Outskirts

Chapter Eight

Due Process

A warm breeze washed over me, stirring me awake. Sunlight poured in past Sandy to illuminate the cave with warmth. The desert seemed much more homey from inside that cave, if not also a lot creepier.

I rolled over and sat up, rustled my mane with a hoof. It was a good thing I kept it so short, otherwise I might have to worry about having to get sand out of it. I had nothing to really complain about though (y’know, besides the whole ‘home got burnt down so now I’m in the desert’ thing); I hadn’t felt this well rested in a while. Like, not even back when I was sleeping in my own bed in Raincap.

We had spent the better portion of the night flipping through Pinkie Pie’s Magic Song Book picking different tunes and trying to sing them, usually failing in a hilariously incompetent fashion as Warrick was the only one that knew any of the lyrics or melodies. I couldn’t even remember falling asleep, and I had no idea what time of day it was. But the sun looked like it was really beating down outside, so Sandy would probably have a lot of juice by the time we were ready to head out. Speaking of which, I didn’t see Vanity and Warrick anywhere.

I got up and stretched out before heading over to Sandy. I figured they were probably just waiting for me in there. Before I could even raise a hoof to the door Vanity burst out and slammed into me, sending us both down into the sand. I pushed her off me and rolled to my hooves.

“Ow! What’s the big deal?!” I asked in that ‘I just woke up and I’m grumpy’ sorta way.

She flapped up off the ground, sending up a plume of sand. When she landed she turned quickly to me with panic in her eyes.

“It’s Warrick! He’s...he’s like...gross!”

“Aw, come on. The no pupils thing is kinda weird, and the robot wings are a bit scary, but ‘gross’ is a little harsh.” And if he was gross, what did that make me with my gimpy cripple wings?

“What? No, I mean like right now. Like not always he’s gross, just now...Like...ungh!” She shook her head, trying to think of a way to explain. ”Just come here!”

She scooped me up and flew into Sandy.

Vanity knew. She knew how much I hated being flown by other ponies. Whatever she was on about, it better have been important.

She let me go when we were inside and scurried over to the cockpit. I dusted myself off and turned towards her.

“Oh good god!” I shouted, shocked by what lay before me.

“Please, call me Warrick.” His voice was about ten times raspier than usual and he was just laying there on the cockpit floor looking like one of the emaciated foals that they showed on those charity commercials. And he looked clammy. Like really clammy, and moist all over. Like a sick cat.

I shook out of my panic and turned to Vanity.

“What happened?!”

“I don’t know,” she said, shaking her head spastically. “I just came in here and he was all...gross!”

“It’s the snake,” Warrick weazed.

“What? But you killed it.” Giant snakes were one thing, but giant snakes that could revive themselves...

“It ate me, remember? I must’ve gotten some of its venom on me.”

‘Some’? If that puddle of gunk he was bathed in yesterday was venom, he had been exposed to a bit more than ‘some’.

“Well...what’s gonna happen to you?” Vanity asked, her eyes wide and her lips pouted.

“I’m probably gonna die, slowly and painfully.”

Vanity’s face went pale...well, paler than white already was. “What...?”

“Haha, very funny,” I said, trotting over and knocking his head with my hoof. “Just tell me what to get out of the crates in the back to heal you.”

“Food and bullets, remember?”

I had hoped he’d just been kidding.

“Well...then...what are we going to do?!” Now I was panicking again.

“Grab some popcorn?”

“This is serious!” Vanity shouted, bucking him in the stomach.

“Ow. Okay, okay. But if you two beat me to death then there’ll be nopony to save.” He tried to move to get to his hooves but didn’t budge an inch. He had a brief spell of violent coughing.

I placed a hoof on his chest. The cold steel of the breastplate sent a chill up my leg. “Can we take this thing off, so you can breath better?”

“Without the right tools you’d rip my body open before it came off.”

Well shit.

“But as far as saving me goes, you’d need anti-venom.”

“Where do we get it?” Vanity asked immediately.

“Anypony that lives around here would know about the snakes. They’d need to keep a supply of it. But it’s too dangerous.”

“What? That makes no sense. There was a town, I saw it remember? I could just go there and ask for help. We could trade them food or something,” I reasoned.

Warrick tried to laugh, but just ended up coughing. “Not that easy. The ponies out here aren’t as welcoming as the ones in Equestria.”

“Then I’ll just have to steal it,” I said, shrugging.

“You’re crazy.”

“Hey, I was able to sneak around in the lab under Raincap right? I know how to be quiet. And plus, if I get caught, I could always try to weasel my way out. I did survive an encounter with Pestilence himself.”

He just stared at me, his heavy wheezing the only noise in the air.

“Look Warrick, you have two choices: lay here and die; or lay and be dying till I get back with the anti-venom. And plus, you aren’t exactly in any position to stop me.”

He looked at Vanity. “Go with her.”

“No,” I contested. “You can’t stay here alone, and I’ll be able to be more sneaky if I do this alone.” I sighed. “If only Vanity knew some healing spells she could at least-”

“Oh that’s right!” Vanity shouted. Her horn began to glow and she touched it to Warrick’s side. He shivered a little then began to look around.

“Well...I’m in significantly less pain right now. How did you do that?”

“Clementine,” she answered.

“He taught you medical magic in two days?” I asked.

She giggle-snorted. “No silly! I just saw him do it. It’s really easy if you see somepony do it first.”

“Well whatever it is you did, keep it up till I get back.” I looked from her to Warrick and nodded, then turned and began to climb out of Sandy.

“Wait up!” Warrick called out. I turned back to him. “You’ll probably be needing something.”

“Oh yeah!” I said, facehoofing.

I grabbed my gun.

<<-------------------------------------------------->>

I had underestimated just how fast New Sandy had been. The distance we had driven from where I saw the town, to where the cave was, was a lot lengthier when taken on hoof. I kept telling myself it wasn’t that bad though. Not only was I on a heroic rescue mission, braving the barren plain in search of a curing elixir to save my ailing companion, I could also take solace in the fact that the bodysuit Four Leaf had given me pretty much eliminated my having to worry about sand.

Eyeballing it, the town looked like it was maybe another mile or two away, so at least I was close. But I found myself thinking more about what Warrick and Vanity must have been feeling than my own frustration with having to do something as simple as walking. I mean, I wasn’t the most physically adept mare out there. I was no slouch mind you; getting onto the varsity pegasus volleyball team was a mean feat for a flightless pony (even if they did just let me on to make Vanity happy), but this was still a pretty tall order, so I knew they must have been worried. Especially Vanity. So in a way my mission was really two fold; sneak into a potentially hostile settlement in the middle of nowhere to get anti-venom to save Warrick, AND prove to both of them that I’m not that useless. Which in all truth, couldn’t be that difficult. I mean I’d been sneaking out of my room to go stare out the fence for years. I was like a certified ninja, only y’know, without any real formal certification.

It still bothered me though, having others worry about me. Not so much because I didn’t want them to feel bad, I mean they were the ones that chose to worry, but because it made me feel bad. It was like having messed up wings made you completely worthless. And while I may have tended to adopt a similar sentiment during my tyrades of self pity, logic prevailed. If having no flight made you useless, what about earth ponies? There were plenty of them that did pretty amazing stuff. Sure, this would probably be much easier for Warrick or Vanity since they could just fly in, grab the stuff, and fly out, but that didn’t mean it would be impossible for say, a very well prepared earth pony. And I was basically an earth pony with hood ornaments glued to my torso. I’d be fine.

<<-------------------------------------------------->>

It was quiet, and pardon the cliche, but it was actually far too quiet. I wasn’t expecting the hustle and bustle of a big city, but it was like a ghost town there.

I was keeping close to the worn out wooden buildings, which were built to form an osculating circle around the town center. I hugged against their outer walls and scurried between them quickly to avoid being detected by ponies that weren’t there. I had my hood on for extra camouflage, and my face canon was securely strapped around my snout. It was even heavier when being held up by neck strength alone, and the revolving chamber and barrel reduced my field of vision pretty significantly. If there had actually been somepony else there, they wouldn’t even have to sneak up on me. Just stay directly in front of me and they’d be golden.

And then I heard something. It sounded like it was coming from the center of the town. Convoluted chatter followed by sporadic outbursts of what sounded like staunch disagreement.

Trying to remain as stealthy as possible, I snuck around what looked like a tavern to get a look at what was going on in the town square.

A large group of ponies was gathered there. A small partition of about a dozen were segregated from the group, and there was one standing at some sort of podium. One pony, who looked like he had been severely beaten, was standing away from the group, looking down at the ground with a mix of panic and shame.

If I didn’t know better, I’d say this wasn’t a trial. But I did know better, so I could tell that it was, in fact, a trial. Hardly an official one though. This looked less like the due process and more like the ‘somepony did us wrong so let’s beat him to a pulp and then formally punish him’ process. Either way, I wanted no part of it. The type of ponies that would perform this manner of vigilante justice weren’t the type I wanted to be caught sneaking around by.

As I was turning away to continue my mission, I noticed a box with a red cross on it through one of the building’s windows. That had to be first aid, unless these ponies used it for something else, like to store booze. Which, judging by the size of the tavern, may not have been a far fetched assumption. But it was still my best bet. The only problem was that the building it was in was directly in the line of sight of the group of ponies attending the hearing.

“Dammit,” I whispered under my breath. I didn’t have time to wait for these ponies to finish their little farce and go home. Warrick was dying and I needed that anti-venom.

I slowly crawled back behind the tavern and considered my options. There wasn’t much to consider. With luck, they’d be too absorbed in the trial to notice me for the split second I’d be visible while I slipped through the entrance into the infirmary.

I continued sneaking, now with an actual target. As I crept behind the makeshift homes and shoddily constructed establishments I could here as the ‘judge’ tried to take control of the excited crowd.

“Order! I will have order in this court!” He slammed his hoof against the podium, mimicking the act of banging a gavel. “Now, the accused claims that his actions are justified due to the fact that according to his account, he acted only in self defense.”

The crowd erupted into a torrent of profanity and disdain.

“Order! We will have order!”

From the glimpse I had gotten, the judge was an older stallion with a light brown coat and a greying mane. Going off how he sounded, he really didn’t care much for order at all. He seemed more anxious to get to the sentencing than anything else.

“Now,” he continued. “Does the accused have anything else to say for himself?”

There was a short pause. I stopped walking and waited to hear something.

“Yes, I do.”

I continued on.

“I did nothing wrong. I just wanted to trade supplies so I could get some water. Your people attacked me!” He spoke in such a collected manner that I couldn’t help but feel he was telling the truth.

“So, you expect me to believe that a group of ponies from this humble village would attempt to rob an innocent wanderer? Now why would they do that? If I may be so bold as to ask.”

“Are you mad?! We’re in the Celestia damned desert! You know how hard it is to come by anything out here. When they saw what I had they must have figured it would be easier to just take it rather than trade for it.”

The crowd went into uproar again. The judge banged his hoof against the podium.

“Aha! So by your own words, I can assume that you yourself were lacking of a proper amount of supplies!”

“What? Yes, I just said that. That’s why I needed to trade for water!”

“That’s why when you saw a group of peaceful ponies that had water, you killed them and tried to take it for yourself!”

The ponies began to clamber, but this time it was in agreement. They actually believed that sack of crap. This was just ridiculous.

“No...no that makes no sense! How could you think that?! I just needed some water!”

“You are a murderer! Do you know what the punishment for murder is here?”

The ‘accused’ was a tan earth pony with a dark brown mane that looked like it had once been perfectly quaffed before the dishevelling nature of the desert had gotten to it; and he had a typewriter for a cutie mark. Somehow I doubted that the act of taking life was one of his special talents. But it was none of my business, nor was it any of my concern. Plus, he could’ve just been a really good actor.

As they continued to go back and forth, I finally arrived at what I assumed to be the infirmary. I could see the medical kit through one of the grimy side windows. Now I just had to get inside without being seen.

I got ready to sprint in and get to work looking for the anti-venom, but I had to wait for the opportune moment.

A snide comment from the judge, a rebuttal from the defendant, and the outraged roar of the crowd.

That was my chance!

I slipped out from behind the infirmary and towards the entrance. Right then, just before I could get inside, he saw me. Not the judge, or anypony in the audience. Him, the pony on trial. Our eyes met for a brief moment, and in that moment I knew exactly what was about to happen.

“Thief! A thief! He’s armed! Look, all of you! There’s a thief!” He began hopping up and down, pointing his hooves at me frantically. The others weren’t falling for it, until I did something really stupid.

“Fhey! I’m fffnot a ‘fhe’!” I shouted, then immediately cringed back at the realization of my fault.

Everypony turned to me. Their eyes fell on the weapon strapped to my face and several of them pulled out their own, putting them on with practiced speed. I wiped my hood off and began to unstrap my face canon.

“Waif! Waif! I’mf nosh fhere for troufle!”

I tossed the gun into the sand and threw my forehooves into the air, falling to my haunches.

“I’m not here for trouble. I just need-”

The judge raised a hoof, silencing me. He turned to the mob and gestured for them to lower their weapons. They reluctantly complied.

The judge looked back at me. “Who are you my dear?”

I took a deep, relieved breath. “My name is Wink. My friend got eaten by a giant snake and needs anti-venom.” It wasn’t until after saying it that I realized how ridiculous that sounded.

“Your friend was eaten by a giant snake, and now he needs antivenom.” The judge nodded slowly. “Well, disregarding that fact that you are armed, camouflaged, and were just sneaking around in an attempt to remain undetected, I see no reason to not believe you.”

Dammit.

“Listen, I know it sounds strange. And yeah, I have a gun and I’m wearing this camo stuff, but I’m telling the truth. That’s why I was heading for this building. I saw the first aid kit and-”

As I spoke, one of the ponies turned back to where the criminal had just been. He was gone. In the distance you could almost make out what looked like the silhouette of a pony fleeing like a runaway slave. The pony turned back to me, her eyes wide.

“She was with him! Look!”

They all turned to where the tan buck had been standing.

“She was a distraction so he could get away!” the mare shouted.

Oh no.

The ponies in the crowd nearly instantly brought back out their face canons and took aim at me.

I smiled nervously. “I suppose you’d find it hard to believe if I were to say that this is all just an incredibly huge and unfortunate coincidence, right?”

The judged glared at me, his eyes narrowed. “Take her.”

<<-------------------------------------------------->>

Of all the potential things that could have gone wrong, of all the dangers I faced in taking on this task, my downfall came in the form of the loose lips of some coward that saw an opportunity that he just couldn’t pass up. In truth though, I couldn’t really blame him. It’s not like I was planning a daring rescue for him. For him, it was either do what he did, or be at the mercy of those diluted vigilantes. But I still hated the douche bag.

A guard pony walked up to my cell with a large bowl and some sort of ladle. She placed the bowl on the ground and scooped out what looked like oatmeal, only green, and spilled the slop onto the floor in front of me.

“Soup’s on,” she mumbled, the ladle still in his teeth.

I looked down at the pile of vomit, then back up at my server. I shook my head. She just shrugged and went to the next cell.

The pony to my left was devouring her soup. Some of the other prisoners were even sticking their hooves through the bars of their cells, trying to grab at the bowl and begging for extra helpings as the guard pony did her feeding rounds. That same guard had confiscated my face canon upon my arrest, and had it not been for the fact that the thought made her face flush red, she might have stripped me of my body suit. Fortunately I had at least gotten to keep that.

Regardless, this was a serious problem. Not only was the clock ticking for Warrick, but I had already been locked up here longer than it should have taken me to get the anti-venom and get out. Every second I spent here was another second of concern weighing down on Vanity and Warrick, and the last thing I needed was for the former to do something stupid in the vein of rescue.

I surveyed the jailhouse, looking for anything that may aid in my escape. The place was right out of an old Western film. The windows were barred off, with no actual glass pane in the opening, allowing for sunlight to flow unfiltered into the dingy building. There was a wooden desk with a single chair in the center of the one roomed structure, and out cells populated the wall opposite the one entrance. The jailhouse wasn’t in the best condition. It looked like it hadn’t been properly maintained against the harsh conditions of the desert, or maintained at all for that matter. But as run down as it may have been, it was still fully intact, and that was enough to make the notion of escape little more than a fleeting fancy. I might as well have been locked up in a high security prison.

“Hey, you.”

My ears perked at the sound of a withered, raspy voice coming from the cell to my right. I looked over to see a decrepit old grey stallion leaning against the bars between our cells. He smacked his toothless gums together and his foggy eyes went unnaturally wide.

“Hey, you,” he repeated.

I looked around, then pointed a hoof at myself, shrugging.

“Yeah, you. I see you got them wandering eyes.” He smacked his lips together. “Yeah you do. All the new ones do. Trying to find some hole, or some crack that they could squeeze through. Give it some time, them eyes’ll eventually stop wandering.”

I moved closer to the old buck, sitting down next to the bars that separated us. He didn’t seem to notice. I raised a hoof and waved it back and forth in front of his big, cloudy eyes. They slowly followed, sometimes failing to notice the movement.

“So, if you can’t even see my hoof right in your face, how could you know what my eyes are doing?” I asked snidely.

He laughed at me. “I’ve been locked up in this jail house since the day after it was built thirty three...or wait, it musta’ been a good thirty eight years ago...or was it fifteen? Well either way, I’ve been here long enough to know what ya’ll new recruits is doing once you first get thrown in. I did the same thing.”

“Well that’s good for you, but I don’t have time for the dour. I have to get out of here. There are ponies depending on me.”

“Yeah, that’s what everypony says. What makes you different?” he asked, his face smearing closer against the bars.

“The fact that I haven’t committed any crime,” I offered, matter-of-factly.

He laughed even louder at that. “Yeah, you’re gonna fit in just fine here. So, what are you really in for?”

I rolled my wandering eyes. “I just told you, I did nothing-”

He burst into laughter yet again. I stared back at him pouting.

“If you’re not even gonna listen, I’m done talking to you!” I turned away from him and continued scouring the room for an escape route.

There was a short moment of silence. It was broken by the sound of something breathing very close to my neck. I turned around and was greeted by the snout of the old stallion poking through the bars, hovering only a few inches behind me. His big, bulbous eyes were squishing against the bars that he had slipped his mouth through. Had it not been such a shock, this actually might have looked kinda funny.

I gasped and jumped back, placing a hoof over my racing heart. This sparked another bout of hysterical laughter from the stallion. He pulled his face free from the bars and began to roll around and kick his legs while cracking up.

“Crazy old fool.”

He sat up and wiped away his tears of laughter, getting ahold of himself. “Alright, okay. Wooo, that was fun. Haven’t had a laugh that good in, oh...I don’t even know.” He approached the bars and stuck his hoof between them, offering it to me. Only he was about three feet to the right of me.

I stood tongue in cheek, staring at the wrinkled old nut case. Obviously time had not been a friend to him. but maybe I could be. I stepped over to him and shook his outstretched hoof.

“Nice to meet you, little lady. My name is Hardknox.”

“Nice to meet you too, Hardknox.” I thought for a moment. “Wait, what am I saying? It’s not nice to meet you. All you’ve done is creep me out.” I pulled my hoof away from him.

“I...” He turned away in shame. “I was just trying to make a friend. I’ve been here so long...nopony even talks to me.”

I groaned and stuck my hoof between the bars. “Fine. My name is Wink.”

He slowly turned to me and approached my outstretched forleg. He reluctantly brought up his own hoof, his eyes going wide at the thought of pony contact. Then he lunged forward and started to lick my hoof furiously.

“Gah! What the hell is wrong with you?!” I pulled my hoof away and rubbed out his saliva on the ground, then thanked all things holy that I had still had my body suit on.

“Hey! You didn’t tell me you were wearing clothes! That ruins the whole joke!” He crossed his forelegs and sat looking cross.

I just shook my head and laid against the concrete back wall of my cell. Hardknox mirrored the action, laying against his own wall and staring up at the ceiling of his cell.

“It’s a hard life,” he said solemnly.

“You do realize that I’m not gonna pay attention to anything you say, right? I’m not even going to respond to you.”

“You just did,” he contested.

“I meant after that.”

“You just did again.” He smirked.

I closed my eyes and sighed deeply. “Why me?”

“Because you chose to go it alone.” His tone was different, drastically so.

I turned my gaze on him. He was still staring up at the ceiling, but gone was that demented grin he wore so proudly. In it’s stead, he bore a stoic, contemplative demeanor. Either he was being serious this time, or he was just trying to fool me again.

“What do you mean? You don’t know anything.”

“I know that you had friends you could have taken with you. But you chose to do whatever it is you were doing here alone. That’s why you’re in the mess you’re in right now.” He turned his head to me and shrugged.

“How do you know that?!”

My thoughts began to race. Had Vanity and Warrick been captured, or worse?

“Because you told me so yourself. You said there were ponies out there depending on you, correct? Well if they were any real friends, they’d be right here with you.”

“Whatever. I don’t have time for you; I still need to think of a plan,” I said, waving him off. I couldn’t afford to waste time getting my feathers rustled by this idiot.

“A plan? You’re still on that whole escape thing? I thought I told you there was no way out.”

“Well unlike you, who’s given up on the idea, I can’t afford to think like that. My friend is dying and I need to get him medicine.”

And that wasn’t looking too good. The crazy old fool had been pretty much spot on. The only way out of this jail cell was with a guard escorting me; and without a weapon, I had no real chance of getting away if and when that came to pass. In all honesty, I’d likely spend the rest of my very short life in this cage.

“How long?” the old stallion asked.

“Till what? I go nuts, reach through those bars, and ring your neck?”

“Till your friend dies?” he clarified.

“Oh...that.” I hung my head. “I don’t know.”

I was only now beginning to realize how dire this situation was. Until now, I had just seen it as a chance to go off and be the hero for a change. But Warrick was actually dying. And if I didn’t find a way to get out of here and get him the anti-venom, he was going to die. We had only just started to get to know each other, and I was already in detriment of losing the only pony I could even think to being able to call my friend. Other than Vanity that is, but she didn’t really count.

“I can help,” Hardknox said, his tone more level and reasonable than I had thought it capable of.

“With what?” I asked.

“To get you out. Just agree with whatever I say, alright?”

“You’re kidding right?”

“You want to get back to your friends or not?”

“Fine.” It wasn’t like anything he could do could possibly make my situation any worse.

“Hey! Guard! We got an eager one over here!”

Or maybe he could...

Hardknox waved his arms at me and shouted at the guard sitting at the desk in the center of the jail house. After a moment the guard groaned and slid out of her seat. She stretched and made her way over to our cells.

Hardknox glared at me quickly. “Remember, just agree,” he whispered.

“What is it now you old psycho?” the guard asked.

Hardknox grinned smugly and gestured towards me. “This one here says she wants her trial now. Thinks she’s been ‘falsely accused’.”

The guard laughed. “Yeah, sure. I’m supposed to believe somepony is dumb enough to think they could beat Judge Honeypony.”

I looked to Hardknox, who opened his eyes wide at me.

“Yes, it’s all true,” I blurted.

The guard stopped laughing and looked at me funny.

“Yeah, I figure that since they threw me in here on a BS accusation I can just beat this thing real quick and be on my way. Might even demand to recompense for you guys wasting so much of my time.” I shrugged haughtily.

The guard was squinting at me, her face contorted in confusion. I had a feeling not many ponies had ever been this eager to face the music. She turned back to Hardknox.

“Is she for real?”

He nodded, smiling. “And I believe her too! She has one darn good case if you ask me!”

An anxious smile formed on the guard’s face. “Okay then. I actually wanna see this.” She trotted back to her desk and took up her key ring. She came back and unlocked my door.

I looked at Hardknox from the corner of my eye, but I noticed him shake his head subtly.

The guard pulled open the cell door. “His honor is taking a case right now, but I’ll make sure you go next.”

She pushed me along, closing the cell door behind me. As she walked me out of the jail house I stole one last glance back at Hardknox. Lip reading wasn’t something I could claim to be adept at, but I could tell he was mouthing something. It looked a lot like:

“You’re welcome.”