it, though. I enjoyed a fair bit of swordplay.

My decision in what blade was that I did not wish for another Gladius. Even though it paired well with my hand cannon for close to short-range fighting. I knew that when going to this time Capsule, I would likely find an energy-based weapon to complement my hand cannon. One of its key points was developing and storing Energy based weapons. Combine that with the fact I wanted to move on from swords for a little while. I had made quite an interesting choice that didn't quite fit with the times. A one-handed war axe, specifically a design from the pre-Merlin era of history. It was a hooked axe blade that still sliced and diced. But it could also hook and pull onto limbs and cause some rather violent dismemberment. In this day and age, nothing was too barbaric, plus having a one-handed weapon paired with any firearm was a must. Using a two-handed weapon was just shooting yourself in the foot. Hoof?

This type of axe, regarding its history, was that it wasn't supposed to be used offensively. At least not primarily. It was held in the wielder's less dominant hand and used as a parrying dagger of sorts. But in addition to deflecting attacks by hooking the blade on the opponent's weapon, the axe was effective in removing the opponent of their hands. Least of all things, this axe was a good projectile in the right hands. However, that variable weighed on the material used in construction. This is why Element steel became a quick replacement for most weapon crafting due to its lightweight and durability. But that was in short supply nowadays.

Not to mention molding the metal into a blade or armor took more effort and time than regular steel as well. My current Forge couldn't quite heat it enough to make the hammer fold it as easily. So it was a matter of heating it, pounding it a few times, and heating it again, repeatedly, until you could move on to the more fun phase of forging, which was exhausting.

The Forge itself had quite the arsenal of tools for making armor, weapons, and even bullets, as I had a chem-station and a bullet press. The pool of ash and fire in the stone half-circle sat on a thick layer of tungsten, one of the few metals with a higher melting point than element steel. The stone half-circle sat against the rear wall of the M.O.V while the rest hung off the back on the same tungsten platform. The Forge was relatively roomy, though. There was plenty of space to move without knocking shit over every time I moved from Forge to anvil or grindstone. It didn't really have walls, though. It had arches for windows that formed into a ceiling. Allowing me to look out into the Caravan and the Canteen every now and again. Tables and small half-walls surrounded the Forge, with two small staircase entrances on the sides. Opposite of the Forge was the handle and pommel workbench. An assortment of gems and different leathers lay across the table, along with several drawers holding various items. Along the ceiling, I took an odd approach to lighting. I strung up old pre-war hearths-warming lights. I didn't use them often since the Forge itself threw a lot of light on its own. Occasionally brightened by the sparks of metal that flew off the metal with each swing of the hammer.

I wiped the sweat from my forehead as I returned the slab of metal to the pool of fire, letting the heat turn its dull red glow to a hot orange. "Fucking finally got the folding done!" I looked at a clock that hung off one of the metal beams that held up the ceiling. "By Merlin's Will! It's been six hours already?! Fuck, I must've gotten rusty over the years." I sat down my hammer on a nearby table and rotated my aching shoulder. Massaging it with my hand.

"Ah, Finally finished pounding that metal, eh? Hammering cramps, sir?" I Saw Romulus walking up the left side entrance. He seemed to be in a good mood.

"Yeah, you could say that. Im not quite finished yet, though. I still gotta put the edge on the thing and make the handle." I grabbed a large set of forging tongs and took hold of the red-hot axe head. The shape was still bulky, and the supposed edge was too wide. I moved it to the anvil, grabbed my smaller hammer, and began molding the edge into shape.

"Well, sir, if you don't finish here soon, you won't be able to join the expedition team to the time capsule! Allow me to offer my assistance for the handle of this blade." He walked over to the workbench and began clearing the space. I ceased my hammering to give a quick response.

"That would speed this along since I still need to hit the grindstone after this. There should be a design for an axe handle somewhere on that table. I put it together beforehand."

Romulus shifted through the clutter before he held up a piece of paper. "A-hah! Found it"

I returned to my hammering while he put together the handle. Once finished, I quenched the blade in mineral oil for that extra boost along with a quicker quench. Before taking the white metal to the grindstone, I doubled checked the metal for warps. I sat before the stone wheel, put my foot on the pedal below, and gave it a few good presses. Causing the spin, slowly start spinning and quickly pick up speed. The exposed part of the Wheel became soaked as it passed through the water-filled lower compartment. I slowly pressed the blade of the axe head to the stone and held it steady. I watched as the blade's dull edge became shiny and refined to a sharp edge. I held it up and inspected the blade. I ran my finger along it, and blood came forth in a surprising amount.

"Yup! you're sharp enough." I got up and headed over to Romulus as he was still working on the handle. Which looked like a paperclip a child straightened out in the middle of class because they were bored. It ran straight but slightly curved since you could never bend paper clips straight. I've tried.

Romulus took notice of me as I looked over his shoulder as he worked. Tightly wrapping leather around the metal shaft. "Almost done, sir. Just wrapping the handle."

I was Curious about what kind of leather he was using. It was dark green with faint its of yellow and green. It reminded me of, Oh my Merlin. He isn't. "Are you wrapping that in Deathclaw hide?!"

He turned to look at me. The small shutters that acted as his eyelids showed he was excited. "Suprise, sir! I'd hope you don't mind. I had a little bit extra left over from my last project. Seemed fitting that I would return it to you as such." He took the axe head from my hand and began attaching it to the handle.

"Thanks, Romulus."

"It's my Pleasure, sir! Now while I finish this, you should go freshen up. It's early morning, and you don't wanna be late for your expedition."

I looked at the clock again, six thirty, FUCK, I got only got half an hour now! I hurried out of the Forge only to trip and fall into the dirt. I flipped myself around and saw the M.O.V slowly drive on. Thank god it was a walking hour. I got up and rushed inside. I've never taken a faster shower in my life.

By the time I got to the set of three jeeps, I was late by ten minutes. There were four specters to a Jeep, and they were all standing around waiting for me. Spyglass and Romulus were among them. Fuck I really need to keep better track of time. Romulus noticed my approach and quickly ordered the other specters into the jeeps.

"Here you go, sir." he said, handing me the axe with its completed handle. Perfectly weighted, I thought, putting it in the custom sling on my belt with my gladius sheath used to be. Romulus continued, "Now, Spyglass will be going with you on this expedition. So try not to give him too much of a hard time." We both glanced at the nervous specter as he looked over supplies.

"You ever checked his code recently? Thar new nervousness he has is a little unsettling." I asked.

"I have, actually. My source code just finally evolved in this case. It's a first for me, and im keeping a close eye on it. I actually toned it down a bit after our performance last night." I nodded in approval. That was some good news at least. Means I didn't fuck up coping the code, at least.

Spyglass gave me a thumbs up, and I opened the passenger side door and was about to hop in when Romulus grabbed my shoulder. "Come back safe, sir."

"When have I not?" I chuckled. Causing an eye-roll from the old machine as I climbed into the jeep shutting the door. "Aight, Spyglass, let's roll!" The jeep lurched forward as Spyglass put pressure on the pedal. Hopefully, Romulus was right, and this time capsule just had a sensor malfunction.

"We should be there in roughly six hours, sir." Spyglass stated about an hour into the ride.

"We do not have the time for that! Just go sixty, and we'll be there in three." I pulled the lever on the side of the chair and leaned back. Relaxing the best I could.

"Sir, we're pushing seventy right now."

"Fucks sake, it's that far away?"

"yeah, very inconvenient for us, but it is closer to Shattered Hoof Ridge and Junction R7. You're already getting comfy, so just sit back and relax. It's going to be a long ride." Even though I was already taking his advice before he even said anything, I took it with a grain of salt. I turned on the radio and stared into the grand cloud curtain above as DJpone3's music played over the speakers. After a few minutes of listening, I closed my eyes and let my mind drift as I daydreamed about what life could have been like back home.

"Sir, are you ready?" Romulus's voice pierced the veil of my mind, and I opened my eyes to see the front of the Canterlot Royal Castle. The large arching doors with the two guards in magical power armor standing at the sides was a sight I was all too used to. It was the dead of night, and the moon hung overhead, showering the ground with a faint glow. A brisk, cold night wind filled the air. Romulus stood on my left in a rather dashing suit. He always had a way of looking extra fancy in one.

"No, Not really, Romulus," I sighed with despair. "Considering the last time I saw Luna was at the last peace negotiation meeting, and probably the last one. Considering I had to take a magical blast to the back."

"We can always go home, sir. We don't have to go if you don't want to." Romulus put a hand on my shoulder, trying to be supportive.

"No. Both sides in this pointless war have world-ending super weapons that could rain down at any moment. For all we know tonight could be the last chance to at least try to have the final moments be on good terms." I straightened myself. Adjusting my fur-hooded jacket as I walked forward. "That and I wanna have some good memories with my friends. Before we, ya know."

"Yes sir, I understand" Romulus followed suit.

The two guards moved in front of us as we approached the door. One raising a hoof to halt us. "Invitations, please," A voice emanated from one of the suits of armor. Romulus reached out with two cards between his metallic fingers. The guard took the two cards, looked them over, and then returned them to Romulus. "Alright, you're good." He added as he and the other guard pushed open the massive doors and led us inside.

The guards led us through the castle to the main royal hallway. The stained glass murals along the walls with the two royal thrones at the end of the room. The six ministry mares were standing near the center of the room, talking and getting caught up with each other. It had been a long time since the last one of these 'dinners.' Rarity was the first to see our approach, sending a look of disapproval my way. The others turned to see what Rarity was looking at and gazed at me. They were all dressed in formal dresses that reflected them and their ministries and accompanied by a personal guard. Applejack's guard stood out the most, being a steel ranger in full power armor. I guess Twilight's was a close second because it was Spike. A much older and mature dragon. Who snarled silently at me, only to receive an elbow to the gut from Twilight.

There was a sudden tension in the air thick enough to cut. Ever since I first started my campaign for peace and chose not to actively participate in the war. I've been looked at as a disgrace to Equestria and a coward. Even my six closest friends in front of me didn't seem to want me in their presence. Even though I knew what war would bring. Hell, I lived it. I preached on the radio and in speeches to try and stave off war. But to little effect. Nopony believed me and, as time went on, saw me as a nuisance. The only reason I think ponies even tolerated me was that, before the war, I made sure to declare myself as a separate nation from Equestria. Which was not easy and cost me almost all my money.

We stared for what felt like an eternity. The silence tugged at my soul to say something, but I kept my mouth shut. I felt anything I said could mess things up more. It was only when a set of doors opened down the hall was the silence broken, and the focus was taken off of me. As the Princess of the sun and moon walked in. Princess Luna walked first and was much more dressed up than her sister, who hung back. I still couldn't believe Celestia had stepped down. It honestly made things worse, But I never argued against it. I was already on most of Equestrias's last straw. I didn't need the rulers to be as well.

Luna gazed about the room, taking everyone in as if counting them. I think she was making sure everyone was here. Then her gaze fell upon me and changed to a stern stare. Even with the resentment I had against her since the last time we spoke. The other ponies bowed before the royals as expected. I took my arm and rested it across my chest, my fist clenched with the inner part resting against my opposite shoulder. I dropped to a knee and bowed, feeling a sharp, searing pain in my lower back as I gave my people's royal showing of respect. No matter my feelings, I held tremendous respect for the sisters, and as a former royal, I needed to be better. The other ponies bowed as they always did two the royal sisters/

"Good, now that everypony is here. We can begin." I heard Princess of the moon announce, hearing hoof steps that grew slowly distant. I stood up slowly, only to be halted by the same pain. I took a deep breath and slowly resumed. Romulus helped me to stand and follow the group.

We were escorted by Luna's personal guard down a long hallway toward the main dining room. As we walked, I was paid little attention as the other ponies carried on with their discussions before my arrival. It was understandable as everyone had their 'opinions' on me. Even though it wasn't always like that. It felt like it was only yesterday that I was down at Applejack's farm a few months after getting pulled out of the Everfree forest. Helping out and trying to make a fresh start for myself. Or in Twilight's library in Ponyville, learning about this new world I found myself in. I smiled to myself as I remembered the first time I needed to order custom-made clothes for myself from Rarity. Since human-style clothes weren't very common in a world they didn't exist. God, that was such a long day of measurements and odd conversations about underwear.

Two guards pushed open a door as we approached it, revealing a large dining room. A very extravagant crystal chandelier hung above a long dining table, decorated with all sorts of silverware and fancy candles. The table was long and ended at the opposite end of the room similar to a T in shape. Two oversized chairs sat next to each other across the short end. Across the more extended portion with six chairs, three on each side directly across from the other. And right at the very tip was one chair that was just my size. I was surprised they even planned ahead for me, considering they had to grab a chair from the other room last time. Only further showing the dislike for myself, even among the closest to me.

I took my seat and watched patiently as everyone else took their seats. Ignoring the pain in my lower back as I sat. Some requested seats for their own personal guards, mainly Applejack and Twilight. Romulus didn't really need one. He didn't eat, so he stood behind me a few feet back. Keeping an eye on everyone like most of the other personal guards. After a few minutes, an earth pony waiter came out of a side door to the left of the table and began going around the table, taking orders from the royals first and then working his way to the rest.

He finished with Applejack's order before rounding the table, stopping at me, and asking me what I wanted. "I'll take my usual. Two chicken cor-don bleu's extra crispy."

"And to drink?" the stallion asked. Writing the order on his notepad, using his mouth to write.

"Uh, go ahead and come back to me later. Im not sure right now." I said, handing him a small bag of bits. He nodded and moved on to Pinkie Pie, who was next around the table.

As I waited, I tuned into the current conversation that rainbow dash was leading. If I was gonna be a part of this meeting, I might as well know what everyone was talking about.

"And then, me and my squadron brought down a hail fire on lazers on this encampment of zebras while the Steelrangers kept them distracted. It was AWESOME! They didn't even see us coming!" Rainbow Dash boomed energetically, as always. It didn't take me long to realize she was talking about one of her recent missions, and she was bragging about it. She went and bragged about it being her highest kill mission as well. Which really pissed me off.

I wasn't pissed that she was happy or celebrating the successful mission. I see no issue with that. My problem is bragging about kills like it's points on a scoreboard. Taking a life back home was a BIG deal, so much so that it sometimes caused several-year investigations and court cases into the double digits. The only time it was justified was in self-defense or in war. But we never bragged about it at all during our war. If anyone did, they were immediately discharged and put into Elemental counseling. We took those things very seriously. So hearing such a close friend, or perhaps a former close friend. Just bragging about it was so fucking infuriating. So much so that I had to tune it out before I yelled at her to hold her tongue about such indecencies.

I put my left arm in my left hand on my lap and sneakily opened my wristpad. I looked through some projects that were being worked on back at the Hub and checked the progress reports. Most of them were "just in case" projects Romulus put into production. But before I even opened the file, a plate was sat in front of me with two large chicken breasts. Golden brown and looking delicious.

I felt my stomach rumble as I looked at the food. I grabbed the silverware next to the plate and cut into one of the chicken breasts, seeing melted white cheese pour out with tiny bits of ham. I stabbed the piece onto my fork and shoved it into my mouth. The slight crunch into the chicken mixed with the creamy mozzarella and ham was delicious. I haven't had this in so long. I just wanted to enjoy it for as long as I could. Only for me to hear my name to break me out of my food trance.

"So, Riley, how did the last peace meeting go?" Twilight's voice cut through my mind. She sounded nervous but somehow supportive. I guess she was the only one who didn't "hate" me. But sometimes, it really didn't show. I stopped chewing and looked across the table to see everyone staring at me.

I held up a hand and quickly finished chewing before speaking. "My apologies. I don't like talking with my mouth full." I paused, wiping my mouth with a napkin. I noticed Princess Luna shooting daggers at me from across the table. It screamed, "Watch what you say." But it didn't scare me.

"As for the peace meeting, it was in all technicality, the best one progress-wise so far." Several Eyebrows raised. Most of my reports on these meetings went along the lines of "Yeah. They kinda yelled at each other for twenty minutes, and nothing really happened." But I was speaking the truth. It was the best one so far.

"How so?" Applejack was first to ask, getting serval agreeing responses from the other ponies.

"Well, we got the beginnings of the treaty actually written down on paper. So that's a plus. But it was primarily terms that would broker a temporary end to the fighting while everything else was put into place." Everyone at the table was baffled except for luna, who scoffed. No one seemed to care though. Several small discussions broke out with the ponies at the table. Until Rarity asked the golden question.

"What terms could bring about such a drastic change?"

"Well," I began. "The main thing that was brought about in these terms which would make or break the deal. Was the Royal convergence pact. I had to wrangle this thing a lot during the discussions, but the main point we could all agree to do. It was to have Princesses Celestia and Luna be removed from power entirely and replaced by either the six ministry mares as a form of democratic council similar to the Zebra nation. Or, have one of the Ministry Mares take their place as the new royal dictator."

Everyone was baffled including Celestia, who looked at her sister, shocked. As if she didn't tell her.

"How in all of Equestria, did you manage to pull something like that off? The Zebras barely tolerate Luna's presence, no offense, with your meetings on the terminals. You not only managed to get two of the world's most powerful leaders that hate each other more than anything to sit down in the same room together. But you got them to discuss and start an actual peace treaty?! Im surprised word of this hasn't been announced all over Equestria and beyond!" Twilight seemed overjoyed at the fact there might have been an end to this godforsaken conflict. It broke my heart to tell the unfortunate truth.

"If im going to be perfectly honest, I played the biggest kiss-ass you've ever seen. Once you've been in a room with those individuals as long as I have, you find ways to make them sit down and talk rather than yell. It wasn't fucking easy though. This whole shtick was four years in the making." I paused, giving a deep sigh. "However, I wouldn't get your guy's hopes up. The reasoning behind that act is the main reason why that last meeting truly was the last."

The room got quiet, deathly quiet. "Whys that, darling?" Rarity asked, concerned.

"Well, the original pact was to one, have the princesses step down along with a few members of the high zebra council, mainly the more militaristic ones. And two, dismantle the ministries along with most war-based weaponry to somewhat force peace due to the lack of weapons and militaristic prowess. And further discussions would take place from there. Which I thought was brilliant. I managed to talk the Zebras into conforming the Ministries into a democratic council if that's what the decision with you all boiled down to. But I couldn't convince them to change the rule for the princesses, however. The Zebra councils reasoning for it was as stated. 'Nightmare moon and anyone of blood relation are unfit to rule any form of a country as they have been corrupted by the stars.' This caused a most rather heated discussion, to say the least, between Luna and the Zebra council. So heated, in fact, that in a very short spring of events, I found myself one moment taking notes and writing things down in the treaty. To sprawled out on the table with a four-inch scorch mark on my back, unable to move my legs."

The whole room was in shock. The tension in the air seemed gone and replaced with a sense of dread. Until Rainbow Dash slammed her hooves on the table, flaring her wings as she took off from the ground hovering slightly in the air. "Who shot you, uh? I'll have a strike time on their asses within the next day! No one shoots my friend, no matter our issues!"

The rest of the room favored Rainbow Dashes' response, wanting to take action. It warmed my heart that my close friends still cared despite our hardships. All except Luna, who sat quietly staring at me. But alas, it would be short-lived. I raised my hand and slowly calmed everyone down before speaking.

"I appreciate the support, guys. However." I paused, eating some more of my chicken before continuing. "Luna, you wanna tell them the truth, or shall I?" I spoke loudly to ensure she heard me, Wiping my mouth with a napkin. The room's sets of eyes shifted off me towards our great ruler. Who was shocked and glared at me before looking away and the floor. I guess she never expected me to turn this on her. I didn't care, though. This was happening now.

"Luna, what did you do?" Celestia's voice was stern, taking on her parental side as she spoke to luna. But luna stayed silent, continuing to stare at the floor.

"Luna saw fit to start a heated discussion with the Zebras about their 'opinion' of her and Celestia and was getting extremely upset with the Zebra council. And you all know how 'hot-tempered' she can get. So much so that she snapped from rage and fired a magical laser spell at the Zebra high chairman, Which I jumped in front of to save his life. I had to tell Romulus to get more specters in the room as an all-out battle nearly broke out, and escort the royal leaders back to their kingdoms." Now for once, ponies weren't staring and glaring at me. All of it was now aimed at Luna. Which wasn't my goal, yet here we are.

"LUNA! HOW COULD YOU!" for the first time since arriving in Equestria. This was the first time I saw Celestia this enraged, especially at her younger sister. She was even using the old loud voice they used in their younger days. "Our one chance for peace, the one chance we could have stopped all this death, and you threw it away because all because of what? An insult!?"

Luna stood up to her sister with anger in her eyes as she returned her sister's unkindness. "I took a stand to show that I wasn't the nightmare they all thought I was-"

"And look where that got you!" Celestia cut her off. Her anger shook my soul. The two sisters went back and forth, arguing for elements know how long. The other ponies in the room also had their choice of words. The room was in chaos, ponies at war with themselves. And I wasn't having it.

I pulled out my hand cannon and pointed it upwards, and fired. The concussive bang echoed off the walls of the massive dining room. Amplifying the sound heavily and causing everyone in the room to cover their ears. I had their attention now. I slipped my weapon back into its holster. "It doesn't even matter anymore! It's not like you all can turn over a new leaf for peace! The path of war has already been chosen. Mainly because, from what I can see, pony kind isn't ready for advanced technology yet." Terrible choice of words, Riley.

"What do you mean by 'not ready,' huh?" Applejack said, returning the tension in the room to fall upon me as a few ponies gave me suspicious looks.

"Well, you all as a species have made tremendous bounds in technological development. Faster than some humans back where I come from, that's for sure. And it's something I admire from you guys. It's quite impressive, really.'

"Why do I feel like there's gonna be a big 'BUT' coming up?" Pinikepie cut in.

"BUT, there is a fine line that any and all species have that defines their ability to use and understand that technology responsibly. Yes, you, as a species, have made great bounds in technology and science. No one here doubts that. However, your species... oh, how should I put it. It is like a child who got ahold of a working gun. It knows it goes bang and can kill something. But it isn't responsible enough to know where and when it's right to use it. Or rather if it's right to use it at all."

The speed at which everyone in the room turned their anger from Luna onto me could not be understated. I sat there and took the verbal abuse and insults for a minute until things calmed down. Then spoke again, "See, now that right there is why it's true! There was no reason for that at all. Yet I just took the largest barrage of verbal abuse for a very true statement. As a species, you are very short-tempered and can shift moods on a dime. Which is exactly why having such tremendous bounds in advancement can be deadly for you! You could have one of these temper spikes and do something that you would never do! Let's say, for example, a mega spell?"

"Oh, and you think your kind are better than, hm?! You all can handle your technology just fine, right? It's why you haven't bothered to share any of it with us, isn't it? Cause you think you're SO much better, right?" Rarity laid into me. But I wasn't offended. As a matter of fact, I was happy to hear it.

"Yes, actually. You hit the nail on the head." she was taken aback. as if not expecting that response. "It's not a matter of whether or not I think my people are wiser and more responsible. It's a fact that they ARE wiser and more responsible. We went through 5000 years of uninterrupted peace and were around as a race far longer than that. We chose peace over violence thanks to the guidance and beliefs of the elements that make the world go around. We work in unity to achieve and improve life for the better while also keeping ourselves in check. Making sure every angle is accounted for. Yes, I don't share my technology with you, ANY of you. And I won't for a very long time because you will use it irresponsibly without considering the repercussions. Until I see a worthwhile change in pony outlook on technology rather than a means to an end. Nothing will change." Once again, more verbal abuse.

"Sir, I thought you wanted to end on good terms?" I heard Romulus whisper into my ear.

I pushed a hand back to him. "I did, Romulus, I really did."

"We are in a time of war, sunshine. We don't have the time to look over every possible outcome when we make somthin'. We gotta stay ahead of the enemy no matter what!" Applejack protested.

"Yeah, I understand, but need I remind you that there wouldn't be a war right now if you two as rulers didn't neglect the coal and gem trade dispute between the primary pony and zebra businesses. The whole thing started with those two rich families having a dispute over the trade routes. Which you two ignored because I have the papers that were put on YOUR desk." I snapped my fingers as Romulus stepped forward and opened his chest compartment, reaching inside and pulling out a vanilla folder with Celestia's cutie mark stamped onto one of the corners. I opened it and began reading through it.

"As a quote from this document that you signed, 'Any families as wealthy as these should be more than able to sort out such a petty dispute amongst themselves. Plus, Riley went down to one of the meetings himself to see the issues firsthand. This should be over within the next week.' Signed and stamped by yours truly, Miss Celestia." I tossed the folder to Applejack as I finished. she began reading through it as I continued.

"Now fast forward a few weeks later, and these families are hiring talons and mercenaries to hunt down family members to try and dominate the trade market. Which happened to lead to the ultimate starting point of this petty war, where a mercenary group entered Littlehorn to take out one of the pony family members of the house, Granita Gemina. To keep a long story short, the family member tried to get her daughter out of the school and flee, but the fighting had already started before she could get out. Causing the unfortunate massacre that started this whole thing in the first place." At this point, the file had been passed down to Rarity and Twilight and was just now in the Princess's hooves. Twilight even stated that it was a legitimate document and was, in fact, signed by Celestia herself. Everyone was shocked at my knowledge of the subject.

"How do you know so much about that?" Pinkie pie asked.

"I know a lot of things about this war that most of you don't even know. If you're gonna negotiate for peace, you need to know the facts and the fact that I WAS THERE trying to settle the trade dispute before things got to where they did. But coming back around to things I know, I know that most of you really don't care what happens in your ministry and what kind of atrocities happen behind closed doors. And it sickens me that you all lead these ministries and are allowed such disgusting practices to go unpunished."

"What kind of atrocities are you talking about?!" Rainbow dash asked, hovering above her chair again with vice in her voice.

"Let me get my fucking list for ya!" I said, pointing at Applejack first. "Your ministry is full of the original family that started the fucking dispute in the first place. Whether you believe it or not, they've been selling to both sides in this war and helped make both the gun that punches through your overly fancy and overengineered armor and armor-piercing ammo. Along with Helping get both sides stealth bugs and other such commodities of war." I pointed to Rarity next, leaving Applejack with a dumbfounded expression.

"you got hold of a book of dark magic imbued by part of king Sombras's soul himself. And been tampering with souls and putting them into some of your products. I'll even say you've been using it to keep yourself looking young and fresh, as everyone else here looks like they've aged thirty years. Except you, you look the same, if not better, than before the war." I moved on to Twilight and restrained myself slightly before letting it out. I did not want to let myself lose the best friend I had in this room. I skipped the sisters as they already had a lot shown about them.

"You promoted and still run DNA splicing and enhanced mutation practices on living creatures. Causing grotesque monsters and abominations, and you just shove in the caves under Maripony and label them as 'failed experiments.' Hell, some of them were dead ponies brought back from the battlefield for you to test on. It's horrid and disgusting! And what's even worse about it? It's all to impress Miss mentor of the sun over there because you CRAVE approval!" Twilight looked ashamed and disgusted as her head stared blankly at the floor. I stared at Rainbow Dash as she glared at me.

"You... you treat war like a game. Gloating about every win and every kill on your personal scorecard. WAR is not a game! It's a matter of survival! People go to war, and most expect to die for a cause greater than themselves, leaving their old life behind and embracing it grimly. And you tally each of the ones you kill like it's something to be proud of when it's not. Those ponies had wives, sons and daughters, a family. And you treat them like points on a scoreboard. It's sickening." I put a lot of extra vice into a low, hissing tone for hers. I wanted to make my point clear before moving on to Fluttershy. She seemed scared of whatever I was gonna say. Which wasn't much.

"You know what you did." and lastly, Pinkiepie.

"You are a FUCKING DRUGGIE! There's no other way to put it! You mass produce drugs of almost every kind. You sell it to everyone who can buy it. Even kids are getting a hold of some of the stuff you make. And you're nearly on that crack-ass Mental shit all damn day! You abduct ponies from their home in the middle of the night and put them through all manner of punishment to give up zebra info. I get you to do it to would-be zebra sympathizers or smugglers, but still, it's fucked up." I waved my hand through the air gesturing to everyone at the table. "Every one of your ministries is fucked up in some way or form. I wouldn't bother trying to hide it. I got files on it all inside this tin can right here." I reached my arm around the back of my chair and gave Romulus's metal chest a few good solid knocks before settling back into my chair. Continuing to eat my food.

"GOD, you have all these problems with what we do to try and win the war, yet you don't even help! Maybe if you put more of your energy into helping us rather than getting every bit of dirt you can on us. You wouldn't be looked upon so poorly by the masses." Rarity was coming at me. She clearly took offense to what I said about her. which only further proved some of my theories about her own practices. Still, it surprised me.

"You think I don't have dirt on the Zebras?" I laughed. "Oh boy, you guys really don't know me at all." I reached behind me and felt another vanilla folder fall into my grasp. I threw it lightly like a Frisby across the table, watching it land in the epicenter of the table in a clear spot away from any silverware. "The Zebras, in all honesty, are far worse with that one alone."

Surprisingly, Twilight was the first to pick it up with her magic. I was expecting Rarity to grab it. Floating it over to her and looking at the documents inside. I continued speaking as she read. "When was the last time you all saw a Changeling?" The room was surprised at my somewhat random question.

"Um, Id have to say, since the attack on canterlot during Shinning Armor's wedding. Why? Where ya going with this?" Applejack answered with confusion in her voice.

"Stay with me here. You see, when the war started they couldn't eat the love from ponies anymore since it had all but left with the coming conflict. Replaced by suffering and death, so they saw fit to leave Equestria. They didn't know any of the lands outside of Equestria and ended up in the Zebra homeland. One thing led to another, and some rather unfortunate events happened." I saw the expression on Twilight's face change to horror as she read. Putting a hoof to her mouth. "I believe Twilight has found such unfortunate events."

All eyes at the table were upon her. She gulped and spoke. "The Zebras are hunting the Changelings and using their hides to make the Zebra stealth cloaks." The whole table gasped, and Rarity gaged.

"Yup," I said, eating more of my food. I waved down the butler as the table discussed this newfound discovery. "Can I get a bottle of apple whisky? Not a glass but the whole bottle." I asked him, handing him a handful of bits. He nodded and went disappeared into a side door.

"Sir, I told you to watch your drinking." Romulus's voice was in my ear again, whispering.

"Romulus, cut me some slack, aight? I was already stressed out coming here, and it's only gotten worse with this headache. Just let me have this one." I finished, refocusing my attention on the table. Just in time too.

"How do you do stuff like this? Finding deep secrets amidst all of this chaos. You're a peace negotiator, for Celestia's sake!" Twilight asked. Celestia chuckled at her name being used as a swear.

I leaned forward in my chair, my laidback expression I've had this whole meeting turning stern along with the tone of my voice. "Just because I push for peace doesn't mean I have to be ignorant of the risk of the world around me. Any intelligent third party should be able to learn as much as they can in case of the worst of circumstances WITHOUT being caught. But considering you all and the Zebras don't look at me fondly. Hell, you guys don't even see me as a threat if I was brought into the conflict. That's why it was so easy to learn as much as I had." I leaned back in my chair and returned to my laid-back tone and stance. "No matter what you all think of me, Remember what I did during the Changeling attack so long ago. Im not a pushover. Even the calmest wolf still has fangs."

The room shifted, seeming to see me as someone not to be underestimated. Most of the expressions in the room changed. Fluttershy seemed more scared of me than ever. Before Luna spoke up. "So, now that the Zebra's are no longer seeking peace. What will you do now?"

"Good question!" I started. Adjusting myself in my chair. The room awaited my response anxiously. "I will do... nothing." The room was astonished.

"WHY?! The opportunity for peace has passed, yet you still refuse to fight?" Luna asked, frustrated.

"Your goddamn right!" I stated. "Need I remind you that the reason peace isn't an option anymore is because of YOU! Not to mention this wasn't my war in the first place! Why should I pick up a rifle and fight in a war I had nothing to do with? Why should I face the horrors of battle and the terrors of war for a nation that sees me as a disgrace or a coward?"

Twilight answered me this time. "Because we are your friends. Friends have each other's back through thick and thin. Plus, who knows what will happen to us if we lose this war."

I sat silently in my chair for a few moments, letting her words sink in deep than they should. Godammit, why did Twilight have to say it! I gathered myself and spoke. "Even if I joined the fight, it wouldn't matter at this point. This war has evolved into a ticking timebomb for mutually assured destruction."

"What do you mean?" Celestia asked, knowing the meaning of my words.

"If one side pushes the other to near defeat. The losing side will launch their balefire bombs and mega spells to take out the other as a last-ditch effort to win. But if that happens, the other side will respond in kind with their own mega spells. The world WILL end as soon as one of the missiles goes into the air. No questions asked." I finished with a great sigh.

"But maybe if you helped, maybe we could-" Twilight started to be interrupted by my fist slamming onto the table.

"NO! Thanks to Fluttershy, this war will have no winners! Only losers! Hell, it's more like survivors! My best recommendation is to invest more money into Stable-tech and have as many ponies as possible make it past the end. That way, your kind doesn't die off in the great cataclysm to come!"

"HOW WOULD YOU KNOW!" Luna slammed her hooves on the table, rearing from her chair and staring me down. "All you know is how to talk politics at a table! You wouldn't know anything about how bad war is unless you were down there on the battlefield fighting like the rest of us! Instead, you sit and do nothing like a coward!"

"I'M NO COWARD!" I yelled. Getting furiously angry.

"THEN PICK UP A WEAPON AND FIGHT! She yelled back.

I slammed my hands on the table and rose to my feet. Launching my chair backward as it hit the ground with a loud thud. Plates and silverware rattled across the table. "I REFUSE TO FIGHT IN ANOTHER WAR TO SEE THOSE I LOVE DIE NEEDLESSLY FOR A CONFLICT THAT COULD HAVE BEEN ENDED AT THE TABLE!" The room was silent. I was breathing heavily with anger. Then Applejack spoke.

"What do ya mean by 'another?'"

The word rang in my head, killing my anger instantly as memories from my past flooded my head. I made to sit back down as Romulus put the chair back in place and rested a hand on my shoulder as I slumped back down in my chair. I put my elbows on the table and put my head in my hands. "Fuck, It finally slipped," I mumbled. I heard the clopping of hooves approaching me as the waiter walked over with the bottle of whisky in tow. I took the bottle and tipped him generously. Popping it open and taking a long swig, I stayed silent. Trying to battle the resurfaced demons in my mind back into their cages.

"Roughly three and a half years before I arrived in Equestria, give or take a few years. My people were thrown into the most brutal and chaotic war ever. One that left a lasting impact on our world to the point where we lost our sun due to an eternal storm of pitch-black thunderclouds and red lightning." I paused to take another swig. The hard-hitting boose loosened my tongue even more.

"God, it was for such a stupid reason too. A fucking cultural dispute that started the downfall of everything. I was on the front lines overseeing every battle my people fought. I was our top strategies, planning attacks, and won the majority of battles I led. Compared to the other ten kingdoms. We were doing the best war-wise." I looked around the room at everyone who was listening intently. Then stared down Luna, Which caused her to look away.

"Ultimately, we all died to a superweapon similar to your mega spells. Except for the fact that a cataclysm bomb makes your mega spells look like firecrackers. But still, super weapons of that caliber are one of the few things that genuinely terrify me." I could tell certain ponies in the room were having a hard time believing me. Luna and Rarity scoffed multiple times during my speech, and Applejack seemed like she wanted to believe me but just couldn't. I knew how to prove it, though.

"Romulus, show them for me, please." I said, dropping my head down and waving my hand for him to take over.

"Are you certain, sir?" He asked, making sure that I was alright with it.

"Yes Romulus, im certain. I've had over twenty equestrian years to process my demons. I can watch a few moments of footage." And with a second word. Romulus stepped forward, and his eyes shot light forward like a projector into a floating screen.

The view changed from a light-filled screen into one of chaos and battle. I knew the view was from Romulus. He was my second in command during the war. He was deep in a trench with a DMR in hand. Peeking over the dirt and mud of the top of the trench and taking fire from across the way. Firing back in kind. Missles flew overhead as the audio slowly cut in through his speakers as he got his recording to full strength. Across several parts of the battlefield were enormous two-story mechs crumbled and blown into scrap metal. And a few still walking with guns larger than men in giant robotic hands firing away. Men, women, and specters alike armed with weapons of both blade and gun were scattered across the battlefield fighting for their lives. Romulus, in the recording, was calling out orders and strike maneuvers to many people over the radio. But most of what he said was lost to the sounds of chaotic gunfire and explosions.

In offshoots to the sides, you could see mages flinging large balls of fire from magical runes across the battlefield, which erupted into violent explosions. Another mage called down several lightning bolts from the raging thunderstorm above with another rune as they ripped enemies from trenches and cover. Other mages were shifting the ground with runes to make cover for additional troops to push up to the enemy across the way.

The main two diversity of armor which told apart the two factions at the battle. Were the sleek and robust and much more advanced side of soldiers, which Romulus was on the fortunate side of being on. And the other side who seemed more gladiatorial and brutal with their fighting compared to the other. Which tried to be strategic and work with each other. Their armor was always bloodsoaked and cruder. But most certainly not new as they had seemed to see battle countless times over. Even if the side Romulus was on was more advanced. This enemy had much more prowess in combat. One of them could take down several of the others before perishing. It was horrifying to watch.

In the sky above Romulus, there were large flying metal jets we called jackals. They were more triangular and had two circular support engines, which rotated freely in the wings, with the main propulsion part on the rear part of the chassis. Two large 20mm chainguns were mounted front and center with a secondary 100mm rapid-fire cannon mounted on the underside. These jackals were doing strafe runs on the individuals below. Diving in low, carpeting the ground in glowing yellow shells and blowing the ground apart.

Romulus's vision focused on a giant suit of armor. Bigger than any man by several feet. The armor enclosed the wearer but seemed to move just fine. On his left arm was a giant metal shield that could protect three men behind it. And the wearer was using block rounds and dragging a wounded soldier back to safety. his other arm held a large arm-mounted cannon, of which's barrel had been blown open like a misfired blunderbuss. A bright flash of light erupted into view as the camera grew fussy and distorted as a rocket collided with the suit's shield and drowned the camera in light. Romulius gazed towards another light. As another rocket came into view for a few moments before landing on the ground in front of Romulus and exploding. Cutting the camera feed a second later.

The video ended, and the projected screen disappeared back into Romulus's eyes as he took a step back. Now standing next to me, I leaned over and asked. "Was that the battle of ashrigra?"

"Your memory is impeccable, sir. Indeed it was." He responded.

"Huh, glad you chose one of the worst ones to show. Really sold it, ya know?" I looked back at the ponies around the table, who were all equally shocked. Too shocked to speak even.

"Next time you all second guess my judgment on war. You better think twice before making yourselves look stupid."

Suddenly I felt the whole world shake. The canterlot dining room faded and was replaced with a could-covered sky and a sharp pain in the back of my head. I reflexed and grabbed the back of my head, and sat up. I was in the jeep's passenger seat, and Spyglass was still driving.

"Oh shit, sorry sir! I didn't see that hole until the last second," Spyglass apologized.

I re-adjusted my seat to the upright position. My eyes were crusty and I felt groggy and slow. I was in a hot sweat, my head was pounding, and I didn't know where I was. "Huh, oh, you're fine. It's whatever." I said, rubbing my eyes and looking around. We were still on the road. And the other four jeeps were still in tow behind ours.

"In other news, we were only about half an hour away." Spyglass responded, sounding positive.

I suddenly remembered why we were on the road. "Oh yeah, the time capsule. Any update on its status?"

"No change, sir. Just giving the alert as it was." He looked over the dash through the windshield and at the hood as if looking through it at the engine. "However, we might need to stop sooner than expected because our battery is nearly out. The last thing we need to do is jumpstart this thing in the middle of nowhere."

I agreed. I don't wanna be late when we arrive at junction R7 because we overworked our engines. It would make a businessman such as myself look extremely unprofessional to a very experienced mercenary such as Gawd. Of whom was the only faction leader in that area that I somewhat liked. Once I was done dealing with this time capsule bullshit, we'd be heading toward Junction R7 anyway since Romulus would have hit several other settlements by the time we got there. And Gawd needs to see my face before they can let my Caravan through, not her rule though. At least, that's what she says. I mean, it's not like I can't just blow my way through there and say fuck her rules. But hey, once again, Im have a reputation to uphold as a respectable businessman. So blasting and slaughtering my way through a critical checkpoint on my routes doesn't exactly give the 'respectable' vibe.

Once we were about ten minutes out, I told Spyglass to stop and we would hike it from there. Once we scoped everything out and understood the situation, we would bring the jeeps up and give em a quick charge at the time capsule before sending them back underground. Seemed simple enough, right? Check where the crack is, seal it up, and send it back under until we actually needed it. I was wrong, very wrong indeed.

I was lying down amongst dead bushes and trees as I looked upon the fully emerged time capsule, several specters sneaking by me to my right. The sizeable, cylindrical, building-like structure had ripped and pushed the ground as it had emerged from the ground. It stood nearly a story and a half tall with a large half-circle door at the base capable of fitting a jeep through. The metal along the outside was a brown mud color from the centuries spent underground. It had no significantly distinguishable features on the exterior hull other than its symbol that matched the ones on the jeeps and my helmet. A closed book, tattered and ripped, with a sword as a bookmark. On the cover was a rune that none of the ponies in my Caravan knew the name of except for Romulus and me. The symbol of the Quadrinity.

At the entrance door was a large group of ponies. Roughly eight or so, with several more camped in a few tents nearby. The tents bore Redeyes mark. The ponies at the door had breaching saws and torches, trying to force their way inside. I had Spyglass on the radio, ensuring he was in position with his half of the specter before I gave the order to attack. We had managed to sneak up nice and close to the unsuspecting ponies. I was furious as the presence of these ponies here confirmed my worst suspicions. The other time capsule breaches were most likely due to Redeyes forces. Romulus and I were going to have a very serious talk when I returned to the Caravan. For now, I had my hands full.

"Were in position, sir. What's our plan?" Spyglass whispered over the radio.

"We're going to split their numbers. The space between the ones at the door and the ones at the tents is our main combat area. Your group is going to focus on and clear the tent side while my group-"

"Clears out the ones by the door. Understood." Spyglass finished my sentence. God, he was becoming more like Romulus every day.

"Wait for my signal. You'll know it when you see it" I put down my binoculars and rejoined my group of Specters. Reading their rifles as they await my orders. One handed me a rifle which I took without hesitation. I took a ready position as I looked on at the ponies at the door. Cursing at the durability of the door. I looked back at my squad of eight specters, ready to go. I held up five fingers and counted down without speaking. Once my last finger went down, I jumped up and let the bullets fly. Running towards the ponies, I mowed through several of them myself with the added fire support from the squad. The sudden chaos caused the whole camp to go into a panic. Grabbing whatever available weapons and rushing to aid the ponies under attack. Only to be cut off by the Spyglass's group that emerged from the other side of the encampment.

Per our plan, we grouped together in the space between the tents and the door. There were only about twenty ponies, but we hit them so hard and fast they barely had time to react. I let Spyglass take care of the stragglers as I focused my attention on the Capsule door. The damage from the saws and torches was very apparent as they attempted to cut a pony-sized hole in the middle. Scorch marks showed their path after wiping away some of the ash. They barely got an inch through where they did cut.

"Well, we did build these fuckers to withstand continental shifts. These things are sturdy." I looked around the door for the access panel on the side. I found it smashed and on the ground near the edge of the door. The interior wires pulled out and melted to shit. "They seriously smashed off the panel and tried to hotwire it. God, this is gonna be so much harder now." I inspected the wires hoping that there was at least something fixable.

"Nonsense, sir!" Spyglass announced, walking over to inspect the jumbled mess of wires, only to rip the wires out of the socket. I was stunned at first at his sudden destructiveness and was about to yell at him. Only to remember the admin access port behind the wires. Spyglass's hand morphed and shifted into a sort of access plug as he stuck the whole length of his forearm in the wire port. His obsidian eye's pupil disappeared and was replaced with lines of code.

"It's asking for a security override. Anything for that, sir?" Spyglass asked.

I pondered for a minute, trying to remember a security override code. I knew a few other overrides for some of the gear, such as armor or data access. But now security ones. At least not well, anyway. I then remembered my personal royal override. Something I had since I was born into the royal family back home. I used it to get into all manner of trouble but learned quickly how to be responsible with it.

"Try override code RE-ADR-MAX." I responded. More code flashed across Spyglass's eye. A few moments later, a large green thumbs-up appeared as the door hissed and slowly opened. Spyglass retracted his arm, causing his pupil to return as he stood by my side. I turned to the other specters and gave them the order to stand guard here and not to let anyone inside. The door made a large clunk as the door opened, allowing Spyglass and me to walk inside.

I pulled out a flashlight since it was so dark I couldn't see anything. Spyglass's purple eye lit up like a spotlight as we walked. I coughed as I breathed due to the immense amount of dust in the air. The walls were a dull grey, and there were a few cobwebs in the upper corners here and there. The color of grey seemed to stay consistent throughout the interior. The entrance led down a rather wide and steep ramp-like staircase which ended with a large circular elevator. We stepped onto the round, flat platform, and Spyglass pressed a button on his side which caused a light above us to ignite. Two wired fence doors closed around us as we began our descent. We rode the elevator for a few minutes before it hissed to a stop. The doors opened, and several lights lit up simultaneously. Revealing a long hallway with several windows along the side with a large rectangular door at the end. We walked forward and looked through the windows as we passed.

There were four large windows, two on each side of the hallway. Inside were roughly a dozen specters tucked into the fetal position stored away for activation. one on top of the other sitting against the walls. Pipes on the inside spewed a white cloud of steam that seemed to add a sort of eerie feeling to this whole thing. Most of the specters appeared to be built for more maintenance than combat. As most of them didn't have the extensive armor plating that most of the specters I had did. We continued down to the large rectangular door at the end of the hallway. A handprint scanner panel was on one side of the door, which required an administrative hoofprint or handprint to allow access to the inner chamber. I instinctively pressed my hand to the cold glass screen as it scanned my hand. After a moment, the screen lit up green, and a feminine voice called out over the speakers. "Access granted, welcome young prince."

"Oh god dammit, whoever coded this thing is gonna get beat," I mumbled as the doors cracked open with a hiss and slowly opened the rest of the way.

Inside, several lights were on which made the usage of my flashlight obsolete. The first thing that caught my attention was the massive glass cylindrical pillar in the center of the enormous room. Inside was four orbs of lightning that arced off each other with stray bolts hitting the glass. They were spinning furiously inside the glass chamber, making it hum with a low rumble. The bright lighting inside threw the most light throughout the room.

"Hmm, a fourth-generation reactor. Not bad." Spyglass whistled, walking over to a nearby panel and looking over some data. I silently agreed as I continued exploring the area. Around the reactor were several armory lockers, as well as along most of the interior dull grey walls. My assumption that the color grey was a consistent theme was proving correct. On some of the walls, Specters who looked much more combat-ready than the ones before, were hung on charging cables in sets of two or four. Their arms were stretched like a T, and their heads drooped down toward the floor. As I circled the reactor around its backside opposite where we came in. There was another door with a sign with lit-up white words reading 'workshop.'

I turned my head back to yell for the Spyglass, whose blurred outline I could see through the reactor glass. "Im going in deeper. Start getting some of the combat-ready specters online."

"10-4, sir!" he yelled back.

As I grew closer, the door hissed and opened with a large amount of steam. Startling me slightly, my curiosity compelled me to continue. I looked into the next room and saw a much larger-than-normal specter hooked up to a charging station on the opposite side of the room. As I walked inside, the room was considerably smaller than the last. Well, considering there wasn't a giant ass reactor in the middle definitely helped. Around the room were several tables with tools scattered about in heeps among them. Some are holding unfinished gun-shaped heaps of metal. Others holding parts of specter limbs or the occasional head. I tell you what, whoever was working on these projects left in a hurry if they couldn't clean up at least. One thing I took note of with every one of the unfinished guns on the tables. They all had this glowing blue crystal cartridge among the parts. I pocketed one out of curiosity and kept looking around.

I turned my attention back to the giant specter in the back of the room. I had to take a wild guess. It looked roughly nine feet tall and too bulky to move efficiently. Its chest bulged outward in a type of shark-head fashion that didn't match its rectangular-shaped head. Speaking of the head, it held a sizeable orange lens in its center. Dull but very clearly orange. Its arms were robust, boxed, and shaped into their own segments, except for the elbow servo, which held a circular shape. The same theme stood firm for the legs, bulky but strong. Overall this thing looked like it could take more than a hit, but it couldn't do any kind of fancy movement. I'd take a gander and say even running would be a challenge for this thing. I looked back into its dull orange eye, and a thought popped into my head that I muttered out loud.

"ya know what? You look like Spyglass's steroid-abusing uncle. If he had one. You scream protein shake." The comment made me chuckle to myself. Until a blaring musical tone from my wristpad scared the shit out of me. I furiously checked my wristband what it was, only to read.

'incoming direct transmission from Romulus'

I answered hastily, knowing Romulus would go out of his way to call me like this unless it was serious.

"Romulus, what's going on buddy?" I asked worriedly.

"Sir, we have a problem." His voice echoed through my helmet. The small icon of him appeared on the upper corner of its HUD.

"What's wrong?"

"All the other teams have reported in. All the primary capsules have erupted out of the ground, and they all show signs of tampering. We resealed two of the three. But the third one was breached and looted in its entirety." Romulus explained.

Fear enveloped my mind. The thought of Redeye having breached one of the time capsules horrified me. I had one question on my mind I needed to ask Romulus. "What was supposed to be in the Capsule?"

Romulus took a moment before responding. "According to the records of the capsules on-site log. It held the plans for the Zephyr anti-air defense platform. The Capsule, once fully deployed, would double as a prequel to the platform as a Massive anti-air defense platform. Missles and flak rounds were also stored inside to keep the platform operational for a long while. In short, whoever has these blueprints and the ability to build them. Doesn't have to worry about anything in the sky fucking with them ever again."

"Well, that's just fucking GREAT now, isn't it!" I was so angry I swept the contents of the nearby table across the room. The metal smashing on the floor echoed throughout the room as I sat down on a dust-covered chair. There was silence from Romulus on the radio for a while before he asked,

"How goes things on your end, sir?"

"We engaged an encampment of Redeyes forces attempting to breach the Capsule when we arrived," I mumbled, putting my head in my hands.

"Oh, I see why you're so upset now, sir."

'You think?!" I announced, leaning back in the chair and staring up at the ceiling. "First time we've bothered to check and ensure Project rejuvenation isn't compromised. And lord behold, Redeye's found four of them, broke into one, and now he has one of the most effective pegasus killing platforms at the tip of his hooves. From here on out, if any more of these things pop up with an alert. SEND A TEAM AT ONCE!"

"Understood, sir. And If I may offer you a suggestion. You should see if any of the ponies from Redeyes group has any intel, mission log, or something of that sort, so we know his intentions with project rejuvenation." Romulus's words made sense. If Redeye would send his people this far out from Fillydelphia. He would have sent them with some sort of physical copy of the mission since he mostly hires mercenaries and slavers to do his dirty work. And they can sometimes forget their incentive.

"Understood, Romulus. I'll finish up here and meet you at the junction."

"Sounds good, sir. Travel safe." There was a click over the speakers as Romulus cut the transition. I slapped my knees and got to my feet with a long sigh.

"Today's gonna be a long fuckin day."

Author's Note

Alright, I FINALLY got this chapter out. Now Im going to focus on getting the first two chapters rewritten, and THEN we can continue. I have plans for this story, don't you worry. It's just this one chapter was a little harder, and It's hard to find time to work on it overall with my schedule. Otherwise enjoy.

Shattered minds

I sat at the admin console of the time capsule, looking over data logs and recordings. I couldn’t sleep. We had already been here a whole day, and surprisingly enough, Redeye didn’t send more ponies to secure this place. Guess he had other intentions. I didn’t care. I was more focused on the data in front of me. I sat rubbing my wrist wrapped in bandages as I used my injured hand to scroll down the list. This morning I needed to use one of the time capsule tools to fix one of the jeeps that had one of the suspension panels cracked. Even though Spyglass insisted I use the Arc plasma welder, that I was the one who invented it in the first place. Even though I told him I had never even seen one ever. Hence the massive burn mark on my wrist. My stimpack was working its magic, but it still hurt. The weirdest part about today though wasn’t even that. It was that every single one of the recordings was from me. My voice describes everything in this time capsule down the wires. And I didn’t remember any of it.

“What the fuck... When Did I record this, And when did I build THAT?” I mumbled, looking at the oversized specter still in the same position as before. I sank back into my chair as the recording I was listening to ended. It... Well, I spoke about the details of the Arc elemental reactor. It was a fourth generation like Spyglass guessed, and how it was completely radiation free. As were all elemental power sources. I knew everything in the log already, but I couldn’t for the life of me remember recording it. I was quietly freaking the fuck out.

I pulled my arm around, opened my wrist, and opened a direct link to Romulus. If anyone knew what was happening, it would be him.

“Sir? I’m surprised you called again. I thought next we spoke, it would be at the Junction-”

“Why the hell don’t I remember recording any of the logs here?” I yelled with more panic than anger, cutting him off before he could say another word.

“Um, Im sorry what-” he started, But I cut him off again.

“And this morning, Spyglass had me use the arc plasma whatever on one of the jeeps. Even when I didn’t know what it was or how it worked, but Spyglass kept saying I INVENTED IT!?” I raised my voice louder, echoing off the walls of the room.

“Sir, try to calm yourself!” Romulus was trying so hard to get words in he spoke over me even though I kept talking over him.

“And THEN there is this big orange fucker in here that looks like a steroid-abusing version of Spyglass that, according to logs in here, I APPARENTLY made! It was supposed to be my ‘Greatest advancement in mechanized infantry.’ But I don’t recognize ANY of it!”

“Sir! Please-” Romulus’s words fell on deaf ears as my slow downward spiral continued.

“Romulus, Im freaking the fuck out right now! It’s bad enough my memories of home were getting foggy over time. But now im downright losing memories! What if I-”

“RILEUS, STOP!” Romulus shouted, shaking me out of whatever trance I was in. I sat in silence for what felt like a century. I hardly ever heard Romulus yell before. Let alone him calling me by my birth name. He hardly called me anything other than Sir. Normally he is reticent, very calm, and always has some wise form to his words. But this time was different.

“Rileus, take a deep breath. Your hyperventilating. Calm yourself,” He said in a calmer tone. Concern still hung in his voice. His words made me realize how fast I was breathing. I took several deep breaths, gaining control of my breathing.

“There we go. Now then, Sir. I believe I know what is happening, or well... What has happened.” He said, his voice returning to its usual tone.

“What? You do?” I asked, rather surprised. Even though the whole reason I reached out was that I thought he knew.

“Indeed. Do you remember when we used a combination of magic and technology to put you into stasis some 200 years ago, yes? So you could survive the initial radiation blast.” he asked.

“I do recall that, yes. We had a pod that used advanced cryogenics to preserve my body. At the same time, I cast a rune that would prevent my mind and soul from decaying over a long period of inactivity, along with preventing the cryogenics themselves from harming me in any way. What does this have to do with me losing memories?” I asked, questioning where Romulus was going with this.

“Im getting there. Now even though we had all sorts of safety measures to ensure that you would wake up safe and sound, there was still a chance that the spell you cast would decay over time. Even though you had put multiple reinforcements upon said spell. I recall after roughly 130 years in, the spells decayed finally showed. Flickering and losing its magical power. I knew what to do in such a scenario and reinforced the spell with a boost from an arc element canister. But not before your mind took a slight bit of exposure from the cryogenics. That was the biggest risk we ran with this form of preservation.” He explained.

Connecting the few dots there was easy, and I quickly understood. “So, there was a slight mishap with the spell, and the resulting exposure to the cryogenics caused me to lose memories?”

“In short, yes.”

“And you didn’t tell me this why?” I asked, very frustrated.

“It was only a few moments of exposure. You never showed signs of mental degradation until now. Other than your PTSD episodes and panic/anxiety attacks. But those were apparent before you went under. Now I fear what else you may have forgotten.” He said worriedly.

“Is there a chance that this could worsen? Under ANY circumstance?” I asked.

“Unless you went back into the Cryopod without the spell, no, you should be fine.” I sighed in relief upon hearing those words.

“However,” he started again.

“Fuck.” I groaned.

“It’s not bad news. I was going to suggest that we run some tests to see exactly what parts of your mind were affected. That way, we know the extent of the issue.” He said.

“It should only be memories, right?” I asked.

“Sir, is the mind only used for storing memories?” He asked sarcastically. His words made me want to facepalm at my own stupidity.

“No.” I sighed. “Alright, once we get back to the Hub, let’s run these tests.”

“Understood, sir.” I heard another voice over the microphone. Another specter from the sounds of it, But I could not make out the words. Romulus’s voice seemed to quiet, as if he stepped away from the mic. Returning a moment later.

“Sorry for having to cut you off like this sir, But we just arrived at our last stop before the Junction.” He said.

“No worries, go make money, and we’ll talk more at the Junction.” I finished. The connection was then ended a moment later from Romulus’s end. I sat in silence for a few more minutes, staring at the logs on the screen before turning the monitor off.

“Sir, can I get you over here for a moment? I need another security bypass.” I heard Spyglass call from of the off-shooting rooms from the main reactor room. I got up and followed the echo from his voice to the main data hub. He was plugged into the main computer going through long streaks of code and data on various screens. I had him try and get some of the specters online so we could take them back to the Caravan. You can never have too many.

I stood next to him, putting a hand on his shoulder and looking over his work. “Please tell me you got some good news for me.”

He turned his head to look at me. “Well, I did find how to get the specters online.”

“Splendid! Let’s get it done!” I announced, clapping my hands.

“The only issue is we need to bring the foundry online, and then I have to reprogram the whole group of specters that operate it. Spyglass explained, seeming to dread the latter.

“Oh, you’ll be fine. I assume the main foundry is the big room with all the tables with parts on them?” I asked, reassuring the anxious specter.

“Yeah, the foundry was working on making advanced energy-based weaponry. So anything pre-built for the specters in the armory is bound to be pretty damn powerful,” he said as the lines of code disappeared from his large eye. A loud rumble echoed through the walls, and the sounds of metallic marching followed shortly after.

“Sounds like they’re heading to their posts,” I stated.

“Yeah, we better head to the foundry chamber so I can get started. I hope you’re not using that terminal anymore cause I kinda need it.” Spyglass said as we began walking to the main chamber.

“It’s all yours,” I responded.

The door in front of us hissed open as we approached the now bustling reactor room. The specters we saw in the entrance hall had filled the room two a table and were assembling energy weapons of all shapes and sizes. Long, short, and broad, they were all present and being built in this room. When they would finish a weapon, a small drone with a pincer arm would fly out of a service hatch and carry it off. To the armory, I assumed.

“I’ll go start reprograming them,” Spyglass said. Stepping away and plugging into the terminal I was using moments prior.

I started walking in between the table, watching the specters work on their weapons. I was curious as I didn’t remember much about this facility. So seeing these weapons was quite curious to me. At the same time, though, you could say I was shopping for a new gun to complement my hand cannon. I still needed to think of a proper name for the thing.

As I browsed, I couldn’t help but notice that most of the weapons these Specters were building were quite large. More rifle shaped than anything. Along with the fact that each of the weapons had a very distinguishing feature of a glowing blue crystal near the trigger. Perfectly carved to line up with the gun so as not to look out of place. It almost made the weapon look futuristic. Considering the time, though, almost everything of mine was futuristic. Hell, some of these weapons were even guns! I passed by a table and gazed upon a gorgeous-looking spear! The same blue crystal sat in a protective capsule on the bottom of the shaft opposite the speartip. The spear itself was beautiful, made from Element Steel with engravings of text and symbols from my homeland that glowed with the same color as the crystal. The shaft was made of a black stained wood that, upon touching it, felt more like metal. It was a work of art. I was very tempted to take it, but I put a hand to my axe that sat on my belt and humbly moved on.

I suddenly heard an error alarm sound from one of the tables near the entrance with a red light, and a specter called out,

”CONSTRUCTION ERROR! MISSING CRITICAL COMPONENT! POWER GEM POWER SUPPLY!”

I sauntered over to the table, which had very minimal parts compared to the rest of the bunch. And sure enough, there was no glowing blue gem to be seen. I reached into my pocket and pulled out the gem I took when I first walked in, and set it on the table. The specter looked down and grabbed the part, and began assembling. It took only a few moments, but the specter put together a very nice-looking pistol. The grip had spots carved out for the finger to sit comfortably. The barrel was long and wide and seemed to meld with the gun rather than be a separate part of the rest of the gun. The exit for whatever projectile this weapon fired was almost rectangular, save for the curved corners. The crystal I placed on the table sat where the bullet shells would normally eject after firing on any normal firearm of this size. That was another thing that surprised me about this gun, the size. It matched my hand cannon’s size, which is no easy feat as it is the largest in its category.

As I was admiring this weapon, the specter made to grab it as a case that matched it perfectly appeared on the side via a small carrier drone. I instinctively grabbed the gun before the specter grabbed it. And was greeted by another surprise, it was surprisingly lightweight. Even my hand cannon had some heft to it and could most certainly double as a blunt weapon if needed, but still.

”ANYTHING WRONG, SIR?” The specter blared. Its booming, deep voice snapped me out of my trance on the weapon.

“Yeah, everything’s fine. Im just gonna keep this one. It’s a damn fine piece of work. You should be proud.” I responded.

”THANK YOU, SIR. BUT I AM UNABLE TO FEEL THIS EMOTION CALLED ‘PROUD.’” he responded, his voice keeping its loud, monotoned feel.

I scoffed, “Whatever, mister grumpy guss. Please resume your post.” I said, walking away before a metal hand grabbed my should and turned me around.

“YOU MADE NEED A HOLSTER FOR THAT WEAPON, SIR.” The specter said, holding up a metal holster with a clip on the side, presumably to attach to a belt.

“Thank you, specter,” I said, taking the holster and hooking it onto the left side hip of my belt. The specter saluted and resumed putting together weapons as another set of parts was dumped on the table.

I turned the gun in my hand a few times, looking it over and getting an overall feel for it. Finding out which buttons are the safety and such. One button gave a most curious reaction. Like the slide of a standard pistol, the top part of the gun slid back, and the gun gave a slight hiss before it returned to its original position.

“You are a curious weapon, arent you?” I said, putting the pistol in its new holster.

Suddenly the whole room erupted into marching as the specters began marching out the main entrance, startling me. “GOT IT!” I heard Spyglass shout from the terminal across the room, holding a thumbs up in the air.

I shook my head and smiled, walking over to him. “Good work! What would I do without you and Romulus’s fantastic programming skills.”

“That’s not all!” Spyglass responded. “Check this out.”

The large specter in the center chamber began hissing as the dull orange lense hummed to life with a firey glow. I quickly stepped closer to get a better look as the large unit raised instead of lowered. In its T-shaped pose, its arms inserted themselves slightly deeper into the unit’s should with whirs of servos. They bent at the elbows and shoulders in all sorts of ways as if calibrating themselves. The head turned left and right as if doing the same as the arms before they all returned to a resting position. There was a release of clamps in loud clicks as the machine dropped to the floor, Indenting it. The knees of the giant specter bent only slightly before returning to its upright stance. Its whole interior body now glowed with the same fiery orange glow as its eye. Its hands were clenching and unclenching as if still setting up.

“Damn, this really is your juiced-up uncle, isn’t it Spyglass?” I said. Walking around the hulking beast of a machine, looking it over.

Spyglass let out a short laugh before responding. “It’s funny you say that, on the logs about it in here. Along with it being the first of a new generation of super specters, it was supposed to be an upgraded chassis to upload myself into once optimized.”

“Really?” I asked shocked, looking at Spyglass. Who responded with a nod. “Huh, I really don’t remember shit from this place,” I added, looking back to the machine.

Then it spoke, “EXPERIMENTAL ADVANCED COMBAT SPECTER ONLINE, CODENAMED, WARDEN.” I jumped back from the machine’s voice. It was definitely robotic and nowhere near as advanced as the other specters. But it was low and powerful that could resonate in even the most stubborn beast’s chest. Something that could intimidate a dragon.

“CURRENT MODE. SCANNER. SEARCHING FOR THE BLOODLINE OF MERLIN.” The machine’s head panned to me, its burning orange lens staring into my soul. “BLOODLINE FOUND, AWAITING ORDERS.”

I let out a breath I didn’t know I was holding in. I stood up straight and looked into the lens with a stance I hadn’t held since my days in my homeland. “I am Rileus. You will address me as Sir from now on. That over there is Spyglass.” I said, gesturing to the specter that just walked up next to me. “He and Romulus are my two commanding officers. They are the only other two you will take orders from unless I say otherwise. If you will allow Spyglass to access to your personal uplink. We can get you on our network, and he can give you your next set of orders. Copy?”

“COPY.” The machine dropped to one knee and leaned down. He was still taller than Spyglass and me. “PLEASE TAKE CARE IN ACCESSING THE PORT ON THE REAR OF THE HEAD.” I urged Spyglass to get to work, and his nervousness began to show again. Slowly but surely, he made his way to the Warden’s backside and plugged into the back of his head. It only took a few moments for him to finish, and he very quickly returned to my side.

The Warden stood back up, and his voice shook my soul again. “ORDERS RECEIVED, ACQUIRING PERSONAL WEAPON BEFORE MOBILIZATION.”

“Excuse me wha?” I never said something so fast. I watched as the Warden turned around and grabbed the handle of something sticking out of the spot where he once sat idle. He then pulled out one of the most giant fucking guns I have ever seen, matching his size and tenacity. The barrel glowed with rings of orange and heat fizzled off of it, making the air above it wiggle. The whole gun was black. Even in the dim blue light, it was apparent this gun meant BUSINESS.

“PERSONAL WEAPON ACQUIRED, MOBILIZING.” The Warden said before walking between Spyglass and me. Forcing us to move out of the way, he dented the floor with each thunderous step as he walked towards the exit. Spyglass and I stood side by side, looking at each other before I shrugged and followed behind the machine.

I stepped outside and looked upon the small camp my specter group had set up while Me and Spyglass were in the capsule. They had the jeeps parked in a circle around a small unlit campfire. Probably the sun was still up even though you couldn’t see it through the clouds. There were a few extra than the amount we came with, but I brushed it off as a few Spyglass pulled out of the time capsule’s storage. The new jeeps were loaded with large boxes that matched the same symbols that designated this facility. I had told Spyglass to take some of the immediate weapons and have them taken back to the Caravan. It was better to have them with us than have them fall into Redeye’s hooves. I saw the Warden among the specters sitting on one knee, waiting for us to move out.

I took out my new energy pistol again and looked over it several times. I wanted to know what made these energy weapons so different from those I saw around the wasteland. So what better way than to shoot something with it? I looked around for a target I could shoot without repercussions and settled for a nearby tree.

I aimed at the tree and pulled the trigger. There was a small pulse sound as a large Pointed bolt of blue energy blew from the barrel, flew through the air, and impacted the tree with a poof of blue fire. The bolt traveled much faster than most energy weapons I had seen, and the gun itself didn’t give much kickback. What confused me most was that the energy projectile had a point, not a rough one. It looked like a broad-tip blade of blue energy was flying through the air. Most energy weapons I had seen were more rounded and left a trail of energy a foot behind it like a smoke trail. Other than that, it seemed like any other energy weapon.

“Maybe the impact is what makes it so different?” I asked to myself, walking over to the tree to investigate.

The hole in the small tree matched the barrel of the pistol, both of which were still smoking. Small embers encompassed the hole, signifying the heat of the blast. But that was consistent with all energy weapons. I circled the tree several times, trying to find what made this gun so much different that it had its own facility. I was about to give up and accept the fact I had a blue energy weapon rather than a red one. When I noticed a small spec of orange amongst the trees behind the one I shot. I walked over, and I saw the same mark as the first on another tree. I looked back to the original tree, and the trajectory matched. I then looked past the second tree and saw a large boulder with the same mark and a hole that punched all the way through it.

That’s when it hit me. “Armor-piercing energy weapons?!” I exclaimed, looking at the weapon before returning it to its holster. “Sheesh, I never would’ve guessed. How the fuck did I manage that?” I asked myself like I knew the answer. I’d have to look through those files again on my own time. But for now, I just needed to move on.

I returned to the camp and got a blip noise on my wrist pad. I brought my arm around to see it reminding me its sunset. Wait, sunset!? We came in when it was sunset? How have we been here for over a day? I looked around urgently for Spyglass so we could get packed up and head for the Junction. I grabbed the arm of a passing specter and asked it where Spyglass was, and he pointed me back towards the Capsules entrance. I was expecting him to be inside, but I found him tinkering with the busted access panel just outside the main door.

“Spyglass, we ready to go? I didn’t expect us to be here as long as we have been.” I asked, looking over the camp as I leaned against the wall next to him.

“Yes, Sir. I just need to finish fixing this panel, and then we can send this thing back down. After that, we just need to wait for the scouts to come back.” He responded.

“Where are the scouts at?” I asked.

“They reported in about an hour and a half ago saying there was a small group of Redeye’s, around five they said, that were out scouting when we came and cleaned house. Said they were gonna take them out before heading back,” he explained. A spark from one of the wires caused Spyglass to flinch and mumble a curse as he worked. I gave a small chuckle before responding.

“Well, I hope they get back soon. I’d hate to keep Romulus waiting at the Junction. And to be honest, for the rest of this round of trading. Im gonna stay with the Caravan. I need a break from all these expeditions.”

“That’s understandable, sir.” Spyglass started, “and with the whole memory loss thing you have going on. It’s Probably best you take it easy and figure yourself out.”

I looked at Spyglass with a glare, which he quickly picked up on. “I... Never meant to offend, Sir! Romulus already filled me in and asked me to keep an eye on you. Along with the fact that your guy’s conversation inside wasn’t exactly ‘quiet.’”

I softened my expression before responding. “Yeesh, he got to you that fast? Damn, I always forget how good he is at his job.”

Spyglass suddenly gave a triumphant ‘huzzah’ as he finished soldering two wires together and shut the panel. The screen lit up shortly after. “Finally fixed it! For Redeye being the intelligent pony he is, sure does send a lot of idiots to do his job. That thing was a pain in the metal rear to fix.”

“So now you’re able to send it back down, yeah?” I said, pushing off the wall.

“Yup, just need to set a few parameters so Redeye can’t find it again,” he responded, taping his metallic fingers on the screen as he went through multiple settings.

“SIR! SIR!” I looked around, trying to find who was calling out to me, as my eyes met a small group of specters running towards us.

The lead one stopped in front of me and saluted, “Sir! We just returned from our patrol and ran into some Redeyes forces. Im sure Spyglass filled you in on our report.”

“Yes? Go on?” I responded, waving a hand and urging them to go on.

“It was a small group, likely belonging to the one we encountered here. But we found this in one of the pony’s saddlebags.” He held up a folded-up piece of paper with a wax stamp of Redeye’s insignia on it.

I snatched the paper from the specter’s hand and quickly opened it. The text was horrible in quality like a child was the one who wrote it. I began reading.

Ok, dirtbags. Im gonna keep this short and simple for you numskulls. Redeye wants you to raid another one of the bunkers that another team did some time ago. Just go break into it, and grab as much as your puny little legs can carry. Then haul ass to shattered hoof ridge and regroup with the rest of our forces. With some luck, you’ll get there right after we overrun the place. And on the off chance you get there before or during the attack. STAY AWAY from the fighting. If there’s one scratch on the goods, I promise my whip will get to know your ASSES very well!. And one more thing, DONT COME BACK EMPTY-HOOFED!”

I tossed the paper to the ground as anger fueled me and turned on Spyglass, pointing my finger directly at his face. “SEND THAT THING DOWN, NOW!” I didn’t even wait for a response before turning to the rest of the encampment. “EVERYONE PACK UP! WE’RE LEAVING, NOW! HAUL ASS PEOPLE. WE GOTTA GET TO SHATTERED HOOF!” In the sudden commotion and scrambling of Specters, I looked up to the dark grey sky, the pink of sundown nearly gone and replaced by an abyss of black.

”God dammit! It’s already past sundown? I hope that Romulus gets there in a reasonable time. This is gonna be rough.”