Fallout: Equestria - Shadowless Augury

by goobadia

Rating: mature
Tags: Adventure, Crossover, Gore, My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic, Dark, Original Character
Length: 51923

After being orphaned, two brothers go on a quest to find the pony that killed their parents. However, things aren't always as easy as they seem.

After being orphaned, Suthain and Fortis Cor go on a quest to find the pony that killed their parents. However, their adventure isn't made easy by the constant struggle in the Wasteland, but the two brothers endure and find help along the way. The Wasteland won't let them go so easily though.

Published 2013-01-22 03:10:01 UTC
Last updated 2013-06-06 00:47:12 UTC

Alpha

(Advisory Warning: this chapter sucks. I thought I’d warn you now.)

Fallout: Equestria – Shadowless Augury

Chapter 1: Alpha

“Hi, my name is...”

Life was routine for my family and I. We would go from somewhere in Neigh City to somewhere else in Neigh City. We would usually trot until we found somepony in need or we simply decided to turn back after three days. With the way things were in the Wastes, we were usually destined to help somepony.

Now I, your tour guide through this story, will start off by introducing the four pony gang.

Let’s start with my Mother, Amaranthine. She wore a violet coat and eyes, a pure white mane, and neat horn on her head. She was beautiful, smart, and a good shot with her scoped .44 revolver. She painted over parts of it in purple, painted a purple eagle, and calligraphically engraved “We All Sing Glory” on the handle with her magic. Her artistic ability really showed on that revolver and her painted leather armor. The armor was a midnight black with a coat of deep purple painted over parts. Around her neck she wore an eagle pendant. She also served as our medic since we don’t know anything about anything. Mom was even nice enough to teach us some things. If she wasn’t helping us or the Wasteland she was either reading, writing, or drawing. Yes, she was a bit of a nerd, but that doesn’t mean she couldn’t handle herself in a fight. She could shoot and run, what else is there? Her nerdiness even carried into her cutie mark. Her flank carried the silhouette of a paintbrush and pencil above a medical cross, and to top it off, a book underneath all of that. I hate reading.

Damned eggheads.

Let’s now go to my Father. Mr. Beryl Blue is a beautiful and independent unicorn and he don’t need no buck. His coat and eyes were a deep blue and his mane was blue and white. He was very similar to Mom; very smart, had a passion for learning, egg-head. Just like Mom, he could seriously kick tail if he needed too, with or without a weapon. With all the studying Dad did, he became very skilled in everything he set his mind to: magic, repair, lockpick, a lot of stuff actually.  He did plenty of reading at a Stable-Tec building and learned enough to outfit us all with a shiny and polished Pip-Buck from the same building. Similarly to Mom, he had black leather armor with blue painted over the same parts. Dad’s weapons of choice were an assault rifle and a sniper rifle, both in perfect condition. Mom used her magic to make the engravings, “Roads That Don’t End” and “Views That Never Cease”, respectively. And for his butt mark: a book (again?) with a wrench atop it. I still hate reading.

Since unicorn blood ran strongly through our veins, my brother and I were both unicorns of course.

So my Bro, my BBBFF, Best Big Brother Friend Forever. Best brother in this piece of shit Wasteland! And how could you go wrong with a name like Fortis Cor. He had a bluish-purple coat, blue eyes, and a white mane. Just like our parents, he was very smart. Not as much of an egghead though. Mom and Dad were good fighters in the Wastes, but Cor was the best fighter I have ever seen. Mom and Dad taught him how to shoot at an early age for obvious reasons in the Wasteland, and his skills continually improved. He became a really good shot at all ranges, and so his weapon of choice became a hunting rifle with a scope. With this he wore plain black leather armor. Even with his skills, he was hurt at a young age when his gun was knocked out of his hands by raider with a knife and was nearly killed; he still has a scar on his face and a few on his body. After that he taught himself how to fight, and as soon as he could he taught me everything he knew about fighting. With all the time we spent training he got a really nice body. I did not, unfortunately. Another talent of his was music; he could write and play several instruments with his horn. As for his cutie mark, it was a silhouette of a pony kicking another pony-silhouette in the face. The former having an iridescent musical note where a cutie mark would normally go.

And at the end of the list we have me, Suthain. Yes, my bro and I do have strange names, get over it. I had a coat and eyes just like Mom’s and a white mane with light blue stripes running through it.  As I said before, Cor and I trained in hoof-to-hoof combat and we both became deadly. However he was the one who came out of this training with an excellent body, I was still in the weak body I had always been in. Cor taught me how to shoot and fight when I was just a colt, and so I became a decent shot at long ranges and a great shot at short to mid ranges. I had dual .32 pistols and a rifle and armor like Cor’s.  I took a lot of traits from our parents that my brother didn’t. I became great with magic, medicine, art, repair, and lockpicking. Those were the major skills. I can pick other skills up quite easily.

*  *          * * *        * *

A common day for us, we walked amidst the ruins of this forgotten world. Not a soul in sight, not until we saw three balls not too far away, each one covered in a red coat. As we got closer, my Pip-Buck’s Eyes-Forward Sparkle picked up a friendly green bar in the same direction as the balls. I’m starting to get the feeling this was something else. My fear came true, they weren’t balls, they were ponies, and the red color was blood that pooled around them and stuck to their coat. We rushed to see if any of them were breathing. One was taking very slow breaths, maybe there was hope her. She was missing a limb and her blood dried onto her coat and formed a dark pool around her, I’m surprised she was still alive, but she was close dead at this point. She barely moved as we approached her. There was a melancholy look in her eyes; she knew her fate. Mom starting using her magic and whatever we had on us to try and heal her wounds, Dad went to scavenge nearby buildings for supplies to help the mare, Cor and I stood watch over the doctor and her patient. The mare was hurt badly, Mom was trying her best to save her, but we all knew she wasn’t going to make it.

Dad came back after 10 minutes with a disappointed look on his face. “Nothing,” was all he said.

“No healing potions?” my mother asked in response.

“Nothing.”

“Not even food or water.”

“Nothing, besides we have some of our own.”

“We have this,” she said as she floated out three bottles filled with murky water.

“Can’t you filter it, or something?”

“I would have done that already if it were an option,” she said matter-of-factly.

My father waited a moment before starting again, “How’s she doing?”

“She’s doing better than when we first came to her, but I’m not sure if she’ll last too long without food or water. She’s terribly dehydrated and has certainly lost a lot of blood; it’s amazing she’s still alive.” It must have been through the strength of her own heart that she was still breathing long enough for help to come to her. She must have been lying there, in her own pool of blood, for at least two days.

“I’ll go check in the other buildings, then,” Dad said as he left again. The other buildings were completely rundown, so I wasn’t sure if there was going to be anything other than rubble.

We awaited his return as Mom continued to give the mare purple healing potions and used her magic to heal her. She was starting to look much better than when we first got to her, Mom wasn’t lying about that. She was lying that she had a chance of surviving, with or without food and water. It wouldn’t have done much other than extend whatever was left of her life. She wasn’t going to make it, and that’s why the Wasteland sucks. No joy, no compassion, no breaks.

The mare started moving. Maybe Mom did save her. The mare looked at all of us and all of her surroundings. “What happened?” she asked this as if she truly didn’t know what happened. Perhaps she had brain damage.

“It’s okay, you’re safe. We need you to remember what happened. How did you end up here?” Mom asked with kindness in her eyes.

“Um…,” the mare took a moment to think about her answer. “I was going from… I can’t remember. Where was I going?” She asked herself.

“You were going somewhere, that’s all that matters. Were you travelling alone or with somepony?

“I was with two other ponies. We… we were going down this road, and then… we were… attacked. It wasn’t… it wasn’t anything I’ve ever seen before. They were viscous… no mercy… they killed them. Then, they left me to die…”

“Who did this to you?” she wanted to go after whoever or whatever did this.

“They weren’t ponies anymore… they were monsters… soulless monsters,” it was definitely a scarring experience for her.

“Who? Who were they?”

“Don’t go after them… they’ll just do the same to you. They… they don’t have morals… they only kill… they’re worse than anything in the Wastes,” she said. The worst part is she was probably wasn’t lying. The Wasteland fucks you over continuously and won’t stop until it chooses to; the inhabitants only make it worse.

“Tell us so we can stay away from them if we see them,” Mom lied. We were going after who did this. We knew it and the mare knew it.

“There’s no use… if you see them… you’re already dead…”

She was gone. We failed her. The Wasteland didn’t give her a chance of hope. It doesn’t give anyone a chance of hope, and that’s why it sucks.

Dad joined us shortly afterwards, he didn’t have any food or water. “She didn’t make it?”

“No,” she informed him, “Let’s go,” and with that we continued down the road.

* *           * * *        * *

The sky grew dark. We walked in silence. There was nothing along our way, just destroyed buildings. We decided to set up camp in a small grey building. It wasn’t completely destroyed like the rest of the buildings around us. After clearing the building out, we put down our saddlebags and lay our bed rolls down. We could finally get some rest, we definitely needed some.

Just as we thought our day was over, we heard noises outside. There were a few red bars on my E.F.S. I couldn’t quite tell how many though because they were bunched together. We stacked on the sides of the door, two per each side. They weren’t going to expect an ambush upon entrance. The door was kicked open and two ponies in black armor rushed in. Their armor had a coat of yellow that branched out to form a lightning pattern. Cor and Dad took them both to the ground and began choking them out. Two more ponies quickly rushed in and shot three times above us all, and then a mare aimed her gun at Mom and me, a buck aimed at Cor and Dad. “Stand down! Move away from them,” the buck ordered. Cor and Dad loosened their grips and the ponies they were grabbing slipped away from them. They checked all of our pockets and emptied them. “Get up,” the same buck commanded. Cor and Dad obeyed. I could see what Dad was doing; he was trying to figure out if he could fight them. Unarmed and a 1:1 ratio, it looked like we had a chance.

Of course three more ponies entered. Two wore the same black armor with yellow lightning, but the other wore only a tattered black cloak. He was a unicorn buck that was much bigger than everypony in the room. His muscles weren’t defined, but large and intimidating. He had a look in his eyes. That look that told us he wouldn’t just kill us; he would make us suffer first, just like the mare we tried to save. His coat was a blood red and his mane was the same but with yellow streaks, his eyes were also a deep red and his voice was deep and had a soothing accent, “Restrain them.” Four ponies came to shackle us while two others kept their guns on us. Dad countered the mare trying to shackle him and took her weapon. He managed to get two shots into her head before a buck shot him. All of my family in shock, we were ready to rush to him. Mom was the first to move and the second of us to fall. Whether it was out of fear or smarts, Cor and I didn’t even scream. We only watched as our parents were killed before us. “Fools. They’re actions have led to their downfall,” the buck said, “Take everything they had on them, you could use it.” Two mares took everything on the ground before them. A mare went and picked up Mom’s necklace. Cor and I were shackled together by one of our forelegs. It really didn’t make walking easy, but we got it under control quickly. He left the room, our captors followed him. “Bring these two to the cages. If they try anything, let them know what death feels like,” and with that he departed with the two ponies that entered the room with him. The other four led us in the opposite direction.

I had a really bad feeling about what was going to happen to us. Instinct told me to analyze the ponies around me. Two had assault rifles, the other two had shotguns. All of them carried a knife on their armor and one shotgun mare carried all of our belongings. She holstered Mom’s revolver and Dad’s sniper and assault rifle. Around her neck she wore Mom’s eagle necklace. She was definitely going to die. This was going to be a tough fight, but we could do something; we just had to be patient.

* *           * * *        * * *

We walked for about 30 minutes before I decided to do something. The assault rifle ponies led us while the shotgun ponies watched us from behind. I started looking around. Taking in the image of destroyed buildings, gazing at the ever cloudy sky, peeking at which pony had all the weapons. She was walking behind Cor, perfect.

I looked at my brother. There was no worry in his face. He would get us out of this, but I could do it before him. “Behind me,” I whispered, almost soundlessly. I grabbed my mother’s revolver with my telekinesis and instantly brought up the unique Stable-Tec Arcane Targeting Spell. I selected the mare’s head and put three shots into it. At such a close range, she was dead in the first shot. I kicked the mare behind me in the face as soon I was out of S.A.T.S., it was enough to keep her confused. My brother, realizing what happened, grabbed the mare’s fallen shotgun with his telekinesis and quickly shot the mare behind me twice, turning her into a bloody, gore strewn mess. Both assault rifle ponies were stunned. Waiting for S.A.T.S. to recharge, I aimed down the sights of my mother’s favorite gun and shot the mare directly in front of me. Out of ammo, I beat the remaining pony with the revolver. It gave us enough time to keep him dazed and let my brother shoot him with the shotgun.

Cor and I searched these ponies for a key to these shackles. We unlocked our restraints and hugged each other. Our parents were just killed before our eyes, and a hug was greatly appreciated. A few tears fell from my eyes, none from Cor. He was crying on the inside, but he wanted to stay strong for me. He wanted to let me know he was going to be there for me, that it was all going to be alright. As long as we were still together, it would be alright. I took Mom’s eagle pendant and hung it from my neck. After gathering everything at our feet, we took a look around us then headed back from where we just came. We needed a place to sleep, but because we were constantly on the move we never had a home. We would just travel from one town to the next and sleep wherever we could. So Cor and I made way for nearest trading town, Prute.

Footnote: Level Up!

New Perk Added: Point Buck – +10% damage with guns.

Quest Perk Added: Big Losses – When you suffer a big loss, you want revenge. Your attacks now do 10 % more damage against those who have wronged you. Your companions feel the same effect.[/size]

Hunting

Fallout: Equestria – Shadowless Augury

Chapter 2: Hunting

“It’s worthless, a waste of time. This goal is out of reach, you better fall back in line.”

Prute, a magical land of trade that we constantly visited, you sort of had to when you are constantly finding loot along your travels. It was a large town that was broken up into five sections.

S1 is the first place visited, especially because it’s at the entrance of the town. There’s not much to it, there were a few caravans that would stop there, and a few small shops were set up.

S2 is the largest section and where all trade takes place. Dedicated shops for anything you could need were built where you can buy or trade. Traders would set up camp and offer prices better than most of the shops that have been set up, but the product is usually worse. If you know how to repair, it’s probably worth it to buy from these traders, if not just stick with the dedicated shops that are set up.

S3 has nothing more than a living area and two bars. Boring if you ask me.

S4 and S5 are really one section but most separate them into two different ones. S4 is the red-light district; adults only, even though fillies and colts are there daily. Prostitutes and chems are obviously in high supply there. S5 is more bars. S4 and S5 are shipped as one section because the two are constantly being mixed together and there are no real boundaries separating the two.

* *        * * *        * *

We reached our destination and got ourselves a room. We could finally get some rest, safe rest where we don’t get attacked. We put our stuff down, again. “Fuck,” was all I said.

My brother held me close, “It’ll be alright. We’ll push our way through this, trust me.”

“I know we can push through this, I just miss them so much.”

“Me too. Let’s get some sleep. Good job out there, by the way. You probably saved us both,” he gave me a pat on my back before letting me go and headed off for his bed.

“Thanks,” I said unappreciatively. I didn’t want to be complimented for saving two of us; I wanted to be complimented for doing a better job and saving all of us. Fuck. Why does the Wasteland have to shit on everyone? Not just ponies, everyone.

None of us got much sleep after what happened. We just lay in bed, waiting for morning. It was only a few hours away, so not too long of a wait.

Looking at a stained white ceiling, I started thinking. That was never good for me.

‘How could we have done better?’

I don’t know. If they waited for a better opportunity, like me, maybe they would have survived.

‘So it’s their fault? We couldn’t do any better?’

No, I couldn’t. If Dad telegraphed his plan to us then maybe I could have done something. Maybe we all could have reacted and taken all of them out.

‘Dad made a foolish mistake. What about Mom?’

Mom shouldn’t have run to him. She left her life in the hands of the ponies who killed her husband and our father, wrong move.

‘Don’t take any blame, then?’

Maybe I could have done something to keep them from dying.

‘So, now we take partial blame? What could we have done?’

Shoot everything and hope it didn’t end in our death…?

‘Well isn’t that the greatest plan we’ve made.’

There wasn’t much I could do, so just shut up, dumb mind.

After wasting my time talking to my head, I realized the sun was out, sort of. The sun never came out. It was always cloudy, always. Everypony says it’s the Enclave, but I don’t really care who did it. All that matters is that there was no sun, just clouds. I still lay in the bed, hoping something would change. Hoping something could take my mind off everything happening. Cor came up to my bed and said, “You’re awake, get out of bed.” I got up and looked at him. “Let’s go.”

“Go where? We don’t have anywhere to go,” I said, sounding more like a pessimist than I wanted to.

“Get a drink,” he said. We needed to stop moping around, and this was a temporary escape.

“What about the second stop?”

“We’ll figure something out, I promise,” he reassured me with a smile on his face. I nodded in response. He hugged me, “I know you miss them, I do too, but we’ll push through this. I promise. OK?”

“OK.”

He looked me in the eye, “I want to hear you say it.”

“We’ll push through this,” I repeated.

“Let’s go then.”

* *           * * *        * *

We walked into the crowded bar and ordered ourselves a couple beers, Mom and Dad never would have allowed this. We took a seat in the small space there was available. As crowded as it was, it was still quiet. At least quiet enough to hear the famous DJ-PON3 on the radio. A calm song was playing for us then it ended and the DJ’s voice came on, “DJ-PON3 here and that was Sweetie Belle singing about internal conflicts we all face. In this hellhole of a Wasteland we always have to deal with something internal and external, but it’s how we deal with it that makes us strong. Our body surviving doesn’t mean much if out soul doesn’t live on too. And that, my little ponies, is an important thing to remember. And now, folks, time for your favorite part of the day, time for some news!” At this point, no pony was really caring about what the DJ was saying. News about a missing pony or a gang of raiders didn’t really matter to us when the missing pony was so far away from us all.

Our attention was lost until he said something that got everyone’s attention, “And now some news for my ponies out in Neigh City. It’s all good, I haven’t forgotten about you… yet. Two ponies that have been changing the Wasteland for better over there are now dead. Yes, it’s a sad truth, the duo of Amaranthine and Beryl Blue is dead. And now their two sons are orphaned and left alone in the Wastes. I feel for you two. And to everyone out there, sometimes it’s just a pat on the back and telling someone ‘the world hasn’t ended’ to help them keep going. Now please, always look out for one another; watch each other’s back and lend a helping hoof when it’s needed, that’s how you can be a hero in the Wastes. Remember, chaos is what caused this all in the first place. Let’s try to cut down on the chaos. Now this next song goes out to you two,” he finished and let the music fill the air.

Sometimes I just get that feeling that he watches over everything in the Wastes. It happened so soon and he already knows about it! How? How does he do it?!

“Let’s go,” my brother rose to his hooves and started walking out the small building, not even finishing his beer.

I chugged the rest of mine and caught up to him, “Hey! Where are we going?” I asked.

“I don’t know. Let’s just walk to somewhere, anywhere,” he said as we kept walking. We didn’t have much of a plan and we didn’t have any gear on us, but we went anyway

* *           * * *        * *

We walked down an empty road for what felt like hours. Eventually I opened my mouth, “What are we going to do?”

“I don’t know. Do you have any ideas?” he asked seriously. Damn, none of us had any idea on what we should do without our parents. But there was one idea…

“We could find out who that red buck is and go after him,” I suggested.

He stopped and looked at me, “No.”

He started walking again. “We don’t have anything else to do. And unless you have a better idea we should try it.”

“No,” he repeated. “The only reason we’re still alive is because that red buck left us with inexperienced fighters. Two unarmed and shackled ponies against four fully armed and armored ponies is not an easy fight. It’s through some miracle we’re not dead right now.”

“Do you have any other ideas?” he didn’t respond. “Let’s just try and figure out who he is and go after him.”

“How about this: we figure out who he is, and if he’s bad and a pony Mom or Dad would have gone after, then we go. If not, we don’t. Does that sound good?” I nodded in response. I had no doubt that he was bad, but we still had to find out who he is, where he is, and if my suspicions are true.

* *           * * *        * *

We made it to the grey building we were at yesterday and went inside. Mom and Dad were lying next to each other. We took both bodies and put them outside. On the side of the building we started digging a hole. Using our hooves and magic we dug the grave for the both of them beneath a tree. Twenty minutes later, the hole was covered and the epitaph ‘With Us Always’ was on the tree.

We headed back to Prute. If there was ever any information needed, a trading town was the first place to go. The ponies there have been everywhere; they’re bound to know something.

* *           * * *        * *

We made it back and the first thing we did was go back to the room we rented. I sat down, disassembled some of the weapons, took the parts that were good and used them to replace bad parts in other weapons. We didn’t mess with Mom’s and Dad’s weapons, but we took our two hunting rifles and made them into one. The shotguns, armor, and assault rifles we picked up from our captors were in a really good condition; there was nothing I could do. As for the hunting rifle, I didn’t do as good of a job as Dad would do, but it was good enough. Cor took Dad’s sniper and one of the shotguns, I took Dad’s assault rifle and Mom’s .44. The rest we chose to sell. We gathered our gear and left.

* *           * * *        * *

The Stockpile; a large building in S2 that buys from you and sells to you, and with everything ponies sell there it becomes a chore keeping it all. So it’s stockpiled and kept for when ponies actually want to buy, hence the name. The inside didn’t have much other than a counter where the nice mare, Merch, sat behind, ready to trade and buy. We walked up to her and said, “How are you today, Merch?”

“What do you have for me today, fellas?” she asked us.

“We got this,” I said as I took out the hunting rifle, my .32 pistols, the assault rifles, a shotgun, and four sets of armor.

She looked at everything, but her eyes stopped on the armor. She looked up at us and asked, “Where did you get this armor?”

“Why does it matter?” I asked.

“Because only elite members of the Samdiny wear this armor,” she said somberly.

“The Samdiny?” Cor and I both asked.

“Yes, the Samdiny, a group of mercenaries that work as a whole, meaning individual mercenaries won’t take contracts, the company as a whole takes the job. They’re professionals, if you come across them you’re dead, contract or not.”

“They didn’t seem like professionals,” Cor said.

“Are you telling me you took them out easily?”

“It wasn’t a hard fight, even while we were bound to each other,” I said.

“Then you must have been really lucky. Most are lucky if they can take out one of them,” she said to us.

“Maybe we’re just better fighters than them,” Cor suggested.

“Maybe, but not likely, those mercenaries are well trained and well armed. For the future, stay away from them,” she advised us. I’m assuming we weren’t going to get information that will help us from her. We stocked up on healing potions and ammo and she took everything we placed on the counter and gave us bottle caps in return. Yes, it was a strange form of currency, but it worked.

We were about to leave when she said, “I’m sorry about what happened to Amaranthine and Beryl Blue. I just wanted to tell you two to stay safe. You’re parents were good ponies, live up to their example.”

“Thanks, that means a lot,” I said sincerely as Cor nodded his head beside me. There was something I wanted to ask, but I wasn’t sure if I was going to get an answer I liked. I summoned my courage and asked anyway, “About those mercenaries you mentioned, do you know who they’re working for now?”

“I don’t know who he is, don’t really want to either. I do know he is insane and isn’t somepony you should mess with. He hired mercenaries for something though, so he’s probably up to something,” she answered. I knew it was worth a shot.

“I thought you didn’t want us to go after them,” Cor said in response.

“I don’t. Your parents would though, and I know you two want to fight the good fight.”

We nodded in agreement. I said another thanks and we exited the shop. “Well, we can assume he’s bad,” I said to my brother.

“Yes, but we need to know more. I don’t like the idea of going after somepony I know nothing about.”

“Implying we are going after him?” I questioned my Brother with hopeful glee.

“Yes, we’ll go after him, if we can find more info. It would be pointless to go after a pony if we don’t have a clue where we should start.” He was right, we wouldn’t have found that buck if we didn’t know where to start looking. We would have been making circles, accomplishing nothing.

A grey old buck who was watching us as we left Stockpile decided to join our conversation, “Hey, you two.  Come here.” We hesitantly moved towards the buck. His dry, raspy voice said, “You two are looking for somepony, maybe I can help, but you’ll need to give me whatever information you have on him.” We didn’t know much about the mysterious red buck, but we told him the little we did. “I know who you’re talking about, but I can’t tell you much about him. He’s trying to keep a low profile, but hiring a whole company isn’t the most discreet thing to do. I don’t really know where he is now, but your best bet on finding him is hitting up one of his safe houses.”

“And where would we find one of his safe houses?” Cor inquired.

“Well, I can’t actually tell you. You could probably find something out if you raided one of his slave compounds. They’re everywhere, but just out of sight for a regular explorer. There’s bound to be something for you to find there,” the old buck informed us. He had a strange look in his eye. I couldn’t quite place my hoof on it, which was strange for me. I would usually be able to pick apart anypony after talking to them for a minute.

“How do you know all of this?” I asked him. There was no way a buck as old as him was out adventuring the Wastes, finding out about incognito ponies. It just wasn’t possible.

“There are a lot of ponies out there,” he answered, “and these ponies talk about whatever they damn-well please. A buck like me who has nothing to do but eavesdrop can find out about anything around here.” He had a point about getting information from eavesdropping, especially when the ponies you’re eavesdropping on are the ponies that travel around the Wastes, exploring everywhere. That was actually my plan if no pony would willingly give us information, wait for conversation to start.

“Thanks for the help,” Cor said as we turned to leave.

“A word of advice before you go: most of his ponies are terrible fighters. They can shoot, but without their guns, they’re done.”

“We’ll keep that in mind,” I said as we finally walked from the old buck. I wasn’t sure if he was trying to help us or get us killed. Most ponies wouldn’t just tell you what you needed to know, especially without a price. He could be telling us the truth, but I did not want to take any chances. I decided to see if we could learn more before we went after the mysterious red buck.

* *           * * *        * *

After being in S1 for about an hour, we got some confirmation of the old buck’s word, but not as much as I would have hoped. That red buck really was working quietly if none of these ponies knew anything. But that sparks the question: how did that old buck know any of this? He said he learned all of this by eavesdropping on these ponies, but these ponies didn’t know much. Something was up with that old buck, but we weren’t going to focus on him.

We left Prute and just walked. We still didn’t know where to search for these slave compounds. ‘They’re everywhere, but just out of sight for a regular explorer’. I wasn’t sure how difficult it was going to be to find them, but I knew we could do it.

* *           * * *        * *

We kept walking among ruined buildings, searching for anything that is or can lead us to a slaver compound. We searched relentlessly, but we didn’t find much. I was determined though, I wasn’t going to stop.

Cor and I walked up to a building, almost completely destroyed by time and the megaspells—the spells that brought an end to the war of ponies and zebras. The war wasn’t one that ended well for any involved; it nearly brought an end to life in Equestria. Some survived by being put in a Stable built by Stable-Tec, it could withstand the impact of a megaspell and all the radiation it brought with it, at least some of them could. From what I’ve learned, not all the Stables were built to protect its inhabitants, some were designed as experiments. Yes, Stable-Tec is filled with assholes, moving on—we climbed over rubble and up destroyed stairs to the top of the building. A higher view point might help us in our search.

Upon reaching the top, I took out Mom’s revolver and looked through the scope. I searched the horizon for anything that could be a slaver compound. There wasn’t much to see other than a small building, completely destroyed. It looked different, as if it was destroyed purposely and the rubble was pushed closer together and piled up. It was trying to hide something. Maybe I was trying to find something to look for, anything that could hide something just out of sight. I signaled Cor to follow me around the buildings so we could get a look of whatever was behind the pile. If what we found was what I was hoping to find then I wouldn’t want to find out by being attacked. No, I was going to attack first.

We stopped and looked around the corner of a building. Nothing, there was nothing behind the destroyed building. I walked to where I thought a compound would be. There was nothing more than a locked ammo box and an empty first aid box. I took out a screwdriver and a bobby pin and started to pick the lock. After four failed attempts, the box opened. Inside there were some shotgun shells and a few grenades. We took it all and went to search again.

* *           * * *        * *

It was starting to get dark, we had been walking between buildings for hours now and we were tired of looking. At this point it was just walking and looking left and right. I wasn’t looking for anything strange anymore I was just walking and turning my head. However, something did catch my eye, a small shimmer in the distance. I took out Mom’s revolver and peered through the scope. Shackles, ponies in binds were quietly walking in the dark. I was able to make out the shape of seven ponies. I couldn’t tell which ones were slaves and which were Samdiny.

I crept up to a building and peeked around the corner. I still couldn’t tell who was who even from here. Cor and I began trailing the group from far. I knew it was a bad idea to let them regroup, but I went with the plan anyway. The worst that could happen was a firefight and I’m not expecting any of the slaves to be shot during the fight. What would be the point of shooting your own slaves? If the Samdiny are as formidable as Merch said they were, then maybe a firefight would end badly for all of us. I still didn’t want to be shooting at something I couldn’t see and I wouldn’t want a slave to get shot, so I decided to take a chance.

* *           * * *        * *

We trailed behind them for at least an hour, hearing (and barely seeing) ponies being hit for walking too slow or not facing forward. It was sickening abuse. How could anyone treat another like that? Abusing one another was what got us into a war in the first place, the reason for all this chaos. The group we were following reached their destination though, a lit and open field with cages that held ponies. Cor stopped me before we were exposed to the light.

From here we could tell Samdiny from slave. There were four Samdiny in the group we just followed and four more at the compound. A rough estimate of thirty slaves was sitting in cages with four-five per cage, including the ponies that were just brought there. Merch told us that Samdiny elites wore armor with yellow lightning, but only one wore that design. That meant the others weren’t elites, and hopefully it meant they were less experienced.

I took out Mom’s revolver and Cor took out Dad’s sniper. We brought up S.A.T.S. and put three shots into the bodies of the closest Samdiny. As our shots made contact they fell from the impact, blood dripping from the wounds. Everypony readied their guns and looked our way. They couldn’t see us though as we snuck to a different position. The leader ordered four of her ponies to search for us while the other one look over the slaves. She stayed in the center of camp and looked around for us with a shotgun in her magic’s grip and an assault rifle on her back. We set up another two shots into the closest two Samdiny. It brought more attention to us this time. Bullets whizzed through the air around us as we brought ourselves closer to the ground. We took another shot without S.A.T.S and another two dropped. Two left, we almost won this fight. “We need to keep her alive,” I told Cor as I pointed to the mare with the yellow design on her armor, “she can tell us where we’re going next.”

“What if she can’t tell us?” It was a question I didn’t have a real answer to, but I knew I could do something if it came to that.

“She’ll tell us,” I assured him. The last pony we could kill was behind the cages, and we couldn’t shoot him unless we wanted to risk shooting the slaves. I quietly circled around in the dark to get the shot I needed. With S.A.T.S recharged I put two bullets into my target’s head. Only the leader was left now, but how could I get close to her without getting shot myself? I shot the ground around her, but she didn't move at all. Instead she shot at me with her assault rifle. I was the distraction, perfect. Cor took the opportunity and ran up behind her and tackled her to the ground. Her assault rifle was knocked free and I took it and her shotgun before she had a chance to grab them. I put my gun to her head and started the interrogation, “Who do you work for?"

“I work for myself,” she snidely answered. She wasn’t going to make this easy for us.

“Who do you and your team work for?” I demanded more aggressively.

“We don’t work for anyone. We’re a private group,” she answered. She was a terrible liar.

“Don’t lie to me. I know you work for somepony. Now, tell me who he is.”

“I don’t know who I work for. He sends emissaries to deal with us. I don’t know who he is, what he looks like, or where he is. All I know is he wants us to capture ponies,” I could tell she wasn’t lying; I’m a good judge of character.

"What does he need ponies for?” I kept asking.

"I don’t know. Why don’t you ask him,” she snidely answered again.

“What happens to the ponies you capture? Where do they go?”

“I don’t know. I really can’t help you, and I really don’t want to help you,” she answered in that annoying tone of hers.

“You’re not making this easy for me. Make it easy.”

“Sorry,” that was all she had to say. Sorry. That was it.

“Sorry, but it’s going to have to come to this,” I told her as I pushed my gun closer to her head. I really didn’t want to do it, but I would if I had to. My magic slowly began to tighten on the trigger.

“Wait! Waitwaitwaitwait! Listen to this: you don’t shoot me, and in return I act as a tour guide for you,” she suggested.

“Why would I do that?” I asked skeptically.

“Because you seem to be out of ideas,” as true as it was, I wasn’t going to admit it.

“How do I know you wouldn’t shoot me in the back first chance you got?”

“I said I would be the tour guide. That means I walk ahead of you. You would always have your eyes on me.”

"What about when we get close to your team? You wouldn’t screw us over then?”

“Well, if I do, you could always shoot me. You two aren’t bad fighters. If there was a fight, you two could handle it.” As much as I appreciated the comment, I still didn’t want to take the chance.

I looked at Cor for an answer. He nodded his head. I moved the gun away from her head and said, “Congratulations. You win the honorary title of ‘tour guide’,” I joked.

“It’s all I ever wanted to be!” she continued with the joke.

"Unlock those cages,” I ordered her. She unlocked the cages and set free several emaciated and angry looking ponies. Some gave thanks to Cor and I as they left, others told us this mare should be killed. I asked each one that passed me if there was anything to know about this mercenary. None could give me anything useful except she was going to shoot us when she got a chance. Only I wouldn’t give her that chance.

We looted the dead Samdiny for ammo, guns to sell and repair, and any food they had on them. Maybe eating two-hundred year old food wasn’t the best diet, but I’d take any food out here in the wastes.

We finished our looting and our new member asked, “Where are we going first, boys?”

“Where can you take us first?” Cor asked in response.

"Let’s go visit some of my friends,” she suggested. And so we went.

* *           * * *        * *

It didn’t really feel like we were going anywhere as we kept walking amidst ruined buildings in silence. Our new dark gray coated mare decided to break the ice, “So... you two got a name?”

“Why does it matter?” I asked, not really caring for her or her question.

“I’m just wondering. Name’s Twisted Shadow. I’m not that twisted if that means anything,” she told us earnestly.

Nothing was said for a few seconds, but I decided to show her the same affection, “Suthain.” I waited for my brother to introduce himself, but it was clear he wasn’t going to say anything. “That’s Fortis Cor,” I spoke for him, “my brother.” He didn’t look happy that I introduced him. “Mind telling us where we’re going.”

“A camp, just like the one we were at,” she said. "If there's any information I could get you two it would be there." It might have been a trap. Regroup with more Samdiny then attack us, but I had a plan and faith. She might try and screw us over, but if she did I was going to be ready. "We're here, just around this corner," she informed us.

I peeked around the corner and saw another camp set up in between two buildings. I spotted two cages but nothing else. After a second of thought, I moved back. "This is the plan: Cor and I go into that building there and keep watch," I said as I pointed my hoof to the large edifice to our right, "Shadow, you go in and gets us what we need to know. You try anything and you die," I told Shadow, not even joking in the slightest.

"There's just one problem," Cor spoke up, "how do we know she won't tell them to attack us after we leave?"

"I got it under control," I assured him. "Meet us back here when you're done," I told Shadow. "Let's move," I commanded them. I let her walk ahead of me and used my magic to make a small microphone that I sneakily placed in her mane.

Cor and I headed into the building and took watch through the small windows. I tuned my Pip-Buck's radio to the bug I placed just in time. "Hey, guys," I heard Shadow say with trepidation to the group of six.

"Twisted Shadow, what are you doing here?" the leader with the yellow patterned armor asked dimly. She was staring daggers at Shadow; I could understand her trepidation now.

"You know... just passing by. I... uh, actually I came to ask if you could... um... help me with something," it looked like she would faint before she got any info.

"Well don't just stand there, ask!" Leader Mare commanded testily.

She took a moment to regain her composure and asked, "Do you know who we work for? And where I can find him?"

"We work for a buck that you don't mess with, unless you want to get fucked up. Does that bring up any memories?"

"Hey that wasn't my fault!" she yelled defensively, "He tried raping me and he tried killing me, and somehow I ended up taking the fall when I fought back!"

"Still, cutting off each of his limbs and beating him with them seems a bit harsh," I would have thought that was the end, but then I remembered this is the Wasteland, there's never an end, "Then you cut off his penis and fed it to him. When you finished you didn't even end his suffering! According to the record, you just gave him a kiss on the forehead then walked away and left him there to slowly die!" I cringed. Didn't she say she wasn't twisted? I'm not a fan of barbarism, so this certainly made me doubt our choice of letting her travel with us. Cor's face gave me the impression he was feeling the same as I was.

"Well... he had it coming to him," she said flatly. There was still a small hint of fear in her and the Samdiny leader still looked like she wanted to kill Shadow.

"You were the reason we were all 'disciplined'. That was the reason everypony wanted to kill you and suffer worse than he did."

"It's not like our punishment was that bad. So we couldn't eat for three days and we had tougher workouts. It wasn't too bad," she said easily. How did she say that though? She looked so weak; I would imagine she would be dead from that.

"Why do you want to find this buck?" Leader Mare asked," You're just going to do something stupid and end up getting beat up by everypony else, again."

"I just... want to have a chat with him is all," Shadow answered.

"Last time you had a chat with our boss we found a pony without a penis or limbs drowning in his own blood," Leader Mare said simply.

"Oh no, nothing like that, just a friendly chat," Shadow said mischievously.

"You know you're going to get fucked up again if you do anything," she warned Shadow. From the look in her eyes I think she was hoping for a chance to beat up Shadow again.

"Just tell me what I want to know," Shadow said, finally asserting herself.

"Hit up one of the safe houses. You're bound to find him or some info on him there."

"Which is the closest one?" did she really not know? I thought this was her profession? If this could even count as a profession.

"Go to the school."

"Thank you," Shadow said as she turned to walk from where she came.

"Shadow," Leader Mare called. She stopped and turned her head, "As much as I want a reason to kick your ass, don't screw us over, please."

A warm smile grew on Shadow's face and she said, “No promises."

We ended the transmission and sneaked out of the building we were in. Shadow was waiting for us where we made our plan. Upon reaching her she told us what we overheard, "So the first place we're going is a safe house."

"Yes, we know," I told her.

"Could you really hear what we were saying?"

"Yes. I'd get that microphone out of your mane if I were you."

She put her hooves on her mane and started searching for the microphone I placed. She took out the bug and grumbled, "You could have at least told me you put this here." I could have done that, but how would I know if I could trust her if I did? It was a risky move, but I had to take my chances.

"So the big question, how do we free those slaves?" Cor asked us.

"We prefer the term prisoner. It makes us feel better about ourselves," Shadow told us.

I started thinking. The Samdiny were lazing around, oblivious to anything happening around them. The tops of the buildings could be an advantage for us. Take out each Samdiny with ease and they wouldn't even be able to hit us from up there. Go back down and free the slaves or prisoners, whatever we were calling them.

But I wanted another solution, preferably one with less killing. The cages were pinned up against the wall of a building. A sneaky pony should be able to get there and unlock the cages and slowly lead each pony out without getting spotted. If we failed sneaking then it would turn into a firefight. I couldn't have the slaves caught in the middle of that. We needed a distraction, and our tour guide would work perfectly.

"I've got a plan. Cor, go up to the rooftop of that building and be ready to open fire if something goes wrong," I said as I pointed at a four story building. Perfect for sniping and offered good protection. I turned to Shadow, "Distract them while I work on freeing the slaves."

"Prisoners," she muttered.

"Shadow, I don't care. Slaves or prisoners we have to free them. The mic is going back in your mane, so don't try anything," I informed her. "Listen to the broadcast, Cor, and shoot if she compromises us. Everypony understand?" They all nodded and began to move into position.

I moved through the empty buildings and moved into position. I peeked around a destroyed wall to see if Shadow was ready. She was slowly walking to the leader. The Samdiny gave her their full attention. This was my chance.

"Just a quick question, why are you always a bitch?" That was the only thing I paid enough attention to hear. Leader Mare shoved Shadow and a fight started.

While everypony was focused on Shadow getting her butt kicked, I took out a bobby pin and screwdriver and started to pick the lock. I hushed everypony inside the cages as they started whispering amongst themselves. Two bobby pins later and the first cage opened. I told this group to wait in the building I just came from and went to the last cage. This one I unlocked with just one bobby pin.

I led this group and the other group from building to building as quietly as possible. We met with an amused Cor on the rooftop. He tried to keep from laughing too loudly. "She just went up to her and asked!" he said quietly. It was somewhat amusing but we had to put a stop to this soon.

"Should we let her fight it out?" I asked Cor.

He thought for a second, "We really shouldn't, but this is fun to watch!" I decided to use this as a test. A chance to learn how strong and useful could she be to us. And it was still fun to watch.

The two mares threw their hooves at each other like crazies and kept trying to get into a dominant position. One would take down the other only to find herself on the ground the next second. Leader Mare was finally about to win. Shadow was on the ground and Leader Mare was merciless.

Shadow wasn't about to quit though. She covered herself well, and when she found the opening she attacked Leader Mare. One hard punch to her face and she was stunned. She took the opportunity to push Leader Mare off her and move on top of her. Now Shadow had the advantage. She didn't stop throwing punches at Leader Mare. I didn't expect Shadow to be a good fighter, but this wasn't terrible. She knew what she was doing at least. One last blow to Leader Mare and she wasn't moving. The green bar on my E.F.S showed she was still alive, but looking at her made me think otherwise.

Shadow picked herself up, said, "Bitch," and walked away. The other Samdiny went to care for their unconscious Leader and still hadn't noticed the empty cages.

We headed out the back door of the building and let the slaves go on their own. Cor and I met with Shadow in the same place as before.

She looked at us with a proud smile on her face. "Good fight?"

"It was... entertaining," Cor answered. The fight didn't get interesting until the end and both fighters sucked.

"Oh come on! You gotta give me more credit! I knocked that bitch out cold!" her giddy voice screamed.

"You get more credit when you fight better," I told her.

"That wasn't good enough?" she asked as she turned to lead us to our next destination.

"How long is this walk going to be?" Cor asked her.

"Far. Very far. Maybe it would help if I knew where the school was."

"Why don't you know?" Cor asked.

"Do you expect me to know everything?"

"We expect you to at least know where your own safe house is."

She stopped walking and looked down, "I have good reason not to."

"And they are...?"

She gave a little shake of her head, "It's not so simple to talk about."

"Let's just keep walking," I told them.

She seemed content with that suggestion and started walking again.

* *           * * *        * *

It was getting dark and we decided we needed to stop for the night. We went inside the first building we found that looked like it wasn't going to collapse on itself and lay down our bedrolls and took off our saddlebags. After a small meal of two-hundred year old food we decided to sleep. I searched the buildings by us for anything I could use as a leash for our tour guide. I didn't trust her fully yet and I didn't want her running away or trying to kill us in our sleep. After a short search I found a small rope that I used to tie her to a beam on the opposite side of the room.

We all settled down and tried to sleep. Cor was out quickly, but I couldn't sleep. I stared at the ceiling for some time before I took the pendant Mom wore. I turned it in my hooves and held it close to my chest.

I missed them. I couldn't change what happened though. As much as I wish I could, I couldn't. Hopefully the afterlife was a better place than the Wastes. What wasn't better than the Wastes though? All that is here is pain and misery. Every soul suffers; the good and the bad, the ones that don't deserve it and the ones that should burn. It's a sad truth. But a pony can't be perfection in the Wastes. Sadly, we're all reduced to killing each other to survive. The Wasteland is ruled by fight-or-flight. There's isn't as much civility as I would like in the Wastes. But I believe we could go back to an age of ponies where there is good, an age where we don't tighten our grip on the trigger when we meet someone new. We could fix all this; we just had to try harder.

I was close to falling asleep then I was whipped on my side. I yelped and turned to see Shadow standing above me, holding the roped I tied her with and a look of success on her face. "Try harder next time, kid," she whispered as she threw the rope on me then went back to her side of the room.

I stood up and tied her back up and made sure the rope was secure. Then I went back to my bed roll and drifted away.

* *           * * *        * *

I was shaken awake by a frantic Cor. "Wake up! We've got a problem!"

"Ugh, it's too early to wake up," I said as I stood up and shook myself awake.

"We lost somepony," he said as he pointed to a beam and a rope with no Shadow.

"How...? Where'd she go?"

"I don't know, but we'd better find her if we want to get to that safe house."

I went to where the rope lay and investigated. I wasn't good at tracking, but I thought I would give it a try anyway. I put myself in her position and looked at the ground for prints. There were hoof shaped dust prints in the ground. I followed them out of the building and into the street until they disappeared into the dead city.

Well... there went that plan.

I stared out into the street. How were we going to find her?

"At least we can assume she went this way."

"No," I said, "She didn't go this way."

"What makes you say that?" Cor asked.

"Just a hunch." I had no real reason to say it, I just had a feeling...

"Let's split up and look. I go this way," he motioned to where the prints led, "and you go that way," he motioned the opposite direction. "We meet back here in three hours."

I nodded and we went back into the building we slept in. Why was everything still here? "If she ran away, you think she would have taken our stuff and her's."

"Maybe she's dumber than we thought," he suggested. Who could be that dumb though? There was something wrong with this scene. We took our supplies, left the building, and parted ways. Maybe splitting up wasn't the greatest idea, but we would have a better chance of finding her this way. There were plenty of buildings to look through, but I didn't have that much time. I had to minimize my search so I didn't waste time. If I escaped from somepony and I didn't have any weapons where would I be? I would go for the nearest town. Of course I had no idea where the nearest town was, I had no idea where I was. Sure I've lived in this city my whole life, but I haven't explored much of it. Cor and I were always following Mom and Dad, and they didn't travel far.

I started walking through the buildings. I kept my eyes open for any signs of where Shadow might have gone. I didn't see anything for a couple blocks then I noticed something. There was fresh blood on the deteriorating pavement. Somepony was here not too long ago. The blood trailed down the street and into an alley where it led to the skeletal frame of a radhog, pigs' irradiated descendants.

I turned out of the alley and kept walking. If Shadow came this way she couldn't be too far away. I continued down the street and made a turn at the end of the block. I didn't know if she would be this way, but I gave it a shot anyway. It wasn't long until I found more blood paired with another gutted radhog. There was a trail of bloody hoofsteps continuing down the road. If I was following Shadow then she's dumber than I thought. She was careless when she escaped and now she was leading me to her.

I followed the hoofsteps into a building to find a familiar charcoal pony sitting around a fire, cooking her radhog meat.

She looked at me then turned away. "Thought you could get away, huh?"

"Actually, I thought I could go for some food that wasn't two-hundred years old."

"Yeah, whatever you say. I don't want to encourage you, but next time you run away don't leave an obvious trail."

"I was going to come back. I left your saddlebags there and I even made enough food for the three of us," she said as she pointed at the cooked meat. It would actually feed all of us. "Besides, you two treat me better than the Samdiny ever did. The ponies there just wanted to kill me. The only reason I'm not dead is because our rule book discourages the killing of fellow Samdiny." She actually looked sad talking about it.

"Do you want to talk about it?" I asked as I sat down next to her. Dammit, why was I being sympathetic?

She shook her head. "No. It's not one of my finer tales."

I stood up. "Let's head back then."

* *           * * *        * *

We arrived back at the building and waited for Cor to come back.

We sat down outside. It was a quiet few minutes before Shadow asked her question. "Why are you and your brother doing this?"

"It's a personal and moral affair," I answered as I took the eagle hung around my neck in my hoof.

"I'm guessing that necklace meant something to you."

"It was my mother's," I told her. "She always wore it. You Samdiny bastards and your leader killed my mother and father less than two days ago," I said as I fought back tears.

"I'm sorry," she said sincerely. "Do you know why they killed them?"

"That's what I want to find out. And I will find out," I told her with conviction.

"And I guess I'm helping you with this."

"Yes. You're useless, no offense, but you're probably the most willing Samdiny." Sure she was the first we met, so 'most willing' out of one. But she said she hates the Samdiny, and she has been helpful. She's taking us to a safe house which is where that old buck told us we should go. When she asked where the closest one was I expected closer though. Maybe it was a trap. "So how much more walking do we have to do?"

"Hmm... maybe a few more hours."

"Why don't you know any of this? You don't know where your own safe house is. You don't know who hired you."

"That's another story better left untold."

"A lot of dark and repressed memories?"

"More than you would like to know," she said. She looked like she was about to cry.

"What if I do want to know?" Why do I keep feeling sympathy? I have to stop doing this.

"You still don't get to know. I'm not going to burden you with my past." I wouldn’t have a problem being a shoulder to cry on, but it felt weird. She was Samdiny, the same ponies that killed my parents.

"So be it."

Cor finally arrived. "Oh, you found her."

"She left an obvious trail. She also went hunting for us," I said as she took out the cooked radhog meat.

"Whoa... food that's not super old." He started salivating. "Mom and Dad never let us eat meat. We had to hide our catch and eat it when they wouldn't notice."

"Why weren't you allowed to eat meat?" Shadow asked.

"Ponies are herbivores," I answered.

"Well, not anymore," she said. "There aren't any plants left, in case you haven't noticed."

Changing the subject, Cor asked, "How did you get out of the ropes?" I was interested in finding out myself, but it was probably my fault for not tying them securely enough.

"I was known in the Samdiny as an escape artist. That was the one of the only reasons I was as high of a rank as I was." At least I couldn't be held responsible for her escape. "And somepony sucks at tying ropes," she said as she turned to me.

"I blame sleep deprivation."

"We don't hold the water responsible for our wayward behavior." Cor said to me. He told me this once before. It’s not that I don’t find meaning in these words, but I haven’t been put in a situation where this could apply.

We sat down and ate the food Shadow caught for us. Afterwards we got up and headed to the school.

* *           * * *        * *

Finally, we were here. 'Very far' was an understatement. We probably walked across most of Neigh City at this point.

"Here it is," Shadow told us as we approached the large brick building that was in incredible condition. It was hardly affected by the megaspells that dropped or by time.

"What's in there?" I asked her.

"That's what we're going to find out."

We peeked through the glass doors and windows. No pony was in sight. We took the opportunity to walk in.

The inside was absolutely beautiful. Bright and colorful ornaments were on shelves and hung from the ceilings, medals and awards were left polished in display cases, drapes adored the walls and together added life to what would have been a boring foyer.

We walked down a hallway and into the first door we saw. It was a large open gym. Or it would have been if there wasn't a large octagonal structure in the corner.

"What is that?" Cor asked as I stood there admiring the octagon. It looked so sleek and perfect, but whatever was happening in there probably wasn't good.

"No pony really knows. This gym used to be empty, but now that's there," she told us while pointing at the large structure.

"No pony knows or you don't know?" Cor asked. "There's a difference between the two."

"Both, actually. Yeah I'm not alone on this one. The only ponies who would know are the ones working in there."

"How do we get in?" I asked.

"I'm sure somepony has a key. And it could probably be opened from a terminal somewhere in here." I made the decision to look for the terminal. One fight and this entire place would turn against us.

We headed went back into the hallway and found the cafeteria close by. Two of the walls were made almost entirely of glass. Looking in we saw about two-hundred ponies. Now I really didn't want to start a fight.

We snuck past the cafeteria and closer to the classrooms.

"Is it a bad idea to split up?" I asked the two as we approached the long perpendicular hallway lines with classrooms.

"It probably is, but let's do it anyway," Cor answered. "Assuming all or most of the ponies in here were in that cafeteria, we shouldn't have much to deal with."

"I'm surprised there were that many ponies in one safe house. There are usually never more than thirty ponies," Shadow told us. Something seemed off about that many ponies in one place when I saw it. What was happening?

"Cor, take Shadow and check every room on the left side of this hall while I take the right." Cor nodded unhappily with the partner arrangement. I'm guessing he still didn't like Shadow.

Most of the rooms I checked were empty, and the ones that weren't usually had nothing more than a row of cots. But in one room I did find bottle caps, a nice combat knife, two submachine guns, two grenades, and plenty of ammo for all our guns, no terminal unfortunately.

The next room I checked had five lone monitors with a green glow emanating from the screen.

I think I found what I was looking for.

I loaded up the first terminal and was surprised to find it was unlocked, which was good for me because I wasn't very great at hacking these machines.

"Note to all Samdiny" was the first entry on the terminal. It read:

Meeting at safe house #13 on August 22. All officers and other high ranking Samdiny are expected to show up. Those in field duty are exempt. Non-officers are not obliged to appear.

How many Samdiny were there? If what we saw wasn't all their members and we might be their enemy, then we would have a problem.

The only other entry, "Hard Light," read:

All ponies interested in volunteering in Project Hard Light must submit their forms before the end of the week. The first Hard Light session will begin on 8/18.

Perhaps that's what happening in the octagonal structure. I didn't know what Project Hard Light was, but it didn't sound good, especially when it was related to the Samdiny.

The next terminal had the same information. But the third terminal had something more. "For newcomers"

This how our system works:

You are going to be called a rookie, grunt, bitch, noob, newbie, ass licker, or the one of the Samdiny favorites: Cunt Man McGillicutty. Deal with these names.

Well, wasn't that quite the name.

There are four ranks that you can attain, starting with grunt, mercenary, officer, and chief. To rise through each rank you must complete a number of contracts within an amount of time. Group contracts are usually taken and offer greater benefits in the Samdiny.

Current employer: Red Rum

Found it.

As I was getting ready to leave, Cor and Shadow busted through the door. Both were panting and speechless. "What's wrong?" I asked them several times before getting an answer.

"We found somepony with issues. Had to haul ass out of there," Cor told me between breaths.

"Who was it?"

"Really skinny pony. Scars all over his body and face. He had a shit ton of knives on his belt and in the room. Motherfucker tried cutting us up."

"And you two ran?"

"Suthain, you didn't see him.  He was scary as hell and was throwing knives and swinging at us. He was moving faster than what I thought was even possible. We couldn't take him down, especially when only one of us has a gun," Shadow said.

"And he might have alerted everypony else in here," Cor said.

I turned my head into the hallway and saw nothing. I moved slowly and carefully through the hall, looking for a pony hiding in the rooms I already cleared. Cor and Shadow crept up next to me. Something made me stop in my tracks though. I barely saw a hoof around the corner of the hall that led to the cafeteria. The cafeteria filled with two-hundred ponies.

I led the two behind me into the nearest classroom. I silently motioned Shadow to hide and Cor to take a position by the door on the opposite side of the hall.

When we were ready I took a grenade and threw it where I thought the pony was. A few seconds later and there was a loud explosion accompanied by several screams.

"Move up!" I heard somepony shout. Four ponies walked in pairs along the walls. I took out Dad's assault rifle and brought up V.A.T.S. Time froze and I put two shots into the heads of the closest ponies. Everything started speeding up again and my targets' heads exploded. The two behind them took cover in the classroom next to them.Behind the two ponies was a disorderly swarm as opposed to the neat formation that preceded it. Cor and I exchanged nervous looks as they came closer.

Just in time to bail us out, Shadow tapped my rump and yelled, “Traps set!” over the noise. I took a quick glance in the room to find grenades scattered on the floor. She held a grenade up with her magic and was ready to throw it on the ground when the moment came.

I took out my last grenade and motioned Cor to come to us. I yanked the pin and threw the grenade in between the masses of ponies running at us. Cor bolted to where I took cover, shooting as he ran. We went in the room and heard the loud explosion and screams accompanying it. One mare made it past the explosion though and came into the room shooting.

Cor didn’t hesitate to open fire on her. She didn’t die though. She looked up at Shadow with a questioning look on her face. “Shadow? Why are you helping them?” She asked through broken breaths. “You’re supposed to be on our side.”

The ponies’ howls grew louder. We had to move now.

“Consider this my resignation,” Shadow said as she waved the grenade in front of the dying mare. Does this mean she was leaving them and joining us? I had no time to think about it when I saw her pull the pin and her magic’s grip released.

The three of us burst through the windows opposite the door. We ran to a wagon and took cover behind it. In its deteriorating state it might not be the best the cover, but it was all we had. We put our heads down and suddenly I went deaf. Even behind the wagon I felt the shockwave and heat from the blast. I laid there motionless for a moment before I stood up again.

The entire classroom was destroyed and so were the rooms beside it. It was a complete mess of gore in the areas that stood standing.

Shadow observed the destruction and uttered one word, “Cool.”

I was speechless as I stood there looking at the crater. I finally turned away and went to Cor. I gave him the knife I found. “You like CQB, right?” He took the weapon merrily. “So… what did you two find?”

“Plenty of grenades and ammo,” Shadow answered. “Nothing else.”

“I got us a name. Red Rum.”

Footnote: Level Up!

New Perk Added: Horse Sense – You are a swift learner. You gain an additional +10% whenever experience points are earned.

Reanimate

Fallout: Equestria – Shadowless Augury

Chapter 3: Reanimate

“Is it… zombies?”

“Uh… not very likely.”

A name, that's all we had. It wasn't much, but we would have to work with it. Hopefully somepony will recognize the name, but if not then we would have to rely on the Samdiny. This buck is trying to be hidden though. If the Samdiny didn't know who he was, who will then?

* *           * * *        * *

“Red Rum…” Shadow started thinking. Please tell me you've heard the name before. “Doesn't ring a bell.” Nothing is ever easy.

“We don't really have much then,” I said as we started walking away from the once beautiful school. “And I have no clue where we are.” We were never this far away from Mom and Dad’s usual route. I never realized how big Neigh City was, and we had only travelled a fraction of it.

“You have any more friends who might know where we should go next?” Cor asked Shadow.

“There might be some ponies I could ask. Assuming we reach them before word spreads that I've just gone rogue.” She just quit being a Samdiny mercenary less than a minute ago. Not only did she quit, but she killed so many ponies when she did. She really went out with a bang.

“Take us there quickly. Anything we can get on him is vital at this point.” Shadow nodded and started leading us to our next destination.

“Yeah, but before we leave, tell me about that resignation.” Cor said to her.

She stopped walking. “I’m done with the Samdiny. I can’t say some of it wasn’t fun, but even I knew it was wrong. Everything we did was wrong. The worst part is they felt like they had morals. Being honest to a contract doesn't make you a morally good pony though, right? It's about doing the right thing.” A simple smile grew on her face. “A group of mercenaries thinking they have morals,” she chuckled, “It’s the dumbest thing ever. So, I guess I’m with you two now.”

I looked at my brother, see what his opinion on this was, but he was looking at me for an opinion. I nodded my head. “I guess you’re with us now. You can have this back now,” I said as I handed her the weapons we took from her when we first met. Some might think trusting a stranger and former enemy (or she was still an enemy) was a bad plan, but I knew what I was doing. I could tell the Samdiny was destroying her; we were just the spark that made her leave. Without us, she wouldn’t have anywhere to go.

“Can I get new armor? This one isn’t cutting it.”

“Hold on to that armor, it might come in handy later.” She nodded her head in response. With that we started walking again.

* *           * * *        * *

I was confident in Shadow's ability to get us to another compound at the start of our walk, but after going in circles for an hour and listening to Shadow mumble to herself about which way was right, I realized we were going nowhere.

“Is it safe to say we're lost yet?” I asked her.

“No,” Shadow said firmly. “I know where I'm going.”

“You said that the last time we passed this building,” I reminded her.

“I just… fuck! Fine! I don't know where I'm going!” She threw her hooves in the air.

“Well, what now?” I asked.

“Are there any other safe houses nearby?” Cor asked the defeated Shadow.

“I'm thinking… Oh! There's one at Rad Hill.”

“Take us there,” I commanded her. I had no clue where Rad Hill was, but from the name I imagined needing plenty Rad-X and RadAway. Assuming it was named after radiation.

“How far is Rad Hill?” Cor asked.

“Maybe an hour's trot, if we pass the checkpoints easily.”

“Checkpoints?” Cor and I both asked.

“Rad Hill is an extremely protected town. It's heavily guarded and checkpoints are set up around major roads. Or whatever counts for major in the Wasteland.”

“Why would they take such precautions?” I asked.

“The town was built on top of an underground lab. The lab held countless riches and was stripped quite quickly, but of course greedy ponies came to take the riches. Rad Hill was constantly attacked and the ponies living there could barely protect it. The Samdiny wanted a share in those riches, so they made a deal. Protection for a share of what they found in the lab and full access to the lab. The lab became the safe house and Samdiny protect that town like no other. And that's Rad Hill's history in a nutshell.” So the Samdiny had at least one ally. They probably had more. That meant us waging a war against them would lead to our downfall. We weren't ready just yet.

“How difficult would it be to get past the checkpoints?” I asked her. We might have to end up sneaking past if they won't let us in so easily. And I didn't think I was ready for another attack on all Samdiny forces within the mile.

“If they think I'm Samdiny still, it should be easy. If not, we probably won't even get in.” I was hoping for the former, but knowing the Wasteland, things wouldn't be so easy.

* *           * * *        * *

We weren't too far from the checkpoints now. We slowly walked toward them as we kept an open eye for a way to sneak past them.

I could make out the ponies from here. All the Samdiny had their usual armaments, but something stood out. They all wore headsets. Not very important, but if they had headsets that means they could know Shadow left the Samdiny. I hoped for the best as we got closer to the checkpoint.

A mare stood on top of a wall made of scrap metal and sandbags. The wall stood about three times my height and seemed to extend forever. The tan mare shouted down at us, “State your business here!”

“Twisted Shadow, Samdiny officer, ID number: 51-840-341-7752! Requesting entry to Rad Hill!” Shadow yelled back.

The mare said something inaudibly into her headset. She nodded her head and the gate into Rad Hill opened. I let out a breath I didn't realize I was holding.

We walked in to find a not so luxurious town built out of thin sheets of metal. Ponies were stationed at guard towers and constantly kept an eye on us.

“That wasn't so bad,” I said in regards to the checkpoint.

“It's more like we got lucky,” Shadow said back to me. “The ponies at checkpoints don't like letting others pass, especially if you have company. We got lucky they didn't decide to shoot us.”

“Where's this lab?” I asked.

“There,” Shadow pointed to a cave at the bottom of the hill where the sheet metal town lay.

As we approached the dark cave my Pip-Buck started ticking slowly. There was radiation here. I was right about the name, unfortunately.

“Anyone have Rad-X and RadAway?” Shadow asked. Unfortunately we didn't. And I had a feeling every eye was on us.

“Let's make this quick. Shadow, do you know your way in there?”

“I can't say I do.”

“Search the safe house quickly then. We can't spend too much time in here.” With that we went deeper in the cave.

Cor and I turned on our Pip-Buck's light when things started getting too dark. The ticking was slowly speeding up.

“You think there would be lights in a safe house,” Cor said.

“They're trying to hide it. Ponies won’t come into this cave if there is radiation and no lights,” I figured.

We kept walking until we reached a service elevator that took us down into the earth. There was a haunting feeling that the lift would break while we were riding on it. The sporadic placement of lights didn’t calm my uneasiness. I noticed my Pip-Buck stopped clicking as we continued to go down.

The elevator stopped and we couldn't see anything. With our Pip-Buck's light on again, we started walking into the darkness. In the darkness we found a door about twenty feet from the elevator.

We were greeted by an almost blinding white room. It looked so sanitary as opposed to the filthy Wasteland above. Ponies quickly shuffled between tables and machinery, paying no attention to us. I assumed they were Samdiny.

“Stay close to me and don't do anything obvious,” Shadow said with a stern voice. I'm guessing we're in a serious situation now.

We hugged the wall of the large room and followed Shadow. I looked around the room as we walked. I couldn't focus on one thing though; ponies and machinery were moving around quicker than I could keep up. What were the machines and ponies doing? The robotic arms twisted and pulled at small silver boxes. The ponies ran with the boxes from one table to another and left the machines to do their jobs. Other ponies were huddled around a table with another machine sticking out from the table. Different machines took small and shiny metal plates and assembled… something with them.

Before I could finish seeing what everypony was doing, Shadow opened a door for us. We were in a much smaller room now that only held a desk and one terminal. Shadow locked the door and powered on the terminal. “Nothing,” she sighed, “just the name Red Rum again, and something about Project Hard Light.”

Project Hard Light, I read about it briefly when we were at the school. I went behind the desk to look at the terminal. “Project Hard Light” read one entry.

Project Hard Light is to begin as soon as safe house #36 is ready for use. All medics, engineers, and participants are to report to safe house #36 when the notice is given.

I could assume the bedlam outside was Hard Light related, but what was it? Before I could ask Shadow if she knew anything, somepony unlocked the door. In the doorway stood a tall and muscular earth pony with a cobalt coat and a jet black mane. “What's happening in here?” he asked.

“Oh, um… Chief Navy Grave,” Shadow's trepid voice said. “We… uh… We-”

“We came to be a part of Project Hard Light,” Cor covered for her.

“Don't bullshit me,” Chief Navy Grave said.

“We're not, sir. We have come to be a part of Project Hard Light,” I said.

“You better tell me what's happening now, Shadow,” he commanded.

“We were… uh, just sent to make sure everything was in order with Project Hard Light,” she said. Why? Why was she such an awful liar?

He stared daggers at her. She was just barely shaking under his stare. “Who're your friends?” he asked her.

“J-Just some recruits,” she said. Why was she so terrified?

A strange smile grew on his face. “Has anyone ever told you how bad of a liar you are?” He chuckled. It was the most honest statement I heard a Samdiny say. “I'm losing interest in this subject. Get out of here before I kill you myself.”

Shadow was ready to bolt, but she remembered why we were here. She asked Chief Navy Grave a question. “Before I forget, can you tell me something about Red Rum?”

“What is there to tell?”

“Where is he? Who is he?”

“‘Where is he?’ That's a question I doubt anypony could answer. As for who he is, he’s silent about those details too. Rumor has it he has augmentations to strengthen his body, but he has to live in constant pain. So he got another augmentation to have him on a constant supply of opiates. Another rumor is he plans on using us to destroy then rebuild.” That caught my attention. “But my favorite one is where he is Discord, The God of Chaos’ own child. Or the one whe—”

“Wait. Destroy and rebuild what?” I asked, getting back to the more catching rumor.

“Everything, all of Equestria, gone in the blink of an eye. Then he rebuilds it, better.” All of Equestria gone. I actually had to think if starting over would be bad, but the pony leading this revolution couldn't be corrupt. No, starting over would be useless then.

“Is there anywhere we could go to find him?”

“Safe house #7, there’s supposed to be records of everything we've ever done.”

Now that we had our information we could leave. We continued out into the magnificent white room we were in before. Ponies still ran around in chaos.

At the end of the room I noticed panoramic windows. We walked toward the windows and saw ponies lying on tables. A machine beside the tables filled syringes with a liquid from the small boxes I saw the other machines work with. The machine injected the ponies with the liquid from multiple syringes. What was it doing though? Each pony stood up and walked into a back room. I thought about going in to see what was happening, but I was already scared we were going to get caught, so we left.

We went through the radioactive cave as quickly as we could and were back at the radiation-free Rad Hill.

“So how far is the next safe house?” I asked Shadow.

“I don't even know. It’s somewhere by a metro station. We could find it if we try hard enough, but it might take a while.”

“Would anypony here know?”

“Maybe, but that would be suspicious, and we don't want to arouse suspicion.”

“Let's head to the town before we go,” Cor suggested.

The layout of the scrap metal town was confusing and the ponies in the town kept giving me weird looks when I got lost. Eventually I found a general store by the name All the Scraps.

The inside looked just like the outside, thin sheets of metal and steel beams made up everything in the town. Behind the counter was an earth pony mare with a green coat and a cotton candy mane and matching eyes. “I haven't seen you three before. I'm guessing you're new here.” We nodded our heads. “Welcome to my shop then. We buy your scraps and we sell other ponies' scraps. The name’s Jade. How can I help you?”

We got orange pouches of RadAway which did exactly as the name says it does, got Shadow leather armor similar to ours, and sold whatever weapons we didn't need and bought ammo for our guns. After exchanging caps, we left for wherever Shadow would take us.

* *           * * *        * *

        “It doesn’t feel like we’re going anywhere,” I complained after not even 10 minutes of walking.

        “It’s going to be a long walk. All these walks are long walks,” Cor said. “Why, the fuck, are all the safe houses so far away from each other?!”

“Which sounds more secure? Everything of importance right next to each other or everything of importance on opposite corners of the world” Shadow retorted.

“Which one's more convenient? How about that? The Samdiny have some of the worst logic I’ve ever heard. Are they all idiots? Because it sure as hell sounds like they are,” I said.

“They are, but that's not the reason why they take such precautions. If one secret got out everything could be compromised.”

“Such as…?”

“Knowing where all the safe houses are could lead to something unfortunate for them.” I felt a plan coming from this conversation, a plan in which we wouldn't get anything done, just like this one.

“Mind telling us where they all are then?” Cor asked Shadow.

“I can't, and I'm not telling you the story of why I can't.” Cor wasn’t fond of that answer. I put a hoof on his shoulder and a simple nod that said “trust me.” That must have been good enough for him.

“How far from the metro?” Cor asked.

“I don't know. There should be a safe house nearby where we could download a map of the safe houses, but it's probably going to be a sneaky bit of business.” Perfect for me, I was a master of stealth… or at least decent enough.

“How far from that safe house?” I was starting to think that was the only question that arose when we went to these safe houses. Nothing about what was in there, only when we would get there. At this point it was what we were having the most trouble handling.

“We'll find out when we get there.” That wasn't very assuring.

* *           * * *        * *

The urban Neigh City was more than a few miles behind us at this point. We were on the countryside now. My Pip-Buck named this dead terrain Peneia Plains. It was still technically Neigh City, but to everypony else it wasn't even close to the city.

“There,” Shadow pointed to a small rundown shack my Pip-Buck labeled as Mountain Dew's Shack. For a safe house I expected something more. And this was not nearby like Shadow said it was.

“That’s it?” Cor asked in disbelief.

“Oh, it gets better,” she said as we approached the rotten wood door.

It opened to a typical shack you would find in the wasteland. Deteriorating spartan furnishings, knocked over and broken bottles of alcohol (and a filled bottle of vodka and moonshine that I took for keeps), broken picture frames, and of course, a holotape left by somepony’s bones. I plugged it into my Pip-Buck and let it do the work.

“I don't know what's happening. I don't even know if I want to. First I saw the brightest light I ever hoped to see along with a great rumble and a resounding bang, now it's all quiet. I took a look outside and there was a huge green fireball consuming the city. Half of my family was in that city…

He sighed sadly, “If anyone ever hears this, promise me you'll do better. I had a chance to stop this damn war… If I tried harder I could have. Please, do better than me, try harder than me.”

The recording ended. I assumed the pony remains and the holotape were Mountain Dew's. I felt a bit sad for him; he had to carry the burden of failing all of ponykind. I couldn't help but shed a tear.

“Suthain,” Cor called me, “are you all right?”

“Yeah,” I said as I looked back at the two behind me. “So how does this pass for a safe house exactly?”

“This isn't the safe house,” Shadow informed me. I was confused but at the same time glad that this wasn't all there was. Shadow walked to the wall away from the door and gave it a tap in three different locations. The wall slid down and a staircase was revealed to us. “That's the safe house,” she pointed her hoof down the stairs. “Like I said before, we need to sneak around here. Anypony spots us and we’re dead.”

“Why do we have to sneak around?” I asked her. I don’t understand why the Samdiny wouldn’t recognize somepony they still thought was their own.

“They aren’t fond of visitors, Samdiny or not. There’s plenty of high value information in there, and they can’t risk any of it being leaked. So it’s best if only one of us goes in. None of us have the slightest clue of what's down there. We have the same odds of finding the information we need, it's a matter of who's the sneakiest. I should say now I'm not stealthy at all.” At least she was honest.

I thought about it for a moment. I was sneaky, but was this my job? “It's between the two of us, Brother,” I said to Cor. “Take your pick.”

He took a moment to think about this. Finally he looked at me, “I would do it myself, but I know you can do it better.” The comment brought a proud smile to my face. “Take this,” he gave me his combat knife, “for when you need to keep things quiet.” I nodded and proceeded through the doors at the bottom of the stairs.

This looked much smaller than the previous safe houses. A row of terminals stared at me as I stood there wondering where I was going. I tried my luck with the terminal closest to me.

There were journal entries, Samdiny notices, and a map of this safe house. It would appear I'm luckier than I thought.

The journal entries on this terminal weren't important, just somepony complaining about each of their employers. The Samdiny notices were the same ones I read on the past terminals.

The map was the big prize. According to it, this place was huge! It was at least the size of two hoofball fields and it looked like there was a staircase going down. If this was a haven for information, how much was there? Enough to fill this entire safe house? I needed all the information I could get, and conveniently enough, this map labeled what each room had in it. I downloaded the labeled map onto my Pip-Buck and got up.

I walked toward the room labeled “Crossroads”. I was surprised by the lack of sneaking involved in here. As if some cruel deity heard what I said, I walked into a room divided into two floors. The top floor was nothing but catwalks leading to other doors while the bottom floor was a mess of boxes and supplies piled on top of each other about two ponies high. Armed ponies walked around on the catwalks and between the paths left open by the fairly large crates. This was a change from the last room, and was going to be quite a treat.

At least I could use the crates for hiding. Maybe this was going to be easier than I first thought. My E.F.S. couldn't pick out the individual number of ponies here, but I was able to make out at least six on the catwalks and there were probably the same number on the ground.

My map told me I had to go to the end of the room. Seemed like this might be a problem with all the ponies here, but I had faith in my abilities.

I crawled by the crates right next to me and peeked around the corner. A pony walking slowly was approaching me. I turned immediately and went around to the other side of the box. I waited for the pony to get to the box so we were on opposite sides of it. I carefully moved around the crate, keeping it in between us and making sure he couldn’t see me. Once he passed, I walked down the path he came from with no trouble. Though my E.F.S was cluttered with red bars, I was still able to pick out some of the ponies walking close to me.

I reached the end of the room and found a simple door by the stairs to the catwalk. Of course, it was locked. My E.F.S was telling me there were two ponies coming from two different directions. I needed a plan fast. I didn’t have to time to pick the lock though. I dashed behind one of the large piles and waited for the pony coming this way. She was right next to me; I quickly put one hoof on her mouth and pulled her closer to me with my other hoof. With my magic, I thrust the knife Cor gave me into the bottom of her neck, right above her chest. Mom, being a doctor and all, told me where the perfect spots to stab a pony are. It hits major arteries and veins and doesn't leave nearly as big of a mess. The mare in my hooves was gone in seconds.

I looked around, no pony saw me, good. I put the body under the boxes, hopefully I would be gone by the time they notice her. I still had to sneak past the other pony that was coming my way earlier. I slipped behind unnoticed and picked my way through the door. It took much longer than I was hoping for, but the lock finally gave.

I walked into an office with a glowing green terminal on a desk and not much else of notice. I shut the door behind me and quickly went to the terminal only to find it was locked. I wasn't the best at hacking these things, but I might be able to figure something out. Using my magic, I tapped some keys and brought up a new screen. From here I could guess the password until I had to eventually back out from too many failed attempts. I kept guessing passwords, backing out, going back to this screen, and trying again until I finally guessed right.

How did Dad do this so easily? With no trouble at all, he would be logged into the terminal in less than half a minute.

There was plenty of info here. Different projects the Samdiny tried, safe house locations, and entries from a pony named Razor Slash. I heard some talking outside the room and my E.F.S was showing more bars than before. I didn't pay attention to what they said, but I assumed it was about the dead body there. If they knew I was here, then I wouldn't have the time to read through everything here. I downloaded everything on the terminal to my Pip-Buck and got ready to leave.

I waited for the voices to disappear and my E.F.S to look clearer, then I left. The room was empty, no pony was here anymore. The body I left was also gone. I had to disappear quickly now that they knew I was here.

Now that no pony was in the room anymore, I could check the catwalk. There were plenty of doors up here. I opened the closest one and found several terminals that were already logged in. They held the same entries from the last terminal, save for Razor Slash's entries.

I left the room and went into the next room. A munitions closet; assault rifles, submachine guns, handguns, shotguns, sniper rifles, missile launchers, grenades, mines, ammo, everything ever needed and in perfect condition. I took an assault rifle and used its parts to repair Dad’s precious weapon. No magnums, unfortunately, but plenty of ammo for one. I took whatever I thought necessary for the three of us then left.

Into the next room I went. I found even more weapons and ammo. Once properly looted, I got ready to leave. Something caught my eye as I turned to leave, a small glimmer behind a row of rifles. I moved the weapons and looked into the face of a camera. I was being watched. I still had the rest of this safe house to check though. Part of me was saying don’t risk it, play it safe. The other part was intriguing me with the thought of what else was in here.

I decided to finish my job here. I was probably going to end up regretting that.

I left and looked in the corners of the room for any cameras. There was one staring back at me.

I had to do this quickly. I gave each room a quick peek.  All were the same, weapons, or terminals. Some filled with useless junk, others without. Some locked, others not. One room led me to a strange place though. I looked at armored ponies in pods. At the end of the long room was a terminal. Of course I had to go to it. There was a single entry on it, “Project Hard Light”.

We ran some early tests and appeared to have fucked up royally. Every prototype is so damn mad at the world. Even after the memory erasing procedure, all they want to do is murder everything in sight. All of these early test subjects have been transported to stasis while we figure out what to do. Red Rum said he wanted them to be the perfect warriors. To him that means he wants them to kill everything in sight. We think it will just lead to everypony’s demise. So we’re going against the boss and putting them in stasis.

They're pretty much ready for deployment; their armor is built to take just about anything, but we don't want to have something terrible happen. They're almost-perfect soldiers. Hopefully next batch will be better.

Why we dedicated most of this safe house to making a project that might be a failure, I don't know. But now that we have it we might as well make use of it.

So this is what Project Hard Light is. I touched the glass on one pod. Suddenly the pony's eyes opened and she fiercely hit the glass separating us. A small crack formed from the impact and I fell back. All the ponies woke up and the pods slowly began to open.

This was going to be bad.

They jumped out easily. Each pony wore chrome armor covering their chest, back, and legs almost fully. In the small gaps in the armor I could see a black bodysuit. It reminded me of the bulky Steel Rangers' power armor, but it still looked different. With how easily the ponies moved, I assumed the armor was lighter than the Steel Rangers'.

Instead of instantly attacking me, each moved in synch to put on a chrome helmet with a gold visor by their pod. I couldn't tell mare from buck anymore. Then they all turned to me. I slowly backed away to the door. I didn't know what to do. I didn't want to shoot, that would create quite the ruckus and probably wouldn't even hurt them, but they would kill me.

I gave it a try anyway. I took out Mom's .44 and shot at the closest one to me. The pony in the suit simply gave a feminine laugh at my feeble attempt. Before they had a chance to attack, I ran out of there.

I guess everypony took a lunch break because the room was filled again, and every gun was pointed at me.

Great, just fantastic.

I didn't stop for a moment. I jumped down from the catwalk and ran back into the quiet room with no ponies while bullets rang off the walls beside me. The room with terminals was now filled with more ponies. I rammed the one in front of me with all my force. He fell to the ground and I continued to run frantically out of the building.

I reached Cor and Shadow and yelled, “Run!” They followed behind me.

“What are we running from?” Cor asked.

“Huge ass armored ponies!” I yelled my answer as I continued to run. “I'll explain it later!”

* *           * * *        * *

We kept running for about a mile before we stopped. We all fought to catch our breath. “Why did we run again?” Cor asked again.

“In the safe house there were stasis pods… ponies in armor wouldn't even flinch… from a shot at point blank.” I said in between breaths. I calmed down, and then I said, “Ran my ass out of there before they ate me or something. I didn’t get what we were looking for, but I got something.” I waved my Pip-Buck in front of them. “I got plenty of information on anything we might need, except for Red Rum.”

“So do we know where the next safe house is now?” Shadow asked.

I checked the safe house locations I downloaded from the terminal. Safe house #7 was farther away than I wanted it to be, but we had to make the journey. “I got something for the two of you,” I said as I took out the weapons and ammo I found in the safe house and gave them to the two and gave Cor back his knife.

After a little repairing and reorganizing, we were ready to leave. “Follow me,” I commanded as I started walking down the barren road.

* *           * * *        * *

        “Are we there yet?” Shadow asked impatiently.

        I looked at my map. “Not even close,” I chuckled. It was starting to get dark, but I didn’t care. We needed to get there as quickly as possible, and we weren’t taking any breaks. It looks like we weren’t going to sleep tonight.

        “You think by the end of this we’ll have walked across all of Equestria? Because we might as well be walking across Equestria!” Cor yelled in frustration.

“What do you expect from idiots that put safe houses on the four corners of the world,” Shadow said. The Samdiny really were idiots.

“I’m hungry,” Cor complained even more. “When can we stop to eat?”

“For the older brother, you sure do complain a lot more than your younger brother,” Shadow noticed.

I've wanted to complain ever since Mom and Dad died, but I haven't for one reason. They would want me to be strong.

“We don't have food though. Unless you want to go hunting for us,” I suggested.

“Ugh, fine,” Cor sighed. He wasn't a fan of certain lines of work, hunting was one of them. I found it strange because he had the skills to be a hunter, but he still hated it. Of course, when hungry, he’d get food. Cor ran ahead of us looking for game.

“So did you find sneaking to be fun?” Shadow asked me in an attempt to end the awkward silence between us.

“Not as fun as I expected.”  A question came to my mind that I hadn't asked before, but Shadow hasn't been helpful when it comes to questions about the Samdiny. I asked anyway. “Remember that terminal that had something about Project Hard Light? Do you know what it is?”

“Not really. I know some ponies were excited for it. Can't help you much more than that though.” I wasn't content with the answer, but that seemed like the quality of most of her answers. “Why do you ask?”

“In the safe house, I think I saw Project Hard Light. That's what made me run out of there in such a hurry.”

“What was it?”

“They wore silver armor, bullets didn't do anything more than humor them, and they looked like giants compared to me,” I recounted the experience.

“Sounds crazy enough to be Samdiny,” Shadow remarked. I guess that's how it worked. If it was that crazy, then it might just be connected to the Samdiny, but what about something as crazy as trying to start anew?

“I never thought something as simple as revenge would be so complex. We can't even find this damned buck, but we're finding out every little evil thing he's planning. This is hard,” I sighed. “I'll just have to endure.” When Cor was training me to fight, he would always push me harder. If I was too tired to go on he’d make me do more. Each time I asked to stop, he would tell me to endure.

“Things will get better,” she told me. It brought my hopes up until she said, “Hopefully…”

I heard a gun go off where Cor ran to. I guess he found food. More loud bangs pierced the air. There’s no way he would waste this many bullets on one animal. Something had to be up. We ran to where we continuously heard gunshots.

We found Cor shooting at some pony running from him. On the floor was a common Wasteland occurrence, a raider. The pony had her mane up in a mohawk and wore armor with spikes protruding from each piece. The pony running from Cor must have been a raider as well. “Pieces of shit stole my food then ran off,” a disgruntled Cor said. “At least I got some meat for us.” He held up a dead radhog. “It’s a small kill, but it will suffice.”

“We should probably get moving. Hopefully there won’t be any more raider trouble,” I said.

* *           * * *        * *

It was night already, but I already decided we weren’t going to sleep. We had a lot of distance to cover and we needed to know as much as we could about Red Rum fast.

We stopped in an abandoned farm for a break and started eating the radhog that Cor killed for us. I never did this much walking before, I wasn’t sure if my own body could take much more without rest. “Endure,” I kept saying mentally to keep my tired body from going to sleep.

Something made sure I wasn't going to sleep. I heard hoofsteps outside the barn. I carefully peeked out the barn door. There were three Samdiny leading two slaves down the road. I waited for them to pass by us. “Let’s get moving.”

“Can’t we sleep?” They complained.

“No. We still have a lot of ground to cover, and there’s some Samdiny outside. So let’s go take them out.” Both of them looked unhappy with the plan, but they went with it.

We walked out now that the mercenaries had past. It was dark enough for the three of us to hide under night’s cover. We quietly caught up to the mercenaries. One mercenary was in front leading the two slaves while the other two mercenaries were covering their flanks. Each of us had to take one out. There was hardly any room for error; one slip up and those slaves could get hurt or killed.

I motioned Cor to take the mare at the front, Shadow and I would take the two at the back. I didn’t know if Shadow was a good shot or not, but if she wasn’t I needed to make sure I could adjust to her mistake. I was going to be responsible for her.

We were all ready. Shadow and I put several shots into the ponies in the back. Cor quickly shot the pony at the front. I thought they were all dead, and then the pony at front turned her gun at us and started shooting. We couldn't take cover anywhere so we kept moving. Thankfully, she was shooting at us instead of the two slaves. I quickly got off a shot. I was lucky enough to hit her, finally ending her.

We thought it was over, and then raiders came.

Why is it never easy?

Raiders aren't very smart. Instead of using tactics, they charge and get themselves killed. This was no exception. They charged us and led themselves to their deaths. One managed to get a good shot in, but the bullet was stopped by my armor. We took them all down quickly.

All the enemies were neutralized. We walked toward the slaves who were low on the ground and trying to keep from getting shot. We took off their shackles and after a few thanks, they went on their way. Now that we finished our business, we continued down the road.

* *           * * *        * *

It was almost sunrise, or what would count for sunrise when clouds blocked the sun, and we finally reached the safe house. We weren’t in the dead countryside anymore, now we were in the equally dead, large, horseshoe-shaped city known as Neigh City. We approached a metro station and went down the stairs and into the dark station.

We turned on the lights on our Pip-Bucks to find the inside was destroyed. The walls, ceiling, and floors were crumbled. Rubble and detritus just filled the inside.

As we continued to walk in the dark lobby, we heard growling. It might have been a ghoul. Down here, it was nothing more than a mindless zombie who does nothing than attack anything on sight. However some ghouls can be intelligent and as smart as ponies. They don't usually growl like animals though. I could only assume it was a feral beast instead of a civilian.

“Keep an eye out,” I said as we carefully walked through the destroyed metro.

“You'd think the Samdiny would clear this place out before making it a safe house. How safe could it be when ghouls are around?” Cor noted. I was starting to question whether the Samdiny were geniuses who made sure no pony could find them, or idiots who didn't know how to do anything properly. Either way, we had to find the safe house.

Our Pip-Bucks started clicking and an ominous green light came from the end of the lobby. I enveloped Dad's assault rifle in a lilac glow and aimed at the green glow.

A green glowing pony came into our view. Its veins could be seen distinctly contrasting against the glow. It was missing parts of its coat and mane, and its body was deteriorating to the point where no flesh could be seen in some parts, just bone.

Behind the glowing pony came several regular non-glowing ghouls. I would have preferred one ghoul to fight, but the Wasteland wasn't very kind. The growling became louder, I saw the green aura from even more glowing ghouls, and I was a bit more frightened.

Luckily, I had a few grenades on me from the last safe house. I threw one into the crowd and ducked for cover behind a ticket kiosk. The ghouls let out screams as the grenade went off. The glowing ones that survived let out another scream and a wave of green radiation that made my Pip-Buck click even more. The hurting ghouls were re-energized from the radiation and started running toward us.

I took out two more grenades and blindly threw both into the mass of zombies. The two exploded and more screams and radiation waves followed. The grenade killed some, but it wasn't doing much, unfortunately. Before they had a chance to reorganize themselves, I shot wildly in the crowd, Cor and Shadow did the same. I took the empty clip out of my weapon and loaded in a fresh one.

Shooting wildly wasn't working, so I decided to pick targets. The glowing ones seemed to heal the entire crowd with their radiation, so I chose them for a target. I took out two of the glowing ghouls in the front easily, but I couldn't shoot the rest. The glowing ones were scattered in the large crowd of ghouls; I couldn't target them. I had to take the ghouls out before the glowing ones could heal them.

I shot at each one until they dropped. They were getting closer and there were still so many of them. I kept shooting and dropping more and slowing them down. One jumped on me and brought me to the ground. It slashed at my face with its decomposed hooves. I kept it at bay with my own hooves and yelled for help while more ghouls surrounded me.

I turned to see the flash from their weapons behind a crowd of ghouls. I desperately looked for the gun that has been knocked out of my magic's grip. I couldn't see anything through the swarm of ghouls and the occasional green wave of radiation.

Without my gun I had to do some hoof-to-hoof combat, starting with a head-butt to the creature's mouth. I think I only made it angrier, but I kept my composure as its attacks became even more violent. I let go of its decayed hoof and, as fast and strong as I could, punched the feral ghoul; it still managed to get a nice cut on my cheek. I stunned it and used the opportunity to push it off me.

I got to my hooves and shoved my way through all the ghouls around me to find my gun. I searched the floor around me wildly. The ghouls I knocked down were starting to get back up.

There it was! How did it get all the way over there? It didn't matter. I grabbed it with my telekinesis and quickly shot the ghouls. Once reloaded, I started shooting the mass of zombies by Cor and Shadow. It wasn't long before all of them were finally dead.

Shadow stood there holding her shotgun, trembling at the same time. Cor was on the ground with a dead ghoul on top of him which he pushed off after he calmed a bit. All of us were breathing heavy and our hearts were pounding. I let out a sigh of relief. “Fuck ghouls, amirite?” They agreed with me.

“I’m surprised to be alive,” Shadow said. ”I think I'm done with scary for the next few months. All who agree say ‘aye’.”

“Aye,” Cor and I said together.

I don't think I wanted to see another ghoul after that. For a moment, I was starting to think we weren't going to make it. Ghouls can usually be taken down quickly, but when you get swarmed…

I was surprised; ghouls weren't usually in such large groups. Something had to be up down here, and I'm thinking it was Samdiny. Either that or we're the unluckiest trio in the Wasteland.

“So the safe house's first line of defense was a horde of ghouls. How nice,” Cor commented as he picked himself off the ground. “This is the safe house right?”

I nodded my head. “Yeah, this place is made of a red line, blue line, and green line. We just follow the green line and we'll get there soon enough.” Soon enough was supposed to mean “not a walk that would take us all fucking day”.

We walked down the hallway the ghouls came from and into a mezzanine. This large area was just as destroyed as the lobby. A large map preserved behind clear plastic showed us where to go. We took the path indicated by the map and prayed we would reach the safe house before we were old and senile. Maybe that was hoping for too much.

We walked through the destroyed line, and after a surprisingly short walk, we found a surprisingly crude safe house. Instead of an architectural beauty cleverly hidden in the walls, it was in the middle of the metro line and put together with cheap chain-link fences that only covered half the metro line. We walked around and into another mezzanine.

There still wasn’t a Samdiny look to it. There were trash cans on fire and the rubble from the megaspells' destruction wasn't even cleared. I couldn't see any ponies, but my E.F.S. showed plenty of red bars. An ambush maybe? We continued forward and checked a terminal placed on a table. It was nothing special except confirmation that this was a Samdiny safe house.

We walked up nonfunctional escalators and into a small room that held nothing save for a bed and terminal. Upon hacking into it, I found a file called “History”. As guessed, it was the Samdiny’s history from inception to now. We all huddled around the small screen and went to the last entry, “Red Rum - Project Hard Light, Project Clear Skies, Project Destroy Rebuild Until The Goddesses Show”. The last project had me on edge. We were ready to finally learn who he was. We leaned closer as the file started loading.

Empty! The damn thing was empty! There really was nothing on him. Nothing was ever going to be easy. I should have at least figured that.

Cor sighed heavily. “Can’t say I wasn’t expecting that. Well this sucks.” We came so close. We were right there! The Wasteland just wouldn’t let us win this time. “What happens now?”

It was a good question, and I didn’t have an answer for it. “We could ask around,” I suggested. “I don’t know if that’s going to be helpful at all, but it’s worth a shot.”

“No,” Cor said. “I think it's time we call it quits. If the Samdiny don’t even know who they work for, then how is anypony else going to know?” It never really crossed my mind. I just always thought that somepony out there had to know something; it was just a matter of finding that pony.

“Who said the Samdiny don’t know who he is?” Shadow said, catching our attention. “Just because there aren’t any records doesn’t mean nopony knows him. There are ponies who know him, I’m sure of it. We just need to find them.” I couldn't have said it any better.

“So we just keep raiding safe houses until we find our info?” Cor asked. Shadow and I both nodded. “Just wanted to remind you two, this is one of the dumbest ideas ever.”

“It's worth a shot at least,” I said. “I know it's not the greatest plan, but we have to keep going.”

“Suthain,” Cor said as he grabbed my shoulders, “this is dangerous. I know you want to keep going, especially for Mom and Dad's honor, but they wouldn't want us getting ourselves killed over something like this.”

“You know they would want us to do good though,” I said with our eyes locked. “Even if we get hurt more than they want us to, they'd be proud of us if we keep doing right. Just like them. Trust me, Cor. I know we can do this. We just have to try hard enough.”

He nodded reluctantly. He sighed, “Fine. Let's just get out of here before somepony comes.”

I downloaded everything on the terminal onto my Pip-Buck. I didn't know if I would ever use any of it, but any Samdiny information was good to have. Then we left the small room.

I took one step out the door and felt something hit me hard against the back of my head. I fell to the ground with a small grunt. I turned to see a double-barrel shotgun to my head. Cor and Shadow were pushed to the ground beside me and both had guns pointed at them. There were red bars on my E.F.S. that I didn’t notice before.

I got a quick look around me. Seven Samdiny ponies, four were lower ranks, three were higher ranks, each had an assault rifle on them, the three officers had drum fed shotguns similar to Shadow’s on them, two lower ranks had baseball bats, two had fire axes.

A position similar to this got Dad killed. I had to take them all out at the same time, but how?

“So, you think you can just walk in here and nothing will happen?” the buck with the shotgun pointed at my head said. “You were wrong.”

“Are you going to kill us?” I asked.

“No, the boss ordered to keep you two alive,” he said as he looked at Cor and I, but he didn’t move his weapon. “As for her, we weren’t given any rules.”

“So you’re going to kill her. She’s Samdiny, you know,” I informed him.

“Is that so?” He walked to her. It was dark enough so her leather armor looked the same as the Samdiny recruits’ armor. “Why would a fellow Samdiny bring the enemy into our safe house? Answer that for me.”

Welp. I had nothing. Things were going to get loud soon. I just needed to make a plan and execute it flawlessly.

“Uh… Well, you know how easily rookies get deceived,” I said to him. “Speaking of rookies…” I grabbed one of the fire axes with my magic and struck the buck with the double barrel across his face. He fell to the ground and I took his shotgun and put two shots into the closest pony with the help of S.A.T.S.

Cor and Shadow figured out what I was doing. Cor quickly got up and brought a lower ranking Samdiny to the ground. He put himself under the pony as a shield. From there he took the pony's gun and shot one of the higher ranking Samdiny. Meanwhile Shadow took out her shotgun and placed several shots into the pony standing in front of her. Her chest was gone by the time Shadow stopped firing.

I took Dad's assault rifle and placed a barrage of shots into the next pony. Shadow stood and brought the last pony down by bludgeoning her with her shotgun. She didn't stop until the Samdiny's head was completely gone. Then she spat over the body and acted like nothing happened. Cor shot the pony he was shielding himself under and pushed his dead body off.

That was close. “Twisted much?” I said to Shadow. She simply shrugged. I was turning to leave, and then I was tackled to the ground. The pony who I hit with the fire axe was on top of me and throwing his hooves wildly at my face. His face had a large gash across it and it dropped blood on me.

I kept my face covered and tried to avoid his punches. He wasn't intent on stopping though. I grabbed his foreleg with my hoof as it came down. I reached around his shoulder and grabbed my own foreleg just above my hoof. I had his entire foreleg trapped. I twisted it.

He was screaming in pain. “Tap and you'll be spared,” I said to him as he struggled. I didn't want to kill him. I noticed Shadow had her weapon pointed at him. Cor made her put it down.

“Just… do it,” he said to me. “Just… end the pain.”

“Tap,” I told him. He was struggling to get out of my grip. “I don't want to do this.”

“Why… would you… spare me?” he groaned in pain. “Who am I? A pony trying to… ngh, to lead you to your… death?”

“Most ponies would choose life without a question,” I told him. “Please, just tap.” I cranked his foreleg a little more. I heard his hoof tap on the ground next to us. I let go of his foreleg. He immediately rolled off me and held his shoulder.

“Why do you want to keep me alive?” He asked. “What am I worth to you?”

I picked myself up and said, “I believe all ponies have some goodness in them. And you're not Samdiny anymore,” he looked at me slightly confused. “You go back to the Samdiny or anything morally evil, I will end you. Understand?” He didn't answer. I jumped in his face and he fell back to the ground. “Understand?!” I shouted through gritted teeth. He rapidly nodded his head. “Good.” I backed up and got ready to leave.

“So you just say that, and then you leave?” he asked as we were walking away. “How do you even know I'll follow through?”

“I'm good like that,” I said as I turned to him. “Besides, why would you ask if you weren't going to follow through on our deal? If you planned to dishonor the deal, you would have been gone without hesitation.” I turned to leave again.

“Wait. Where are you even going?” This buck asked too many questions.

“To find Red Rum.” He had a quizzical look on his face. “Samdiny boss. If you could help us…”

“Not really. I don't even know who he is. He asked us to capture you two alive,” he said as he looked between Cor and I. “Sorry I can't help.”

I nodded my head and said to him, “Find us if you find out anything.” He nodded and we parted ways.

We left the safe house and walked down the rest of the green line. As we were walking, my Pip-Buck picked up a radio signal. I tuned to it to hear a distraught mare's voice.

“Hello? If anypony is hearing this… I just don't know what's happening anymore. Things just got out of control… We need help… We know there's life outside of the stable… Please, help us… This message repeats.”

We had to help whoever was in this stable. We all knew it. According to my map, the stable was close, next exit led to it.

We quickly moved down the rest of the line and arrived at the exit. We dashed up the stairs outside, around the side of a building, into an alley, and into a rock tunnel. At the end was a large steel gear with a large number 85 printed on the center. Next to it was a control booth and not much else.

I walked to the control booth and tapped a few keys on it hoping it would do something. Nothing happened. “How exactly do we get in?” I asked.

“If only she left instructions. You can't do anything with that terminal?” Shadow asked as I continued to tap keys.

“Nothing,” I sighed as I turned from it in defeat. There had to be some way in. I looked at the two. Something behind them caught my eye. The tunnel we were in was made of rock, but that spot just behind the two of them looked… different.

I walked to it and tapped it with my hoof. A metallic clang rang out. I hit the rock next to it to find the usual sound of rock.

“Is there any way to tear through this metal?” I asked while investigating the faux rock. What could get through this? If I recalled correctly, these stables were designed to take direct hits from a megaspell. We didn't have anything that came close to that strong.

A crevice formed where the metal met the rock. I ran my hoof along it and felt a draft coming from the inside. If I could feel air coming from within, then this wouldn’t protect well against a megaspell. Assuming the ponies inside are still alive then this wasn't here when the stable was initially built. Maybe we could destroy it.

I gave it a nice kick, but it hardly moved. “Help me knock down this wall,” I said to my brother.

“Will it even come down?” Cor asked as he came up to the wall beside me.

“I don't know. We should try anyway though,” I said as we counted down and kicked it in together. Part of the wall dislodged, and we easily knocked it down from there. The wall fell with a satisfying clang. I was actually surprised it worked that easily.

With our Pip-Bucks' light on, we walked through a dark gray hallway and up a stairwell. I hit a button on a wall and a door opened in front of us.

We walked into a dark room and stopped dead in our tracks as soon as the room was lit up. There was dried blood on the wall and floor and a dark red “HELP US” and “FORSAKEN” written everywhere. Numerous dead bodies missing limbs, covered in blood, and brutally dismembered lay on the ground. The lights flickered irregularly.

“What the fuck?” I said as I took in all the eerie aspects of the room. I noticed a holotape next to one of the mutilated bodies. I plugged it into my Pip-Buck and let it play. I heard a buck's voice (I wasn't able to tell from the body) under the screams of many others.

“Goddesses damn it! The password isn't fucking working! The Overmare finally does something right, for a change, by giving us a way out of here. Then our escape doesn't even work! She gave herself up and told us how to get out of this hellhole, but the fucking password won't fuckingwork on her fucking terminal or the fucking main door!!!” There was a moment of silence that ended when he said, “Oh shit, oh FUCK NOOO-”

I heard a small struggle just before the tape cut out. How did we walk in so easily when they couldn't walk out at all? It looked like these ponies didn't stand a chance against whatever it was that did this.

As scary as the room my Pip-Buck named “Overmare's Office” was, we decided to carefully continue on through an open hallway. The two areas seemed to share flickering lights, mutilated dead bodies, and blood everywhere. The same words “HELP US” and other gibberish was written in blood all over the walls.

Every noise we made struck me with fear. I heard some noises in the walls. We all stopped in our tracks and had our guns ready. Nothing was on my E.F.S. though. We didn't know what to expect, but if it was whatever caused this, then it couldn't be good.

The door in front of us opened and a ghoul came out. No, it wasn't a ghoul. Its body was mostly whole, apart from missing its coat, mane, and some skin. It wasn't lacking as much muscle and it wasn’t emaciated like a feral ghoul, but its eyes had a low red glow to them, its face was covered in blood, its bottom jaw was detached, and its hooves had small blades on the end of them. Maybe this used to be a pegasus; it had wings, sort of. Its “wings” were long, sharp, and jagged bones protruding from armlike projections where wings would usually go. Something caught my eye, or a lack of something, there still wasn’t a red bar on my E.F.S.

“What the fuck?” I said aloud as we all stared awestruck at the monster.

It let out a fierce yell then began charging at us. It took less than a second for it to reach me and bring me to the ground. It started stabbing at me with its sharpened hooves and wings. It continued to let out fierce screeches.

“Get it off me!” I screamed as I struggled to keep it at bay. I kept the sharpened blades on its hooves from stabbing my face, but I couldn't keep its wings from stabbing my sides. The sharpened bones didn't penetrate my armor, but it still felt like my ribs were going to crack from the impact. “What the fuck are you two doing?! Shoot it!”

It took Cor and Shadow a second to react to my shouts. Shadow pulled out her assault rifle and put seven bullets into its head. The monster's head popped off and it fell limp. I pushed it off me and picked myself up.

My heart was racing. Suddenly another one rushed through the same door and started running toward us. Another few bullets from Shadow's gun and this one fell too. I picked up my fallen assault rifle and walked over to the creature Shadow just killed. The body lay on its side. I went to turn it over to get a better look at it. When my hoof was an inch away, it quickly got up and brought me onto the ground.

“Ah! What the fuck?!” I screamed. Cor and Shadow peppered the creature with bullets, and it finally went down for good. I pushed it off me and was finally able to look at it. It definitely wasn’t a ghoul, but it was certainly as scary as one.

“It wasn't on my E.F.S., and S.A.T.S. wasn't working on it,” Cor noted. What was so special about these monsters that our Pip-Buck's spells wouldn’t work on them?

“So we should probably get this done quickly,” Shadow said. I nodded and we all started going down the rest of the hallway.

My Pip-Buck led me to what looked like a server room. Servers and panels with lit up controls took the space in this room. It looked the same as the past rooms, except there was a steady red glow coming from the servers against the wall. “NO ESCAPE” was written on the walls in the same dark red as before.

We continued into an open room with two floors. My Pip-Buck labeled it as the “Atrium”. Blood stains covered the walls and floors, there were no lights in this room, and mutilated bodies were on the floor and hanging over the ledge of the second floor. We stepped in and the door loudly shut behind us, the light next to it changed from green to red, and soft yellow lights lit up the atrium. “Ugh, what now?” I complained.

I heard noises, then a momentary silence. I heard a few ghoulish screams a few seconds apart, then another silence. We cautiously went down a set of stairs to the bottom floor of the atrium. A noise behind us caught our attention. A pair of wings lifted the door and a creature slipped underneath the opening.

These things can open locked doors with their wings? A short burst of shots to its head with Dad's assault rifle and it went down.

We turned back around, then another door down a hallway opened and two more creatures emerged. We were about to open fire on the two, then another came from the same door the first one came through. I shot one in front of me and brought it to the ground. Cor and I took the other one in front of us to the ground and Shadow had already taken the other down.

That wasn't the end though. A door by our exit door opened and a creature came flying out of it. I turned quickly to shoot it. While I was shooting, another came from the hallway door. I killed my target and turned for the next one. Cor already had it covered.

I thought it was clear, and then I noticed one creeping up on us from the staircase. I brought that one to the ground and it was finally clear. The yellow lights disappeared and there was a small green glow coming from next to the door.

We walked into the stable's cafeteria. My Pip-Buck's arrow landed on a door behind the counter. A few green bars were on my E.F.S. Hide with the food, genius actually. I tried futilely to get the door opened. It must have been barricaded from the inside. I didn't know how to get in, so I knocked politely. I didn't receive an answer. I knocked again. Still no answer.

They were alive, at least my Pip-Buck said so, but it’s been acting strange since we got in here. Targets weren’t showing up, and now ponies that might be dead were showing up. Part of me thought they were taking a while to open the door, another part was telling me this entire stable worked in reverse. The logical part of me agreed with the former assertion.

I heard a noise. More of them? I didn't want to fight any more of those creatures though. There was a small shuffling sound behind the door. “Hello?” I heard the same mare from the recording whisper behind the door. I was immediately elated. “Is the rescue team finally here?”

Somepony was alive! This stable didn’t work in reverse then. So why didn’t these creatures appear on my E.F.S.? “Yeah, that's us,” I said.

“Oh, thank the Goddesses. We're getting out of here, everypony. Give us one second,” she said, “we need to take down the barricades.” We waited patiently. The door opened to a frowzy peach pegasus in a blue and yellow jumpsuit who was more than glad to see us.

Behind her was a storage room with enough preserved food to last centuries. Several pegasi looked to us with a newfound hope. A few of them were cut and bruised badly. One was missing his foreleg. At the stump they tied his jumpsuit to stop the bleeding. “Is it too much to ask you to get us medical supplies from the clinic?”

“Cor, keep them safe and give them these,” I said as I gave him all of our healing potions. It would be enough to keep them from keeling over before we came back. “Shadow, you're coming with me to the clinic. Can I get directions?” I asked the peach mare. She pointed us down the hall, up a set of stairs, and the clinic should be there

We cautiously walked through the dark, bloody hallway in the direction she sent us. We found the clinic easily. Bodies littered this area more so than the other areas. And even more were gathered only at the door. The door wasn't opening here either. I noticed green bars here too. “Hello?” I knocked. “Anypony in here?”

“We're not opening the door,” a buck said sternly. “We don't care if you die at the door, we just don't want to take the risk of them getting in here.”

“Don't worry, it's all OK. We've cleared them all out. It's safe now,” I didn't actually know if it was safe yet, but I needed some way to get the door opened. “We just need some medical supplies to help the wounded.”

“If it's clear, go to the Overmare's office and open the door from there. Get it done yourself, and you can have all the medicine you want.”

“Just please let us in. You need to understand that ponies will die without your help,” I begged.

He sighed, “I'm sorry, but I still can't let you in. I can't take the risk. If it really is safe, open it yourself.” It didn't seem like we had another choice. I just hoped we weren't going to get attacked again. We were though, I knew it, and the buck behind this door knew it.

We headed back to the cafeteria and told the peach mare and Cor what our situation was. “Well… would you be willing to do it for us? That's what it boils down to,” she told us. I nodded my head. I didn't even have to think about it. I wanted to help ponies, just like Mom and Dad. She gave us directions to the Overmare's office at the top of the stable.

The two of us headed back through the atrium to the Overmare's office, thankfully, without attack. We searched the entire room for any sort of key, but we couldn't find anything. I found a terminal in the first room we came through. It was quite simple to hack into actually. Surprisingly, the only two entries were about the Wasteland:

Entry 1:

Our tests suggest the outside is no longer dangerously irradiated. We shouldn't even have to wear radiation suits. My stable can’t know about this expedition. If they do, they'll want to get out there, and Goddesses only know what they'll do for that freedom.

Entry 2:

We've studied the outside for two days and we have more than enough to report on it.

Our tests were correct; the outside is no longer heavily irradiated except for small, easily avoidable pockets of heavy radiation. The water seems to be greatly contaminated and undrinkable. Old maps are useless now. Most of Neigh City is an abandoned ruin with nothing more than mutated animals, assumedly from high exposure to radiation.

Despite all, ponykind is still alive! A small settlement called “Bedrock” has formed just outside the stable. The inhabitants seemed to find us rather out of place, but soon welcomed us.

Bedrock is a fairly large outpost built in the middle of destroyed buildings and goes far down into the street. They use rubble as a disguise for their settlement. They gave us a quick rundown on what Neigh City (and the rest of Equestria) has become. Ponies took to calling it the “Wasteland”, seems fitting. I've left three of my ponies to stay in Bedrock and collect data until we return.

>Emergency Unlock: Y/N?

>Enter password:

>volar

It was the same password that unlocked the terminal.

>All doors are now unlocked.

We walked back to the clinic and tried opening the door. It opened, but it was blocked. I stared at the tables and machines blocking the doorway in disbelief. I sighed heavily and said, “They just won't let us win.”

“Yup,” the buck said from the inside. “You can slowly take it apart, or blow a hole in it with explosives from the chem lab.”

“Ugh, why? I just want to leave this goddess forsaken hellhole. They can't let me do that?” Taking the barricade apart sounded like it would take a while, so we went back to the cafeteria again and asked for directions, again.

It was a short walk down the hall to a lower level. From there we walked through a door into a lab with working lights. The entire room was lit up with white lights, illuminating gray walls, tables with cylinders filled with liquids and rocks, and other lab equipment. One side of the room had double doors with a sign that read “Experiments”.

Did I want to know what happened in there?

The opposite side of the room caught my attention though. There was a window to another room and above it read “Cryogenics”.

Looking inside through a window, I saw tables with the creatures strapped down and other tables with microscopes and other equipment I couldn't think of identifying. Shadow looked for a formula to make a bomb. “Make a few extra. Never know when we could use them,” I said while I walked into the other room.

The room was cold. A digital thermometer in the wall read “2.73°C”. Four of the creatures were on tables. One body was dissected, the other four were whole. Another door inside the cryogenics lab led to a long room of the creatures frozen in cryo-tubes. None of them except for a few looked the same.

I went back to the creatures on the tables and began to examine the closest one. I moved closer to it. The thing tried jumping at me! I fell back, unable to even shoot it. Its restraints kept it from actually attacking me. I got back up. I took Mom's revolver out and shot it in the head.

Hoping to avoid another one jumping at me, I checked the corpse that was dissected. I could just barely tell it was a buck; his face and body was barely discernible from a buck’s or a mare’s and his cutie mark wasn't even there anymore. I took a closer look at one of his wings. Most of the wing was decomposed. Several sharp bones protruded from the limbs; it hurt to touch the bone. Its forelegs had equally sharp bones protruding from them just above his Pip-Buck. I didn't know much about pegasus anatomy (or any anatomy for that matter), but I didn't think those bones were supposed to be there.

I walked over to a terminal that was on a counter and began to hack into it. After a few failed attempts, I got the password: cure. I began to read the entries.

Medical Journal:

Entry 1:

One of the bucks who went to Bedrock, High Wing, has been becoming increasingly ill. Three days ago we reported a mild fever and chills. His symptoms became worse the next day. Two days ago he had a high fever, extreme necrosis, swelling of lymph glands, and seizures. Nothing we give him seems to remedy this. We will continue to keep watch over him.

Entry 2:

High Wing passed away five days after his symptoms first appeared. More ponies have been getting sick with the same symptoms as him. The disease is definitely contagious, but we're starting to believe some ponies have a natural immunity. For the sake of the stable's health, everypony that has so much as come in contact with the infected has been quarantine. Most of these ponies have contracted the illness, but some of the ponies (including me) haven't gotten sick even though we are in continuous exposure. If our immunity theory is true, then there is hope for the uninfected part of the stable.

Entry 3:

Over half the stable has fallen ill. None of the infected ponies have survived. Some of the ponies have begun a strange reanimation process two-three days after death. We first noticed something was strange when the first pony to reanimate's heart and brain activity stopped then brain activity returned over 35 hours after being pronounced brain dead. So at least they’re not mindless. Not quite sure if that's good or bad.

All of these reanimated ponies have been put in the cryogenics lab for two reasons: we need to preserve them for experimentation and the reanimated ponies are incredibly aggressive and violent. The Overmare has ordered us to begin experimentation on them immediately. None of us really want to cut our now-hostile friends open though.

Entry 4:

We started experimentation on the reanimated ponies finally. Unfortunately, we're having a hard time working on them when they keep trying to kill us. It's not cold enough to completely freeze them, sedatives don't sedate them and the Overmare doesn't want us to kill them. So we're forced to work on attacking and screaming subjects. We've been able to tell that their reanimation has caused their bones to shift. These bones have sharpened and protruded from their wings and their hooves. They use these sharpened bones to attack us.

Because of their slashing nature of attack and the jagged cuts they made in one of our senior medical officers, we've taken to calling them “lacerators”. The lacerators like to play a little “game” with us. Those assholes play dead and when we go to work on them they attack us while we're working on them.

Fucking assholes.

Entry 5:

We've cut some of them open and brought others to the Overmare. I don't want to know what happens in that room where the Overmare conducts her experiments. Not many ponies in the stable know this, but the Overmare is actually a genius. She's helped us out more than once in the lab. Now she's started doing her own experimentation and we're not allowed to see. I just hope things don't get too intense for her.

Shadow came in the room. “Bombs are ready,” she said.

“We're almost out of here,” I breathed a sigh of relief as we started out of the chem lab. A small red light lit up next to the door and the bright white lights were replaced with dim yellow lights. “What now?” I complained.

I heard glass shatter behind us. I turned around and saw through the window to cryogenics a lacerator coming from the cryo-tube room. Was it missing its wings? It disappeared from my view. Several loud clangs came from behind the door. Without its wings, it couldn’t lift the door and get through.

I barely heard a hissing sound and… was that smoke? A hole appeared in the door that slowly grew bigger. I was in too much awe to shoot it. It crawled through the hole then yelled at us. It spit green goo at me. I moved out of the way. The green goo started burning away at the ground beside me. Corrosive acid? It yelled again then charged. Using S.A.T.S., I shot it twice with Mom's revolver and it fell to the ground.

Without a noise, it stood back up and started charging again! The spell hadn't recharged yet. It jumped into the air and thrust its hooves at me. I shot it twice in midair without S.A.T.S, but it kept its momentum. I moved out of the way as its hoof-blades stabbed into the floor next to me.

I went to my Pip-Buck and radioed Cor. “Cor, you there?”

“Yeah, I hear you,” he said.

 “We need your help,” I said, “There's an emergency lockdown keeping us in here. We need you to go back to the Overmare's office, go to her terminal, and unlock all the doors.”

“Going now. How’d this happen?” he asked.

“I don't know. Just get us out of here.” I didn't want to spend any more time in this stable, and these lockdowns weren't helping much.

“Yeah, just give me a second.” Shadow took it down with a quick burst of her assault rifle. Another lacerator came out of the hole in the door. We both shot it down.

“Hurry!” I yelled at my Pip-Buck. We stood with our weapons ready. The panel next to the door lit green.

“Got it!” Cor yelled back to us. “We almost out of here?”

“Almost. Get back to the cafeteria now. Keep those ponies safe,” I said as I went to open the door. Suddenly the door burst open and a lacerator on the other side jumped on me. I kept its hooves away, like before, but this one spit acid at my face. I moved my head out of the way of the acid, but some of it still landed on my armor. The acid left a hole in my armor and was slowly burning into my body. I gritted my teeth in pain, levitated the revolver against its head, and pulled the trigger. Its head exploded and it fell limp. I pushed it off me and picked myself up.

We started out the room and a lacerator jumped out of the hole in the door cryogenics. We rushed out and closed the door. We headed back up the stairs, but another lacerator came out from under a door. I pulled the trigger before it even touched the ground. Mom's revolver clicked. It took me a second to realize it was empty. “Fuck,” I muttered. I moved down the hallway as I reloaded. Shadow took it down.

I heard plenty of ruckus inside the laboratory. I couldn't help but open the door to find out what was going on.

Four lacerators stared at me from inside. I noticed the door to the experimentation lab was destroyed now. I took a closer look at the lacerators. One of them was missing its wings, but it had large snake-like fangs. The second looked normal, or whatever would count as normal for them. The third was the acid-spitting variety, I could tell from the lack of wings and green goo hanging from its mouth. The last one was significantly bigger than the other two. It looked more like a hellhound than a pony actually. I just hoped it wasn't one of those dogs everypony in the Wasteland had grown to hate.

I'd only seen a hellhound twice, but the first time was enough to never want to see one again. Hellhounds were crafty, they dig holes in the ground to get the jump on you, and then they tear you apart with a single swipe of their claws. What I was looking at had the some of the same features as a hellhound, but it also had that same necrotic look to it the other lacerators had.

It would have been crazy to fight that thing. I shut the door and yelled, “Run!” I started for the stairs. What about the others though? The ponies in this stable were already hurt; they wouldn't be able to last a second against that hellhound. I changed my direction and went down the hall.

Shadow and I burst through double doors at the end of the hall. We were in a large open room mimicking the outside, presumably before the war consumed all beauty. I never knew what healthy grass and flowers looked like, or a sunny cloudless day. It felt so wonderful in this room. I knew it was all synthetic, but it felt so wonderful here. I was infatuated with the bright sunlight for a moment. The moment ended when I was interrupted by four lacerators breaking down the doors we just came through.

My mind kicked back into battle mode. I brought S.A.T.S. up and put two shots into the nearest lacerator. Shadow took down the next one. Two bullets from the revolver brought down the next one. Shadow let out a quick burst that brought the last one down.

Another one shambled through the doorway, but everything seemed fine and under control. I got a strange feeling suddenly. I turned around and saw the fanged pony creeping up behind us. It went to bite Shadow. Everything came to a stop with S.A.T.S. I targeted its head for two bullets. Things slowly began to speed up. Its head exploded in a mess of gore from the two bullets, covering both of us. She was repulsed by the splatter of gore in her mane, but that didn't stop her from fighting.

I reloaded and turned to shoot the lacerators at the doorway. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw the wall get torn down by the hellhound-lacerator. Six bangs filled the air, but the hellhound was barely moved by any of the shots. It swiped through the air at me. I rolled out of the way as its claws ripped through the ground.

I kept distance between us while I reloaded. It would charge at me, I would just barely move out of the way, I would shoot and reload, and then we would repeat the cycle. “Shadow?” I called her name.

“Yes, that's me. How may I help you on this beautiful and sunny day?” Was this really the time for jokes? I looked over at her and saw her dealing with all the lacerators in the stable. It was just a field of red bars there.

“Well, I was going to ask for your help,” I said as a set of claws swiped just to my left, “but it looks like we're both in a predicament.” I shot the brutish lacerator twice in the head with S.A.T.S. help. It actually flinched this time. At least I was doing something.

“Yeah, looks like we could both use help,” she said as she continued to gun down lacerators. She barely kept up with the swarm of monsters as she reloaded.

I was mostly defensive when I fought the hellhound. I was able to dodge each swipe of its claws, giving me the chance to shoot its head.

Then it surprised me. It dug into the ground.  This was typical hellhound behavior; I just didn't see it coming. I looked around for it. How was I going to find it? Then I felt the smallest of vibrations under me. Shit.

I leapt out of the way as the ground beneath me exploded. The hellhound rose out of the ground and I kept shooting at it until I was out. This son of a bitch wasn't going down.

I remembered something as I put away Mom's .44. “Shadow,” I yelled, “give me one of the bombs you made!” She levitated out a bomb made from a circular metal casing with a button on top and threw it my way.

I enveloped the bomb in my magic and pushed it against the hellhound's face. I pushed the button on the top of it and backed away from the hellhound. I covered my face and braced myself for the explosion. Hot shrapnel flew through the air and the explosion sent me flying through the air.

I picked myself back up and observed the destruction. The hellhound-lacerator was dead. Its entire head was gone.

“Shadow,” I called her name. “Shadow?” She was lying face down on the ground. A dark pool of blood was around her and dead lacerators formed a circle around her. I ran to her and gently turned her over.

She was alive! She half opened her eyes. “Those bombs pack a punch, huh,” she said quietly. “I had a feeling I fucked up somehow when I made them.”

“Don't worry,” I said as I picked her up in my magic, “at least there's a medical clinic we can go to.” We walked back to the cafeteria. Surprisingly enough, there weren't any lacerators to deal with.

I put her down and took another bomb. I opened up the bomb and saw a pale powder in a container. I assumed it was the explosive powder and removed some of it. I walked back to the clinic. “I'd move back if I were you,” I said to the ponies behind the barricade. I placed the bomb, ran around a corner, and pushed the button from afar with my magic.

The explosion wasn't as large as the last one, but that's not to say it was small. It punched a hole in the barricade. A few ponies in the same blue and yellow jumpsuit peered confusedly through the hole at me.

A brown buck walked through the hole. He looked at me soberly and said in the same voice that answered me before, “You told us it was clear.”

“I know. I'm sorry. We needed the door opened though,” I said to him.

He was less than an inch away from my face now. “Do you realize what you did? You could have gotten us all killed.”

“Those things didn't attack us until we went to the chem lab, which you sent us to. I know I lied about this stable being cleared, but at least I'm taking responsibility for that,” I said.

I thought we were about to start fighting until an orange mare walked in between the two of us. “Both of you stop.” She forced us to take a few steps back from each other. She said to the buck, “Wingspan, calm down.” She turned to me, “Thank you for helping us. Some of us actually appreciate it,” she stared coldly at Wingspan.

“It's nothing. We have some ponies in the cafeteria that really need medical attention. So I'm asking you for your help now.” She nodded and I led her to the cafeteria. One look at the half dead ponies and she rushed them back to the clinic. All of the ponies in the clinic not tending to the wounded ate as much as they could. I could only imagine how hungry they were after being trapped for days.

Cor and I sat in the clinic while we waited for them to finish working on everypony. Shadow was recovering from that explosion. I drank half of a  healing potion and poured the rest into the small hole on my chest.

We had to get these ponies out of here. I wasn't going to let them stay in here. I started thinking back to what the buck said. We didn't clear the stable. It probably still wasn't clear. Which meant we only had some time before more lacerators came. But I wanted these ponies to get treated before I led them out of the stable. Could they treat these ponies in time?

While we waited, Cor and I drank through the bottle of vodka and ate whatever food they had in the cafeteria.

* *           * * *        * *

I thought of something after twenty minutes of nothingness.

What if there were still more ponies in here? We didn't mean to find the ponies in the clinic. What if there were more and we just didn't know about them.

I went up to the orange mare from before and asked, “Is there any way I could check if there are other ponies alive in here?”

“Well that Pip-Buck of yours should tell you. Or you could use the stable's P.A. system to get ponies to set up a beacon,” she offered me.

I wasn't going to walk around the stable looking for green bars and hoping they weren't the ponies I already saved. That left me with one option. “How do I access the stable's P.A.?” I asked her.

“Overmare's office. Do you want me to show you?”

“No, stay here and help these ponies. They need you more than I do.” She gave me a nod and went back to work.

I told Cor to stay here and keep these ponies safe while I went to look for more ponies. He really didn't want me going by myself, but I talked him into letting me go.

I went to the Overmare's office without any problem. I fiddled with a microphone until it worked. Into the mic I said, “Attention to all ponies. Your stable is filled with zombie-like creatures, as you may have noticed. If you haven't been rescued yet, then set a beacon with your Pip-Buck and wait for help to come.”

I looked at my E.F.S. for a beacon to come up. I waited for a few minutes for a beacon. I started losing hope as time progressed. I got up to go back to the clinic, thinking there was no pony else to save. On my way there I noticed something on my E.F.S. There was a blinking marker over my compass.

Some pony still needed saving.

My Pip-Buck led me past the cafeteria and to another hallway with the same gory motif as the other rooms. This room had no light whatsoever, so I had to rely on my Pip-Buck's lamp. “FORSAKEN” was written on the walls in blood. I kept walking through the hallways until I reached my marker.

I opened the door and found a single mare bleeding out on the ground of what I assumed was her apartment. I gently picked her up with my magic and brought her to the clinic.

Once there, I left her to be treated. I started walking to check on Shadow but I heard her whisper to me with whatever strength she had, “Please… help them.”

I walked back to her. “Help who?”

“My friends… Back of the Aviary… Help them,” she said. The doctors kept ordering her to stop talking so she could conserve her energy. She didn't listen to them. “Please… save them,” she pleaded. She stopped moving.

I didn't wait to go back down to the large simulated outdoors which I assumed was the Aviary. It was a long walk to the end of the room, but once there I was greeted with a single door.

The door opened and I peered into a locker room. I walked in and looked for any ponies still alive. Nothing was coming up on my E.F.S.

I walked among the rows of lockers, looking for any ponies. Suddenly two green bars and two red bars appeared in my vision. I ran around the lockers to them.

I turned the corner to see two lacerators eating two bodies. I shot them both down with Dad's assault rifle and S.A.T.S.

The ponies being eaten were still alive according to my Pip-Buck, but for how long?

I moved the lacerators and saw… Mom and Dad? Their entrails hung from the lacerators' mouth and by the hole in their side.

“Mom? Dad?” I slowly approached them. Dad looked at me with anguish. “I'll get you out of here,” I assured them.

“No,” he said. “You've failed us.” Then the two green bars vanished.

I was taken aback. I failed them? Maybe I could have done something, but I wasn't given the chance to do anything.

“Yes, you failed them,” a familiar voice said. I turned to see Red Rum standing there. He put his hoof on my shoulder. “You failed them,” he repeated. “You didn't do anything to prevent their deaths. You failed.”

* *           * * *        * *

“Wake up,” Cor shook me awake. “C'mon it's time to go.” It was all just a dream. Sure enough the doctors weren't working on any more ponies. The wounded ponies were bandaged up and ready to go.

I put away the bottle of vodka that was still open and stood up. “Hold tight for a second,” I said as I walked away.

“Where are you going?” he asked.

I didn't even turn back when I said, “I just want to check something out.” I just had a feeling. I just needed to make sure…

I followed the same path I did in the dream. Every detail was the same. Almost as if I had already known how this hallway looked. I hesitantly opened the same door from the dream.

The same pony from the dream was bleeding out in the same spot. This was really weird now. I picked her up and brought her back faster than I did in the dream.

I didn't wait for her to tell me about the ponies in the aviary, I went there myself.

I ran through the destroyed simulation and more hesitantly than before opened the door at the far end of the room. The gruesome image of my parents from the dream was making this a much more arduous task.

The same lockers were here. The same four bars were at the end of the locker room. I ran around the same set of lockers and saw the same two lacerators from the dream. They weren't eating anypony this time. They were trying to though, and they were about to get a bite in.

I wasn't going to let them get that bite in. I shot them with Dad's assault rifle and S.A.T.S. and they fell down.

The two fully armed ponies underneath the lacerators pushed them off and stood up. A mare and buck who looked like they had gone through hell and back stood up. “Thank you,” he said. “Almost thought that was going to be the end.”

“I aim to save,” I told them. I didn't care what the dream said. I wasn't going to let failure be an option; I was going to save ponies.

I led them back to the clinic. I was glad to see the bleeding mare from the apartment was alive this time. I let another ten minutes or so pass so the bleeding mare could recover, but I needed to get these ponies out of here quickly.

“Is everypony in here?” I asked aloud. Everypony simply looked at me. “I'll take that as a 'yes'. We're going to get you out of this stable and into a settlement called Bedrock.”

“Wait a second. Why are we leaving?” some buck shouted.

“Do you really want to be living here?” I inquired. “There's bound to be more lacerators in here, and this entire place has been ruined with blood, bodies, bullets, and explosions.”

“What if we don't want to leave?” the mare next to me asked.

“It's time for all of you to go outside. You've all been living peacefully without disturbance, but now a disturbance has come up,” I said to all of them. “Your pegasi dammit, don't you want to fly outside. The real outside. Not some simulation that's ruined thanks to us and plenty of lacerators.”

“Some pegasi like their current home though,” a different mare said.

“No. I agree with him,” Wingspan said. “Things are changing. The outside is there for us now, and it's not a dead world of nothingness anymore.” I didn't want to tell them that it sort of was, “It's time we moved out,” he finished with a small nod my way. I was glad he wasn't trying to fight me anymore.

“Thank you. Now can we all get out of here?” I asked the ponies in the room. Other than a few disgruntled ponies, most were happy to leave the stable.

I walked up to Shadow who was still recovering from her wounds. We were limited on our supplies after all. “How you holding up?” I asked as I sat next to her.

“Could be better,” she said while she looked at her bandaged back.

“Do you think you can stand on your own?” I asked and was given a nod in response as she slowly got to her hooves.

With Cor and I in front of the crowd of ponies and Shadow behind them, we left the stable. The large cog shaped door with the number 85 on its face rolled out of its way for us.

Once we were all in the rock tunnel, we closed the large door so no lacerators could make it out again. Hopefully I wasn't also trapping ponies in there. We went through the rock tunnel and into the muted sunset. The pegasi's hooves stopped clopping against the ground. I turned around to see them in awe of the outdoors and some of them captivated by the sky.

“Whoa,” a few of them said as they looked around at the buildings and sky. They all happily took to the air and flew around each other and the buildings.

“Should we stop them?” Cor asked me.

“Nah, let them have a little fun,” I told him. It was the first time they'd been outside and out of their tiny rooms. Of course it was natural for them to stretch their wings. It's the first thing I would do if I was them.

We continued walking as they flew over us. We kept our eyes open for Bedrock as we walked among dark buildings. I called out the fliers to keep their eyes opened for some settlement amongst the buildings.

I looked around for anything that fit the description in the Overmare's terminal. Rubble was said to hide the settlement. But rubble was everywhere. Finding it would be like finding Red Rum; it wouldn't be happening anytime soon.

One of the pegasi called out, “Hey, I think I see something!” He dove down behind the buildings then came around to see us. “I think I found it!”

We all followed him around the building and to a pile of rubble that looked no different from the others. We struggled to climb up the pile, but we eventually reached the top. Looking down we saw Bedrock; a settlement built into the streets and blocked by rubble and buildings.

The pegasi landed behind us as we walked down. Some ponies gave us funny looks as we passed them. I guess it wasn't everyday they saw a group of twenty ponies walking in for the first time. The fact that we were mostly pegasi probably made them think “Enclave”.

I walked to one of the ponies and asked for whoever was in charge of this place. We were pointed to the biggest building at the end of the settlement.

All of the buildings we walked by were made of rubble and scrap metal put together. The roads were made of cobblestone, a true luxury in a Wasteland settlement.

Three pegasi walked up to us. “Hey, you wouldn't happen to be coming from the stable, would you?” a gold mare with a luxurious purple mane asked.

“Are you the ponies the Overmare left to gather info?” I asked them, already assuming it was a “yes”.

“Yeah, we are. How do you know that and why are they out of the stable?”

“Well, the Overmare's terminal had journals about your mission outside. As for the second question, you're stable got really screwed. Something from out here infected the population and turned them into zombies,” I said as her face became concerned. “There weren't many survivors. I'm sorry.”

Without waiting for anything else, she pushed her way through the crowd, giving short hugs to the ponies she knew, but still in distress looking for somepony. “No,” I heard her say quietly. “No!” she shouted furiously. “Dammit!” She flew to me. “Is this everypony?!” she asked frantically with worry.

“That's everypony we could find,” I told her.

“There's nopony else?” I nodded my head. “No, there has to be more. There has to be!”

“I'm sorry, that's everypony.” She mouthed “no” and started crying. Ponies started looking our way. She was making a scene. I doubt all those ponies really understood. I didn't know who she lost, but I knew what she was feeling. Cor did too. Everypony we got out of that stable did.

I put my hoof on her shoulder and told her, “It's going to be all right.”

“Don't say it's going to be all right!” she yelled as she threw my hoof away. “You don't understand! Have you ever lost somepony? Have you ever lost somepony so close to you that you’d rather be dead than alive without them! Have you?!” she screamed as tears ran down her face.

I nodded my head and said, “We've all lost something dear to us. You're not the only one.” I put my hoof back on her shoulder. “Just be strong.”

She nodded. “Be strong,” she repeated. She hugged me and cried into my shoulder. I struggled to keep from crying. I wanted to cry, but I also wanted to be strong for her. I didn't care about the ponies giving us funny looks. Some looked like they sympathized with her. Good. Loss isn't something foreign in the Wastes.

I waved Cor to keep going. His eyes were getting a bit watery, but he nodded his head and led everypony else to the end of the settlement.

I was still holding her. “I know we don't really know each other, but can I ask who you lost?”

“I… I don't really want to talk about it.”

I didn't want to pressure her into telling me if she didn't want to, but I wanted to sympathize with her. “Talking might make you feel better,” I told her.

“My marefriend. Her name was Jetspeed. And my mother, and sister,” she said through her sobs.

“I'm sorry,” I said. I didn't know what else to say. I could try and comfort her, but what could I say? “It's going to be all right.” I already said that, but I knew it wouldn't be all right. Getting over something such as this doesn't happen so easily.

“Who've you lost?” she asked. Like her, I really didn't want to talk about Mom and Dad, especially to a pony I hardly knew. She told me who she lost though, I felt obligated to tell her about my parents.

“My mother and father. It was just a few days ago actually,” I said as I struggled even harder to fight the tears. That night replayed in my head. “I know what you're feeling. You want them here so that bad feeling can go away. But that feeling makes us who we are.” She gave me a puzzled look. “Everything we experience defines us, whether it's good or bad. We're all going to face something hard eventually. How we deal with it makes us stronger or weaker.”

She gave a little nod. “Thank you,” she said as she finally regained her composure. “I don't think you told me your name.”

“Suthain. Yours?”

“Aurum,” she told me. “Thank you for saving who you could.”

“That's me, I aim to save others. Sorry I wasn't able to save more,” like Mom and Dad. “Let's catch up with everypony else,” I suggested. With a nod of her head we made our way to the group.

We walked into a tall building that sunk into the crater. The inside was luxurious and put most places in the Wasteland to shame. I requested to see the leader of this place. Cor was talking to an earth pony with a light gray coat and a gray mane.

Aurum went to talk with her pegasi friends. “I'm here,” I announced my presence. “Are you the pony in charge here?”

“Yes, that's me. Name's Cobblestone, pleasure to meet you,” he said in a haughty voice as he stretched his hoof out. I shook it and he continued with business. “You're trying to make an insane request by the way.”

“They need a home. Please, help us,” Cor said. “They're old home is the worst thing you could ever experience in the Wastes, and this is the closest place they could go to.”

“You're asking for my help, but help comes with a charge,” he said as a smile grew on his face. “You help me, I help you.”

“What do you want?” Cor asked.

“You do a few jobs for me, and I gladly take in these ponies. Or you give me, hmm… five thousand caps.” That was only one option for us.

“What kind of jobs?”

“Oh, nothing big, just a small trip to get my favorite gun back, find some weapons in a police station so we can protect ourselves, get us some food, water, and medical supplies, and maybe eliminate some enemies.”

“Enemies? What kind of enemies?” I asked him. I was fine with everything except for the last part.

“Just some ponies that seem to think it's funny to steal from us at night and a pony who owes me caps.” He said. I didn't want to kill ponies, but that didn't mean I wouldn't set them straight.

I looked at Cor. He gave me a nod. “Deal,” Cor said and extended his hoof.

“Wait,” I interjected. “I want to see the housing before you two shake on it.”

“Of course, follow me,” he led us out the main building and to a shorter but wider building.

We walked through a door that was barely held together. The inside was scrap metal over chunks of rubble. How this building stood, I didn't know. We went up a flight of stairs and Cobblestone opened a door. “This is a common living quarter,” he said as he showed us a large room with about fifteen bunk beds with two footlockers on each side of them, a refrigerator, three lockers, and a radio. At least the room wasn't a cobblestone monstrosity like the hallway leading here.

I nodded my head. “Now it's a deal.” We shook on it.

“Thank you very much,” he said with a smile on his face. We walked back downstairs, and Cobblestone got a pink mare to show the stable ponies to their rooms. “If you'll excuse me, gentlecolts, I have some business to attend to. If you need anything more ask Rose,” he said as he pointed to the pink mare. He walked back to the main building.

“Something's up with him,” I said to Cor once he was out of earshot.

“Of course there is. Dude's weird. And I have a feeling we're going to get screwed over in this deal.” I nodded to that.

We talked to the pink mare and got the three of us a room for the night. Maybe a bit of sleep would do us all some good.

Footnote: Level Up!

New Perk Added: Scoundrel – You can use your wily charms to influence ponies. Each rank raises your Speech and Barter skills by 5 points.

Unstable Naïvety

Fallout: Equestria – Shadowless Augury

Chapter 4: Unstable Naïvety

“You wear a mask of this city’s hero. You are the pretender.”

Sleep is good. I didn’t know how much sleep I got in the stable’s clinic. Regardless, I still felt like I needed sleep. Cor and Shadow definitely needed sleep. Rose led us to the common room the other pegasi were in. The three of us took the first empty bunks we saw and plopped our gear and ourselves down.

It was hard to sleep with all the ponies talking to each other about the lacerators and getting out of the stable. I wanted to sleep, but ponies just kept yapping. I was tired though. I’d sleep soon enough.

* *           * * *        * *

Everything was dark.

Where was I? Was this a dream?

I tried walking around. I felt my legs move, but it didn’t feel like I moved. “Hello? Anypony here?” I asked aloud. I kept “walking” through the darkness. A bright purple light came from a circular platform that just emerged beneath me. Black silhouettes of birds flew around that concealed the light. “What’s happening?” I asked aloud.

“Are you a failure?” a mysterious voice asked me. Each syllable made the light beneath me pulsate.

“What?” I barely asked.

It repeated its question. “Are you a failure? I ask this, but I already know the answer.”

“Is it your answer or my answer?” I asked the mysterious voice. “Because my answer is ‘no, I’m not a failure.’”

“Then why do you feel guilty for your parent’s death? Is it because you believed you failed them? But if you didn’t fail, as you believe, then why have guilt?” he asked me. Was I feeling guilty? Was that the feeling inside me?

“Maybe I do feel guilt,” I told the voice, “but I’m not a failure.” I just saved so many, how could I come close to being called a failure?

“Then stop telling yourself you’re a failure.” I wasn’t telling myself I was a failure though. I was doing the opposite. “You hold yourself responsible for their death, and you believe you could have done better. You believe you’ve failed to save them. Your redemption is saving everypony you see. Are you saving them because you want to or because it makes the pain go away? Or is it what they wanted?” Mom and Dad would want me to save ponies, but that isn’t the entire reason I save.

“I’m saving ponies because it’s the right thing to do. If I don’t do it no pony else will. Not enough ponies are crazy enough to do what I do.”

“If you stopped saving ponies, what would happen? Would Equestria fall to even more chaos and ruin, like you believe it would, or would ponies fix their problems?” I wasn’t going to let fate decide what would happen. I wasn’t even going to give fate either of the two options. No, I was going to fix this myself with whatever help I could get.

“Fate can only guide me. Fate can encourage my actions,” I told the voice. “I have to make my own decisions. Fate can’t make Equestria better or worse, but it’ll bring us on a path. Then ponies have to make the choice for themselves: make things better or let things become worse.”

“You speak truth, but a part of you still holds onto the belief that you have failed and that you will fail. You want to live up to their example, but you’re not strong enough to do it.”

“Their example was saving ponies and doing the right thing. Maybe I can’t do it alone, but I’ll find help. Together we will strengthen ourselves and make things right.” I sat down on the platform. Whoever was talking to me had a point. I wasn’t strong enough to do this myself, but I wouldn’t let that or anything else stop me.

“Then prove yourself wrong by doing the right thing,” it told me.

“Prove myself wrong?” I mumbled. Wouldn’t that mean doing the wrong thing? I wanted to do the opposite though. Everything started fading to black.

* *           * * *        * *

        I opened my eyes to a dark and quiet room. Everypony was sleeping peacefully, except for me. I got up, took out my half empty bottle of vodka, and went to the roof of the building.

        It was a dark night and no lights illuminated the town. I sat down on the weathered edge of the building that overlooked the town. I wasn’t at the highest viewpoint in Bedrock, but I still had a good view over most of the town.

I took a few sips from my bottle. I thought of the dream I just had. “Prove yourself wrong by doing the right thing.” The words stood out so clearly from everything. If I was proving myself wrong I would have to be doing the wrong thing. Was the voice implying that I wanted to do the wrong thing?

I didn’t want to think about this now. I wanted to go back to sleep. The thought of the dream was the only thing standing in the way of that.

I looked around. The location of this town was actually perfect. The incredibly tall buildings helped to conceal Bedrock, and so did the fact that the town was built in a sinkhole in the middle of the road. Piles of rubble served as a wall for the town while not looking suspicious.

My eyes wandered to the top of the tallest building. I could barely make out a small figure at the top and a corresponding green bar on my E.F.S. I stared at it and it stared back at me. In less than a second it shot into the night sky and vanished from sight and my E.F.S.

That was weird.

I looked in the sky for the figure, but I couldn’t see anything. After giving up I took another sip of vodka. The figure helped me forget about my dream, but it started coming back. Was I a failure? Why was this question coming up so often in my dreams? Was it because I felt guilty?

No. I wasn’t doing this now. I took another sip of vodka and let my mind wander.

Where do we go next? Well we had to do the jobs Cobblestone asked us to do, but what about when we started looking for Red Rum again? Somepony had to know who he was, but who? That mysterious buck back at Prute might be able to tell us more. The safe house where I saw Project Hard Light might have a few answers.

The dark figure came back into my view. As it flew closer to me I noticed its orange and blue color. The familiar orange pegasus in a blue jumpsuit landed on the roof and skidded next to me. “Hey,” the mare from the clinic said vibrantly.

“Hey,” I said back to her.

“I’m guessing you can’t get much sleep either.”

“Pretty much,” I told her. “What’s keeping you up?”

“I’m just… feeling a bit haunted is all.” Her face looked like it was haunted. I couldn’t hope to imagine what being trapped in that stable would have been like. She had to watch the ponies she knew and loved get massacred.

“Maybe this will help,” I said as I offered her my vodka. She looked at the bottle skeptically. “Come on, it’s not bad. They say it’s perfectly healthy to drink your troubles away.”

“I think they say the exact opposite.” She took the bottles in her hooves anyway. She sniffed it once and immediately brought her face away from it. “This smells like rubbing alcohol,” she said in disgust.

“Someponies like the taste,” I said. “You’ll never know until you try it.”

She took the smallest of sips. Her face twisted and she said, “Ugh, it tastes like rubbing alcohol too.” She didn’t hesitate to give me back the bottle. I merrily took another sip from the bottle. “How do you even drink that?”

“I like the taste,” I said. “It helps me lose focus, which is good for me. I don’t want to focus on anything now.”

“So what’s keeping you up?” she asked me.

“Dreams,” I said, intentionally keeping it vague.

“Not being very specific. I’m guessing you don’t want to talk about it,” she assumed. I nodded my head. “Thank you, again, for saving us. I don’t think everypony has thanked you and your friends, so I’ll speak for those who haven’t.”

I shrugged and said, “It’s nothing.”

“It’s not nothing,” she replied in amazement to my previous comment. “You saved so many ponies. If you hadn’t come when you did I’m sure all of us would’ve been dead.”

“It’s just what I do. I’m going to save the Wasteland, even if it takes my entire life,” I told her. “Nothing’s going to stop me either.”

“So you’re a pony with a dream?” I nodded my head. “My dream is to save others. That’s why I became a doctor,” she told me. “It just feels good knowing you helped somepony else. I guess that’s why I like it. You know that feeling of course. Sadly though, that job’s gone now.”

“That job is most certainly not gone. The Wasteland is never short on doctors. Anypony out here can attest to that,” I said. “You could be a doctor here, but you might not get too much traffic. The town’s small and probably no ponies will come into town.”

“So where do you think I should go?” she asked.

“This town isn’t bad. It has everypony you know, but another town wouldn’t hurt. It would be a good way to make friends, and you could probably be a doctor there,” I suggested. She thought about it for a moment.

“What do you do?”

“Go on adventures, help ponies, get revenge, you know, the usual stuff.” She gave me a funny look after saying that. “What? That’s common in the Wastes. At least most of it is.”

“Adventures,” she said then stopped to think about it. “What are these adventures like?”

“Why? Are you actually thinking about adventuring?” I asked in slight disbelief.

“A little bit,” she said playfully.

“You’ve been out of your stable for less than four hours.” She gave a simple nod in response. “Adventuring can be dangerous you know.” She gave another simple nod. “Do you even have any experience fighting or shooting?” She gave a simple shake of her head. “You don’t even know half of the things you’ll find out there.” She gave another nod. “And you still think it’s a good idea?” She waited a moment before giving this nod. “You’re crazy.”

“Well it sounds a lot more interesting than being stuck in a small room helping ponies on the verge of death. Besides we all have to learn some way.”

“I just don’t want you getting hurt,” I told her.

“Why are you being so protective over me? We hardly know each other,” she said almost defensively.

“I’m looking to keep everypony safe, whether I know them or not,” I said.

“I can take care of myself,” she said. “Just let me travel out there with you for a few days. I’ll choose what I want to do after that.”

I thought about it for a moment. She couldn’t fight. We could teach her how to hold a gun easily and S.A.T.S. could help her shoot. She could fly. She wouldn’t have a problem evading enemies. She was a doctor. She could definitely help us and herself when we get hurt. She was eager. She would either get wrecked quickly or not get wrecked in the slightest.

“I’m not going to say I’m giving you a chance,” I said, “but I’m considering it.”

“You know it’s going to be a ‘yes’,” she said with a confident smile on her face.

“Whatever you say,” I said. “Just get some sleep. We’ll talk about this tomorrow.” I started walking away. I was hoping she wouldn’t be too trigger-happy when we got out there. Yes, it was a ‘when’, not an ‘if’. She was right about that. I had to give her a hint of doubt to make sure she wasn’t going to be too excited when we got out there. I only hoped it worked the way I planned.

I went back to the sleeping quarters and just fell back into my bed. I wanted to sleep, but it just wasn’t happening. “Yo,” Cor called me, “where’ve you been?”

“Did I wake you?”

“No, just wondering where you went,” he said.

“I just took a trip to the roof for a drink. This mare was there. She said she wanted to tag along with us for a while,” I told him.

“And what did you say?” he asked me.

“I didn’t say ‘yes’, but I’m thinking it.” He nodded. He trusted my decision. Not blindly of course, but with certainty that I knew what I was doing. Sometimes he gets a bit skeptical, but he’s usually trusting of my decisions. I guess that’s why I’m the “leader”, or whatever comes close to a leader. Sometimes I don’t trust my own decisions though. “Do you think it’s the right choice?”

“Maybe. Do you think it is?” I simply shrugged. “What about her?” he asked as he pointed to Shadow. “Do you trust her?”

I nodded. “She blew up an entire safe house for us,” I reminded him.

“Her name is Twisted Shadow, remember? I don’t care what she said about not being twisted, but you heard what she did to that buck. She butchered him. She beat that buck in the metro until his head was nothing more than a bloody mess, and she blew up her own Samdiny friends. She’s definitely twisted,” he said. “I don’t want to get stabbed in the back.”

“Trust me,” I said. “I know she’s secretive and all, but that’s because she feels hurt by the Samdiny. That’s why she doesn’t like talking about them and feels no trouble or remorse killing them.” He still looked at me skeptically. “Trust me on this.”

“Fine,” he said. “I’ll trust you, but I don’t trust her yet.”

“You’re going to have to. She’s going to be staying with us for a while after all.”

“I probably will eventually,” he said. “It’s just hard to.” It was hard for most ponies. Most ponies would think I was insane for so easily trusting a pony that came from the same group that killed my parents, but I knew there was good in her. “I’m going back to sleep. Goodnight.”

“Night,” I said. I forced my mind to let go of everything, and slowly, I began to sleep.

* *           * * *        * *

“Wake up,” Cor said and nudged me. “We got a job to do, a few jobs actually.” I crawled out of bed and got all my gear on. We woke Shadow up. “So which pony’s coming with us?” he asked.

I walked to the sleeping mare with the orange coat and teal mane and woke her up. She barely crawled out of bed.

“It’s so early," she complained.

I looked at my Pip-Buck for the time. “It’s half-past ten,” I said.

“Yeah, it’s early,” she continued to complain. “So am I in?”

“Yes, you’re in,” I responded. A smile few on her face as I said that. “Just don’t get too excited.”

“So what’s the game plan for today?”

“We have to do a few jobs for the buck that runs this place so these pegasi can keep their home,” I told her. “And we have to get you armor.”

“I don’t need armor.” We gave her a look of apprehension. “What? I’m faster without armor. Besides, I can take care of myself.”

“We’re not leaving until you’re wearing armor,” I told her.

“Why?” she asked.

“Because bullets hurt, that’s why.”

“Armor’s overrated anyway. I mean who wears armor anymore?” she joked. “Seriously though l don’t need or want armor. I’ll be fine in this stable barding.”

“No, you won’t be,” I said to her. “I’m not going to have you getting hurt so badly when you get shot, even if it costs a little bit of speed.”

“Ugh, fine. I’ll wear the dumb armor. And since I’m being rude to all of you,” she turned to the rest of us, “I guess it’s time to apologize and introduce myself. My name’s Minum. Nice to meet you and all that stuff.” We introduced ourselves to her and headed off in search of the general store.

The town’s layout was confusing. Trying to find a general store or an armory was almost impossible; we spent over twenty minutes walking around trying to find it. After giving up and being pointed to the small stone building, we went inside to find a buck and a mare of the same color hitting a rock on the counter between each other.

The inside wasn’t very furnished. The only things here were a counter and a door leading to the back. Oh, and a lone plastic chair covered in dust.

You can never forget the chair.

They didn’t notice us come in. I tapped my hoof on the ground to get their attention. They turned to me simultaneously. “Oh, customers… maybe,” the steel blue buck said apathetically. “I’m Lapis…”

“… and I’m Lazuli,” the mare finished the sentence just as apathetically. “Welcome to our shop. Buy to your heart’s content… because no one ever buys from here,” she whispered the last part. Maybe the reason no pony bought was because of their attitude. At least show some energy.

“Hey, just looking to see what you have in stock,” I said to the bored pair. “Do you have any armor? Something for a pegasus. And a battle saddle?”

“I still don’t want the armor,” Minum said to me.

“Well we’re going to need something when you realize you need it. Bullets hurt, just a heads up before you say you keep insisting you don’t need armor.” She scoffed, and I looked at the blue pair.

“We might have something,” Lazuli said with slightly more interest. She opened the door behind her and went in. She came back out with blue armor that looked similar to the stable jumpsuit Minum was wearing. “This used to belong to a friend,” she said as she placed it on the counter. “A little work could be done to it, make it a bit better. No battle saddles though.”

“We’ll make do without it then, thank you,” I said. Minum took a closer look at the armor. “See something you like?”

“Something’s off,” she said as she examined it. “There’s an ‘85’ on it.”

“So…?”

“That’s my stable. My stable never opened. How did you know this ‘friend’?” she asked Lazuli.

“Well, according to the Overmare, Aurum, and those two other ponies out here, the stable has opened,” I told her.

“But that was recent, wasn’t it? Who was this ‘friend’?” she asked again.

“She claimed to be from a stable,” Lazuli said. “I haven’t seen her in years though. She reminds me of you actually, but… No, there’s no way. Lapis, you see it too right?”

“Yeah, I see it. Do you really think…?” She nodded with conviction.

“I’m confused,” Minum said.

“Do you remember your mother at all?” Lapis asked her.

“No, Dad said she died when I was a foal. Did you know her? Is she… alive?” Minum asked with a piqued interest.

“I can’t guarantee you she’s alive, but knowing her she has to be. I remember the first time she walked into this little shop,” she reminisced. “She was a young mare, around your age actually. I took her stable jumpsuit and armored it. She gave it back to us before she went on her ‘final adventure’. Trust me when I tell you she’s still alive.”

“My mom’s alive?” Lazuli nodded her head. “What did she look like? What was she like? Can you help me find her?” Minum spat the questions out.

“Whoa, whoa, one question at a time. She looked a lot like you, actually. You have her eyes,” she said. “She had to be one of the kindest souls in the Wasteland. She saved this little ol’ shop of ours more than once. I swear every inch of her is made of steel. Nothing even came close to stopping her. When you walked in here, you had the same look as her, and I can tell the two of you share the same aspiration.”

Minum started leaning over the counter. “What about finding her? Where is she now?”

“I don’t know. I don’t think anypony knows.” Minum took a sad step back. “I’m sorry we can’t help.”

Minum took another step back. Her face showed despair “What’s her name?” she asked in a low voice.

“The Gallant Warrior, Sonder,” Lazuli said. “After all she’s done for us; I can never forget her name.”

“Sonder,” Minum repeated her mother’s name. She sat in thought for a moment.

“So how much for the armor?” I asked.

“You know what, take it. It’s free. It just needs a few repairs and it’ll be good as new,” she said. She gave the armor to Lapis. He took it over to a bench and started making repairs to it.

“Thank you,” Minum said.

“Oh, it’s nothing,” Lazuli said. “I’m assuming you’re going to try and find her.” Minum nodded with conviction. “Good. Promise me this: If you find her, give her our regards and this.” She put a silver container on the counter. “We’ve been holding onto this for a while. We couldn’t deliver it ourselves though.”

Minum examined it. “What is it?” asked as she examined it.

“It’s just a little gift. You can open it if you’d like, but you probably won’t understand it.” Minum opened the box and inside was nothing more than silver slabs stacked on top of each other. I’m sure it’ll help her out plenty. You’ll understand more when you find her,” she said, leaving it intentionally vague. Minum nodded. Lapis came back and put the armor on the counter.

“Thank you,” Minum said again. She gladly put on the armor. We traded whatever I thought we didn’t need. I kept one assault rifle for Minum and got it repaired, and then left the store.

Now she was going to stay adventuring in the Wastes. She needed to look for her mother. I didn’t know if she was going to be with us the whole time, but she was probably going to be with us for some time. Now I just needed to make sure she could take care of herself. At least she was wearing armor now.

“Now we have to teach you how to use a gun,” I said to her. I levitated the assault rifle I kept and gave it to her. “The ‘X’ in the middle of your vision is where your shot will land. If you need to aim better then S.A.T.S. should help you out. It lets you choose which limb you want to attack, but the spell takes a little while to recharge. Any questions?”

“Yeah... how do I even hold this?” she asked as she gawked at the weapon.

“A battle saddle would work, but they’re out. You could try holding it with your hooves,” I suggested.

“And how would that work?” she asked.

“I’m sure you could figure it out. Unless you want to be stuck with this,” I said as I levitated out a small 10mm pistol. “Ponies without magic can hold smaller guns in their mouth. Pick one.”

“Why not both?” she suggested. She took the both the pistol and the assault rifle. With both weapons in her possession, the assault rifle on her back and the pistol in a holster, she was ready to go.

Now came the task of completing our jobs. We left the stone town and headed for our first task: getting supplies from a nearby school that had been converted into a relief center. Maybe this school day was going to be less hectic than the last.

* *           * * *        * *

It was a short walk compared to the last few days. As we walked down the block of destroyed buildings, I could spot the school on the corner. It was in slightly better condition than the rest of the buildings. Hopefully the supplies we were looking for weren’t already looted.

As we approached the school I noticed the sure signs of raiders. Limbs and mutilated bodies hung from chains, and skulls and blood decorated the ground. Raiders were dumb and high out of their mind on drugs though. A fight shouldn’t last long, but raiders were also merciless brutes. They wouldn’t stop fighting no matter what.

We slowly walked inside the building. The inside reeked. Decomposing bodies filled the hallway. This was a drastic change from the last school.

I didn’t see any raiders yet. My E.F.S. wasn’t clear though. We walked through the hallway and to the gym. Looking through the window I could see makeshift beds, some boxes, and raiders doing… well, raider things, shooting up chems, neglecting guard dogs, and loitering.

“So how are we doing this?” I asked everypony. No pony gave me an answer. “I guess I’m calling the shots then.”

I didn’t want to go in lighting everypony up. I wanted an actual plan. I didn’t want Minum’s first Wasteland fighting experience to be bad, but it was going to be bad no matter what. Actually, a crazy fight might be good for her, a lesson on how to fight.

“All right, here’s the plan: CHARGE!!!” I screamed and bust through the door. Dad’s assault rifle was enveloped in my magic’s lavender glow. I used S.A.T.S. to put three bursts of bullets into the closest target’s body. It brought her to the ground quite easily. I fired half of the remaining magazine at the raider next to her. The remaining half went into the raider after that.

Cor and Shadow came in while I reloaded. Cor’s shotgun blasted one raider to giblets. Shadow’s shotgun turned the last raider’s head into a red goop.

The emaciated dogs were still up though. They jumped at us. One bit my foreleg as it charged. The growling canine wasn’t letting go of me. I batted it with the hard metal casing of my Pip-Buck. It fell limp after three hits connected. The other dog was already drowning in its own pool of blood by the time I turned to attack it.

I noticed Minum didn’t come in with us. She was just outside of the gym. Her face was filled with shock. “You just… killed them?” she asked. “Why?”

“They were raiders, nothing more than drugged up fighters. They’re not even good fighters. Before I forget to ask, did you miss the hanging limbs and bodies outside, in the lobby, and in the hallway?” I asked her.

“These ponies aren’t sane,” Cor said. “It’s better to attack them before they attack us.”

“How do you know they’ll attack us?” she asked in legitimate concern for the raiders. “All three of you came in and out of my stable like you were heroes, and then what? You just come in here shooting the first ponies you see?”

“Minum, don’t lecture us on what’s right or wrong. Remember how long you’ve been in the Wastes for. You don’t know how these things work. This is why I didn’t want to take you with us; you’re too naïve. You want to think everypony is good. I understand that, but they won’t show the good in them,” I told her.

“Did you even give them a chance,” she asked. I didn’t right now, but that was because they’ve had chances to prove themselves in the past. If they didn’t take the chance then, why would they take the chance now?

A moment later she started picking up the supplies we came for: healing potions, chems, food, water, most in perfect condition even after close to two hundred years after being made.

“Don’t forget to loot the bodies,” I said to her. She grimaced. “We need to see if they have anything valuable on them. Like guns, food, water, ammo, the essentials.”

“That’s just wrong,” she said. “No respect for the dead either?”

“More like little respect for the bad,” I said. “You’re going to have to learn the rules of the Wastes if you ever want to survive out here. One of those rules includes looting; it’s a means of survival.”

“But the end doesn’t always justify the means. I’m not looting the bodies,” she told me. I was perfectly fine with anypony with good ethics, but I feared she wasn’t going to last in the Wasteland. Too much compassion is the ultimate downfall because the Wasteland doesn’t allow ponies to be too compassionate. The saddest part is that it’s true. There’s only one pony who’s been more compassionate than what’s allowed, and that’s Mom. But she’s gone now, and nopony can change that.

Cor, Shadow, and I looted the bodies and picked up the rest of the supplies we came for. “Let’s check out the rest of this place,” I told them. “You never know what raiders have in store.” We might just find more supplies or ponies needing assistance.

We walked out of the gym and headed to explore the rest of the school, but before that I said, “All right, let’s split up. Minum, you’re with me, we clear the left side of the school. Cor and Shadow, you clear the right.” Minum was quiet, but she didn’t look happy to be paired with me. “Problem?” I asked her.

“No, not at all,” she said sarcastically. I wasn’t changing the arrangement though.

“Let’s head off then,” I said. She reluctantly followed me into the cafeteria. Hopefully this wouldn’t kill her too much.

The cafeteria had the same raider motif as the outside. It was absolutely filthy, as was the rest of the school so far.

A Sparkle-Cola machine was there for a nice drink. I opened the machine up and found three sodas. “Drink?” I offered one of them to Minum.

“This one better not taste like rubbing alcohol,” she said. She took the soda and took a drink. “It’s so flat and warm,” she commented.

“Yes, but it does have a delicious carrot taste. And we’ve made two caps,” I said as I levitated the Sparkle-Colas’ cap into my bag.

We went into the back of the cafeteria. It was a cornucopia of food. Several bottles of Sparkle-Cola were also there for our taking. We packed all of it into our bags. I helped myself to a Fancy Buck Snack Cake and InstaMash without feeling too guilty for taking some of the food intended for the ponies at Bedrock.

We headed out of the cafeteria and cleared the left side of the first floor. There wasn’t anything of interest until we found the nurse’s office. A few purple healing potions, medical bandages, and chems were in here. We took everything of value in the room.

Before opening the door to leave I noticed three red bars on my Pip-Buck. “There are more raiders here,” I whispered to Minum. “If it’ll make you feel better, we could try to see if there’s any good that’ll come out of them.”

“Yes, it will make me feel much better actually,” she said. I put Dad’s assault rifle away, her gun hadn’t even been out. I opened the door a crack and shouted, “Don’t shoot! We don’t even have our weapons drawn.” We slowly crept out.

“Who the fuck are you two?” a scary looking mare asked.

Before we got a chance to answer a buck next to her said, “Who cares? We got us some fresh meat!” He started taking out his gun, and I didn’t hesitate to drop him as he lifted his gun toward us. The mare shot at us. The bullets barely penetrated my armor; raider guns were usually in terrible condition. S.A.T.S. aided me in destroying her head. Her blood and brain sprayed onto the wall behind her.

“And that’s what happens when you don’t shoot them,” I said to Minum.

“All right, fine, you win,” she said in defeat. “It’s just weird for me. I’m not used to seeing ponies walk into a room and shoot the ponies inside without reason. I guess my stable was more orderly”

“I know taking another life is foreign to you, but that’s going to have to be your best friend in the Wasteland.” Fresh out of the stable and I was already telling her she needs to kill ponies. I was the perfect instructor.

“I don’t want to be a killer,” she said. From her face I could tell it saddened her to think of anypony dying, whether they were good or bad. I didn’t want any killing either, but, sadly enough, certain things needed to be done.

“I know you don’t want to kill. I hate killing,” I told her. She responded with a strange look. “With how good I am at it, you’d think it’s I’d like it, at least a bit, and that’s the worst part. I’m so good at something I hate so much.” I liked fighting, fighting for fun that is. Sparring with Cor was fun. But I didn’t like having to fight to the death. I liked giving ponies the chance to tap out, like that buck in the safe house. I didn’t want to pop his shoulder, so I gave him a chance. I think I made the right choice then.

“You don’t have to kill, right?” she asked with her stable naïvety. I didn’t want to tell her that was how the Wasteland worked. It was her first time exposed to this type of atmosphere; she didn’t need me telling her these things yet. I needed her to fight for us, but maybe she wasn’t ready for this yet.

“Let’s talk about this another time.” I didn’t know when the right time was to teach her how to fight, but if she was going to go on a search for her mother and be with us for a while, then it had to be soon. “C’mon, we have to finish clearing this place out.”

We went up the stairs. The second floor was clear, so was the third. I noticed a mess of green bars merged together and three red bars in my vision while we were on the third floor. Since I couldn’t find anything on the other floors, I assumed it was on the fourth floor. The green bars were everywhere; there could’ve been friendlies in all of these rooms.

We reached the fourth floor. The first room we looked into had caged ponies inside, and so did most of the rooms we checked after that. We didn’t help the ponies inside just yet; we needed to take down those enemies first.

The red bars appeared to be coming from all one room.  I took a peek through the window of that room and saw ponies in cages lining the room and… a Samdiny officer? What the hell were they doing here?

I could see his mouth moving, but I couldn’t hear him. “Hostages are in there,” I whispered to Minum. “Which means this is going to have to be a delicate procedure. You don’t have to shoot, but you might have to.”

“I don’t want to kill anypony. Can’t we wait for everypony else to come?”

“Fine, we’ll wait.” I looked back through the window. The officer went from talking to shouting. He was losing his patience. He pulled out a gun and pointed it at the caged ponies. “Shit, they’re running out of time. Take your gun out,” I commanded. I wasn’t whispering anymore.

“I told you—”

“Minum, I know you don’t want to, but you’re going to have to,” I said. She held her pistol in her mouth. I was intent on dropping the matter ever since our last encounter, but if she didn’t help shoot them, then the caged ponies would be gone. “Ready?” I asked. She shook her head.

At least she was being honest.

“Just stay calm and don’t forget S.A.T.S.” I pulled out Mom’ .44 and opened the door with my magic and rushed in. I kept myself away from the cages ponies and used S.A.T.S. to target the officer and put two shots into his head. Only one hit him.

Still standing, he turned and shot at me. There was no cover here. I couldn’t move into the way of the caged ponies, so I had to take each shot. I felt blood slowly dripping between my body and my barding. I returned fire at him, eventually taking him down. Behind him in the middle of the room were two more Samdiny readying their guns. “Shoot!” I yelled to Minum. I targeted a shot at the pony on the left’s body. She clutched her chest and fell to the ground, but she was still fighting. I turned my head to see Minum standing in the doorway still. “What are you doing?! Shoot them!” I yelled again.

She stared aghast as bullets and blood flew through the air. I killed my target with a critical shot that left me with no more rounds in Mom’s .44. My mind focused on reloading as quickly as I could. My body absorbed each bullet that came my way, which was barely any, but the ones that did left a painful sting. As soon as I had six rounds ready I brought up S.A.T.S. and targeted the last pony’s head. A tough facade shrouded the fear in her eyes. She was missing most of her shots, and she was afraid of me.

Was she a new Samdiny?

If she was new, maybe she could change. I wanted to spare her. My target changed to her hind leg. Both shots hit her, but it didn’t have the effect I was looking for. I shot the same leg another three times. That brought her to the ground. She clutched her wounded leg. I stepped over her and the revolver pressed against her head. “What are Samdiny doing here?” I asked her.

“Fuck off, asshole,” she said through gritted teeth. I must’ve hurt her badly.

“I’m expecting an answer,” I said as I pushed my gun against her head. “The sooner you give me an answer, the sooner the pain ends.”

“It’s a midpoint, for when we transfer ponies from our compounds to safe houses,” she said.

“Why do you transfer them?” I asked her.

“The boss needs them. He, or she, or I don’t even fucking know, needs them for Hard Light.” They were using their own for Hard Light as well as captives? “That’s all I know. Please, let me go, fucking kill me, or whatever the fuck you were going to do, just do it!”

“Do you want to live?” She nodded her head violently.

“Of course I do! What kind of a question is that?!”

I asked the most important question, “Are you done being a Samdiny?”

“Yes, I’m done!” she cried. I saw every ounce of anguish in her face. I took a syringe of Med–X that we found in the nurse’s office and injected her with it. The painkiller took its effect and her pain began to fade.

“Minum,” I called her over, “help her.”

“No,” a maroon pony with a gray mane in the cages said weakly, “don’t help that bitch. After all the evil she’s done, you can’t just give her another chance like that.”

I walked up to his cage and asked, “What’s your name, friend.”

“Spilled Blood,” he responded. I had a strange love for the names in the Wasteland.

 “Nice to meet you, Spilled Blood. My name’s Suthain, and I’m going to tell you something I want you to remember: love and compassion will save the Wasteland. There aren’t many of us who show it. After today I want you, and everypony in here, to let all see what it is to live in the love of others,” I said to all the ponies in the room. I walked over to the officer and grabbed a key off his body. I unlocked Spilled Blood’s cage then unlocked the rest. Everypony gave a short “thank you” then left the room.

Minum had just finished treating the former Samdiny’s wounds. Her leg didn’t look like a dark red, gory mess anymore. “How’s she holding up?” I asked.

“She should be good to walk now,” Minum reported. “Don’t put too much stress on the leg or you’ll be face down in the street,” she said to the mare. She didn’t say anything as she got up and left the room with the slightest limp.

“So you’re sparing her because you want to be compassionate?” Minum asked.

“I’m sparing her so the Wastes can have another pony doing some good in it,” I responded. “Besides, I don’t like killing.”

“How do you know she isn’t lying?” she inquired. “She might just be saying that so she can leave with her life.”

“Don’t ask me how I know she’s good, OK? I just know. Sometimes ponies give a clear indication, other times, I just know. I can’t even begin to explain it.” Throughout my life I always was able to figure out so much about ponies just from their visage. Only sometimes did my strange ability fail me. “The same goes for Shadow,” I told her. “She’s just like that mare, and I trust them both.”

We had to finish opening the rest of these cages. It was a slow and tiring process, an easy process, but tiring still. We only had one key, making this even slower. Eventually, we got all of them opened. Most of them thanked us for saving them. We didn’t find much else in the rooms on the fourth floor, so we left to find Cor and Shadow.

We met up with them on the stairs down to the third floor. “Fourth floor’s clear. Did you find anything good?” I asked the pair.

Shadow informed us, “The motherfucking teacher’s lounge, hiding all the good shit. Chems, food, drinks, everything was there. It took forever to clean the place up, but we got it all. What about you two?”

“Samdiny were here. They use this place as a stop while they transfer ponies for Hard Light. The entire fourth floor was caged ponies,” I told them. There were far too many ponies in this building to be acceptable, even for Wasteland standards. I hoped I didn’t free them so they could walk into their deaths upon opening the doors. “Is the whole place cleared then?”

“It should be,” Cor said as we all started down the stairs. “What’s next after we get this stuff back?”

“Then we get weapons for the town’s defenses. Anypony know if there’s an armory nearby?” Everypony shrugged. “We could try going back to Mountain Dew’s shack, try finding information on Red Rum, and raid their armory,” I said. I was already planning to go back and see the rest of the safe house hidden in Mountain Dew’s shack. This would’ve been a perfect opportunity to check it.

“Good plan, kill two birds with one stone,” Cor said, “but are we willing to travel that far?” As much as I wanted to go back there the walk would have been torturous for all of us, and my legs weren’t up to the task.

“OK, we finish our jobs here, head back to the safe house, and see if we can’t find more on this bastard. Deal?” No pony gave any objection to the plan, and so we headed out the school. “Let’s head out then.”

I honestly didn’t expect the second school day to be this bad, but I put my hopes too high again.

* *           * * *        * *

We went back to Bedrock and paid a visit to Cobblestone. “Here are some of your supplies.” We dropped the supplies we got from the school.

“Wonderful,” he said with a pleased smile. “And the rest of the tasks we agreed on?”

“We’re working on them. We need some information on the ponies you wanted us to deal with first.”

“Well there’s a group called Sixty-Seventh Street Stealers, quite notable for what they’re named after. The gang’s been robbing us for some time now. I don’t even know how they do it. We have ponies watching this place and we’re still missing shit. They’re hideout is in a shopping center called Celestial Mall not too far from here. They might have my rifle too.

“And then there’s a pony named Carmine Coma. Pink coat, red mane, and she owes me money. She’s probably trying to get close with them. Two of my enemies ought to become friends. Go and kill them all, and bring my caps back.”

I nodded my head and we left his building. “I thought you said you didn’t like killing,” Minum said once we were outside.

“I don’t, that’s why I’m not going to. I’ll make sure those ponies don’t simply walk away, but I probably won’t kill them,” I responded.

“‘Probably?’” she questioned my answer.

“If they start shooting it’s going to be hard to be peaceful. That’s typically how it works. Peace and guns aren’t a very good match.” Part of me felt this wasn’t going to be as easy as I wanted it to be. I could hope though.

* *           * * *        * *

We were approaching the ruined Celestial Mall. Hopefully both of our targets were here, less work for us. We walked through the broken glass doors of the building.

It was dark. With my Pip-Buck’s light on I could see how ruined this mall looked. Was Cobblestone sure this was the right place? It looked like no pony had been in here since the megaspells dropped. Random junk cluttered the area and made the walking space smaller. Whatever light there was from the ever-cloudy day seeped in through the cracks and holes in the ceiling and walls. In the darkness the light seemed brighter than anything I’d ever seen before. Motes of dust floated around in the light.

Red bars filled my E.F.S. It looked like we had company. I took out my mother’s .44 with my magic and got ready for a negotiation, and possibly a battle, hopefully the former. The red bars floated all around me.

Were they above us?

A hairless mole rat came through a hole in the wall. The aggressive and unsightly creature with sharp claws and tusks gave a nasty snarl our way. “What about killing that?” I asked Minum. She took her pistol in her mouth. She hesitated to aim at it. “Is it too much?”

“No, I’m fine,” she mumbled through her weapon.

“Try shooting without S.A.T.S. first. Just stay calm. Calm your mind. Calm your breathing,” I said slowly. She took a few deep breaths. She stared intently at the mole rat. When she was ready, she pulled the trigger with her tongue. The bullet ricocheted off the ground next to the mole rat. “Try using S.A.T.S. this time. Let it do the work.”

“No, I’ll get this on my own,” she said adamantly. She took another deep breath. Another bullet bounced closer to the mole rat.

The mole rat started moving toward us. “It’s getting closer,” I said, “better deal with it quickly.” She nodded her head slightly. She closed her eyes and took a deeper breath. She was clearing her mind of absolutely everything. Her eyes reopened to stare at the mole rat. The gun fired a third time. Its bullet went straight into one of the mole rat’s eyes. That didn’t incapacitate it though. “And again.” Blood oozed out of the hole in the mole rat’s face. It was in pain, and she had to end it. Her tongue was still wrapped around the trigger, but she hesitated to fire again. “End its pain,” I told her. As it got closer she took a step back.

BANG!

The rat’s head exploded. Minum’s eyes widened in shock at the mole rat. She didn’t shoot it. I turned to see Cor’s shotgun floating and pointing at the mole rat’s head, or what used to be a head. “She hasn’t even been out of her stable for a day yet,” he said. “You can’t expect her to do these things so quickly. You have to let her adjust.”

“The Wasteland doesn’t let ponies adjust so easily. You know that,” I said. Cor, Shadow, and I were hardened by the Wasteland. After living in it for our entire lives we had to be. We needed to know how to fight whatever the Wastes threw at us. I didn’t expect her to be at our level, but I couldn’t let her get too comfortable with not having to shoot anything. Things were only going to get harder for all of us. She’d eventually leave us to search for her mother, and I needed to make sure she was prepared to take care of herself when the time came.

“Can we just keep going?” Minum asked after she put her gun away. Mole rats were still lurking around us.

“We’ll take care of it from here.” Cor gave Minum a reassuring smile. He was doing the same thing Mom and Dad did to us; he was sheltering her.

It took us far too long to realize Mom and Dad made a mistake raising us. We were nothing more than stable ponies who had never set hoof in a stable. And when the time came for us to do our job fighting and defending, we weren’t able to do it well.

We failed. That’s a mistake I won’t make while teaching Minum.

Minum was in the Wastes now, sheltering wouldn’t do her any good. I was taught how to fight and shoot at an early age, but I still don’t know much. I haven’t known or even heard of the places we’ve been to. I haven’t known of a prominent group of mercenaries. I didn’t even know what I was doing now. I wanted answers, but I didn’t know how to get any. I was hunting a ghost; there was nothing to be found, no traces left anywhere. That’s what sheltering and walking the same strip of land my entire life did.

A mole rat poked its head from the hole in the wall. This one didn’t wait for a pony to shoot it. It scurried our way. Two bullets shot out of Mom’s .44 and caused the mole rat’s head to explode in a bloody mess. Three more mole rats came from the hole and some from around a corner. I wasted no time in targeting the nearest one’s body in S.A.T.S. Two bullets cut through the air and both landed in its side. It fell down ten feet away from me.

Cor and Shadow took care of the other mole rats. Red bars were still floating around my E.F.S. Maybe they were the thieves we were looking for. Hopefully they were, and hopefully they didn’t hear all the shots we fired. “We’re making a lot of noise,” I said. “Let’s move before anypony comes.” We walked deeper into the mall. Parts of the second floor had collapsed onto the first. It blocked some stores and parts of the first floor, but also served as a ramp to the second floor.

We climbed up the ramp made from the collapsed floor. Red bars were still just above the entrance we came through. We slowly and quietly made our way over to the red bars. I peeked into a store to see four ponies talking in the middle. They didn’t have any guns or armor on them. There were six red bars but only four ponies.

Hopefully the other two won’t get in our way.

“How are we dealing with this?” Cor whispered from behind me.

“We’re not. I got this myself,” I whispered back with a confident smile. I came to talk to them, not kill them. Their lack of weapons was going to make this easy. My weapons were holstered and I approached the four ponies. “Howdy, fellas.”

The four turned to me in unison. “Who the fuck are you?” a green colt asked.

“Strange, I came to ask you the same question. Do you have an answer?” Judging from the graffiti behind them reading ‘Thug Life’ and a can of spray paint under it, I found who I was looking for. The green colt looked amongst the other three ponies for an answer. “You wouldn’t happen to be a gang of thieves would you?”

“What’s it matter to you?” he asked. I noticed two green bars sneaking around from behind me. They were getting ready for bullets to fly. I wasn’t going to have any bullets flying.

“I’ll take that as a ‘yes’. I came here to deliver a message. Stop stealing from Bedrock,” I said to the four.

“Or what?” he asked snidely.

I took a few steps closer to them. “Or you don’t get the luxury of living. It’s hard living in the Wasteland, and you’re only making it harder for the ponies you’re robbing from,” I said. I took another step closer to them, staring coldly into his eyes. He swallowed. The blue mare next to him nudged him.

He regained his composure and said, “So you want to fight? Do you really think you could beat all of us?” He wasn’t intimidated by me anymore, but his eyes didn’t want to meet mine. He was nervous and scared. It was all a facade.

“Keep acting tough, but it’s not getting you anywhere. You’re done being thieves. Loot vacant buildings like this one,” I said as I gestured my hoof to the shopping mall, “but don’t steal from others.”

“Where’s the fun in that though?” the blue mare next to him sneered.

“I don’t know. Where’s the fun in dying?” I mimicked her tone. That shut her up. “I’m also going to need your help finding a mare called Carmine Coma.” The green buck pointed his head to a door behind him. “Call her,” I commanded, “and don’t even think about moving.”

“Yo, Carmine, come out for a second! A pony wants to meet you!” he shouted. I hid beside the door.

“Who is it?” a pink earth pony mare with a flowy red mane asked as the door swung open. “Is the boss finally back?”

“No, but somepony else is here,” I said as I pushed her to the ground. My face was only a few inches away from her, and I said, “I’m looking for a few caps you owe to another pony.”

“What the fuck are you talking about?” she asked me. She looked at the four thieves who just stared on in shock. “What the fuck is happening?! Wait, is this part of the test?”

Perhaps she was trying to join them.

“You know what I'm talking about. Bedrock, Cobblestone, caps, ringing any bells?!” I shouted in her face.

“Oh, that asshole. Fuck him, they’re my caps! I didn’t work my ass off protecting his shit-hole of a town just so he could tell me I wasn’t getting my caps! Yes, I stole the caps, but they’re rightfully mine!” she yelled back from under me.

“You’re taking what isn’t yours. Give it back,” I said.

“They’re mine! I need them!” She was almost pleading at this point. Mom’s scoped .44 levitated into the air and pressed up against the side of her head. The eyes of the thieves watching us opened wider.

Minum came around the corner where I left her. “Whoa, whoa, whoa, what the fuck are you doing?” Minum asked. “I thought you said it was going to be peaceful.” It was. She just had to trust me.

“Just give the caps back or I shoot your FUCKING head off!” I yelled in her face. Of course I wasn’t going to shoot her no matter what, but I needed to make her afraid. I needed to give her a reason to give the caps back. Death was always a good reason, but sometimes it’s just not enough.

“Please,” she said gently with a few tears streaming down her face, “don’t do it.” She gave a glance to the door she came from in worry.

“Give the money back and I won’t have to.” I pulled the gun away from her head and shot less than an inch away from her. “The next bullet might be closer.”

“Mommy?” a filly called Carmine Coma. I turned to see a young filly that looked just like her mother. “What’s going on?”

“She’s your daughter?” I asked. Carmine Coma nodded her head. “What’s your name?” I asked the small filly, but she didn’t answer.

“Please, she needs her mother,” she said.

“But do you need her?” Her eyes widened in horror. This was the reason I was looking for. I turned the gun to her daughter. “No! Don’t you even fucking dare shoot her!”

“Suthain, what the hell are you doing?!” Minum yelled. “You can’t just… She’s just a filly! She’s so young!” I barely gave her a glance. There’s method in my madness, Minum. Dammit, just trust me. “Are you even listening to me?”

“My patience is wearing thin,” I said to the mare under me. I shifted the revolver slightly, and now it would only hit the wall. I started to gently squeeze on the trigger with my magic. An orange blur moved through my peripheral vision, and my gun wasn’t in my magic’s grip anymore. My eyes moved up to see Minum clutching Mom’s .44 in her hooves.

“I’m not letting you kill a child over a few caps. I even thought you were the good guy,” she said, disappointed in herself. “What good guy kills an innocent filly?” She put the gun down and started walking away.

“Dammit,” I said aloud. “Cor,” I called him, “stay here and deal with her. I’ll talk to Minum.” He walked out of the corner he was hidden behind and gave a nod of his head. I picked up the sleek black and purple revolver on the ground and followed the same path Minum took when she left.

I walked out of the mall and saw her walking through the parking lot. “Minum, wait!” I called her. She didn’t show any acknowledgement. “Wait!” I called. I ran to catch up with her. “Minum–”

“Leave me alone,” she said. I stepped in front of her path. She sidestepped me without even slowing down.

“Can we talk?” I asked.

“Leave me alone,” she repeated herself. She didn’t know my agenda. If she had known I used intimidation she wouldn’t be so mad, but why was she so mad over this?

“Why are you just storming off? It was just–”

“Do you want to know what it was?!” she immediately turned around and yelled in my face. “It was you ready to kill a filly! It’s bad enough you kill ponies, but now you’re threatening to kill a filly?! What the fuck is wrong with you?!” She punctuated the last word by thrusting her hoof into my chest.

“It was all intimidation. I wasn’t even aiming at her,” I said. “I needed to get the caps out of her, and that was a good way to do it.” What would I have even gained from shooting her? A dead filly, possibly a dead Carmine Coma, and a very angry pegasus, that’s losing on my part.

“I don’t want to believe you,” she groaned, “so why the fuck am I?” It was natural for her to not believe me. She was still so naïve. If it looked like I had a gun pointed at a filly she would believe I was ready to kill her. I knew the situation looked bad, but that was the point. I didn’t expect her to knock my gun free though.

“Maybe because you know it’s true. Even if you don’t want to, you know it is. You might even be trying to convince yourself that it’s not the truth, but it is.” I put my hoof on her shoulder. “Please, trust me. I’m not a liar.” She hung her head with a sigh. “Minum,” I said as I lifted her head and looked into her cyan eyes, “I’d never harm anypony so young and so innocent. That’s not the pony I am. I need you to know that.” She still looked at me doubtfully. What was it going to take to make her believe me?

“A part of me doesn’t want to believe you though.” She looked back at the ground, like she was reminiscing on something dark. She had a haunted look on her face.

“Something’s troubling you. What’s wrong?” I asked. I lifted her chin, “It’s OK. You can talk to me. I’m your friend, aren’t I?”

“This isn’t really something I want to talk about,” she said in a low voice. Dammit, why did all my friends have a dark past that they didn’t want to talk about? Shadow was a Samdiny and she knew absolutely nothing about herself or her former organization. Or maybe she pretended not to know anything. I’d find out the truth eventually. And now Minum was hiding too. “Can we just go back and deal with her?” she asked and pointed back at the mall.

“Fine, let’s go. Stay behind the corner this time. And trust me this time, please,” I said. We walked back into the mall and found Cor on top of Carmine.

“Just give us the caps. Do you enjoy making my life hard? Because you're making it pretty damn hard!” he shouted in her face. The filly still looked at her mother in worry. She was crying and scared of what would happen to her mother.

“Cor, let me handle this,” I said as I approached them. He got off her. “Well, now that a certain somepony isn’t here to interfere, maybe I can actually get something out of you.” I grabbed her and picked her up, and then I pushed her up against the wall. “Tell me where the fucking caps are!” I screamed into her face.

“Go fuck yourself! You’re not getting jack shit from me!” she yelled back at me.

“Your daughter wouldn’t want to see you gone, and I’m sure you wouldn’t want to see her gone.” Once again my gun turned in filly’s direction. She swallowed. “I’ll fucking do it. Don’t even think about fucking test me.”

“Please… don’t. She’s the only thing that keeps me going! I need her! Please, don’t do it!” she pleaded. She needed her daughter, but how badly did her daughter need her. Her filly raising herself in the Wastes and having to keep the memory of her mother dying in front of her very eyes would break Carmine Coma. The gun swung back around and pointed at the pink mare’s head.

“Then I should just kill you then. Can you live with that? You wouldn’t leave such a young filly in the world without a mother to help her, no mother to put her on the right path. How would you feel if that happened?” I asked her. Tears were falling down her face. I was breaking her. It was terrible what I was doing, but good still. “Hey at least she’ll live… or she won’t. She’s only a filly after all.”

“It’s in a safe in there,” she said, and she nodded her head toward the room she initially came from. “The combo is 10-28-15. Please, don’t hurt us. Don’t hurt her,” she said so gently with love for her daughter.

I let go of her and holstered the revolver. “Don’t let me catch you stealing again,” I said to her. “That’s not a very good influence on your daughter. It’s your job to teach her to be better than this.”

I walked into the dark room with little light coming in through the shuttered window. In it I found a broken desk, a broken terminal, and a wall safe. I put in the combo, and it opened smoothly. In the safe was a 10mm pistol and a small pouch with 1,250 Sparkle-Cola caps inside.

I found what we were looking for, but I couldn’t help but feel bad for taking this many caps from a pony who might have deserved them, especially a pony with a kid to raise. I walked back out of the room.

Carmine Coma was sitting down crying, holding her filly in her forelegs. “How many of these caps did you take from him?” I asked her, the pouch suspended in my magic.

“Half of them. He actually paid me the rest,” she said. I took eight hundred caps out of the pouch and gave them to her. She looked surprised by the gesture. “That’s more than half.”

“I know. Make a life for yourself and your daughter that doesn’t revolve around something immoral.” I turned to the rest of the Sixty-Seventh Street Stealers who were still staring in shock, and I said, “None of you better think of stealing either. At least try and have morals.” They nodded their heads vigorously and without hesitation. “I think we’re done here. Take care of your daughter,” I said to Carmine Coma. “Let’s go,” I said to my group as I started for the exit.

We were walking through the mall’s parking lot, and Minum said to me, “Today I learned how intimidation works.”

“I told you to trust me. I wasn’t going to hurt them. I was just trying to get what I needed out of them,” I said. I was usually the pony who interrogated and intimidated in the family. I could tell lies from another pony’s visage like nopony else, and I was good with shallow threats. I’m not sure if the last part’s good or bad, but it got the job done today.

“Why’d you give her the money? She was probably lying about half of it being her’s, and then you go and give her more than half. Good going, Suthain,” Shadow said.

“She wasn’t lying though.” She stopped in her tracks to give me a certain look. “What? I can tell that sort of stuff apart. Like I said yesterday, ‘I’m good like that,’” I said with a small smile. “Unfortunately, because of that I’m short a few caps.” Oh, well, she had a daughter to raise, and hopefully she would put those caps to good use doing that.

* *           * * *        * *

A filled coin purse dropped on Cobblestone’s rotten wood desk. “I got your caps,” I said “and a group of ponies won’t be robbing you anymore.”

“So they’re dead? You killed them?”

“Something like that,” I said with a satisfied smile, the smile you see when ponies find nothing but ecstasy in their kill.

He smiled too. “Hmm… I didn’t think you had it in you,” he said as he counted his caps. He looked frustrated as he finished counting, and he recounted and looked even more frustrated. “I’m short six hundred twenty-five caps. Any idea where they could be?” The caps he paid to her. He wanted them back now. She wasn’t lying though, I was sure of it. As for him… something’s up with him. I couldn’t place my hoof on what it was, but it couldn’t be that bad.

“No idea,” I said. He stared pensively at the neat stacks of coins. His eyes turned to mine. Did he think I took them? I didn’t take them, but I did give them away. He didn’t need to know that last part though.

“Oh, well, that’s a shame.” It’s not like they’re yours jackass. “I’m assuming they didn’t have my rifle then,” he said, and I nodded, “and you need to get the other guns the town needs.” I nodded again. “I’m sure you could find guns anywhere in the Wastes, but there’s one more place you could check for my magical rifle. A buck that used to work for me probably has it. If I know him he’s out hunting with it right now. Find him and kill him.” I nodded a final time and started to head out.

“He used to work for him?” I said as we walked through the lobby. “It seems like he has a problem keeping the ponies he hires. I wonder why that could be.”

“Do you trust him?” Cor asked me. Did I trust him? He was sketchy, no doubt about that, but it was hard for me to decide whether I trusted him or not. “Because I don’t trust him at all.”

“It’s hard to say.” Occasionally I couldn’t figure a pony out. There’s always an exception to each rule. Cobblestone was the exception to my rule. “It’s obvious he’s not a very likeable pony, but I can’t figure out anything more.” Why was he looking for guns though? What did he need them for? I settled his problem with ponies robbing Bedrock, so what else was to fear? Were there other ponies who would attack the town? Or would the ponies who lived here revolt? He needed some form of crowd control. They had a dick-biscuit leader, maybe they hated him. Did they hate him enough to revolt?

There was one friend who might help me with this though. We walked out of the stone building and into Bedrock’s courtyard. “We need to find Aurum. Maybe she can tell us more on Cobblestone.”

We walked around the town, keeping an eye out for her. Where the hell was she? Did she leave? Screw it. “Maybe she’ll be here after we finish running Cobblestone’s erra–”

“SUTHAIN!!!!” a voice pierced through the air. I turned around to see the gold mare we were looking for fly at me. She skidded to a stop only a few feet away from me. “Hiya!”

“Just the pony we were looking for. We need your help with Cobblestone. What do you think of him?” I asked.

“He’s… weird. There’s not much else I could say about him though. Everypony else I know loves him, but I try and stay away from him.” She didn’t know much about him, but she still chose to avoid him. Even she knew something was up with him. “Why do you ask?”

“Just wondering if I need to worry about him,” I said. He was making me take care of his enemies and getting him ready for what looked like a battle. If he starts killing, the blood will be on my hands. I just gave him the survivors from a stable as an army and now I was arming them. Fuck me. “Does Cobblestone have any enemies that you know of?”

“No, I don’t know anything.” Dammit.

“Anything? Has he been training you or anypony else in here for, well, anything?”

“Suthain, what are you–”

“Answer! Lives might be at risk here! I need to know everything you know.”

“I don’t know anything.” I sighed. I might’ve been getting him ready for a battle, and I realized now. Who would he be battling though? He said he needed it for protection, but protection from whom? “I’ll ask around. Maybe I can find out something. If I do I’ll tell you. What’s going on?” she asked with a frown.

“I’ll tell you as soon as I find out.” I needed to find out soon. How long could I pretend to be blind? He was crafty and had a certain charm that kept these ponies blind, but now that I knew, I could work on figuring him out. But how long until he’ll figure me out though?

“It’s time to go,” I said to my group. “We’ll get his guns, and then I’ll decide whether to give them to him after I learn more about him. Aurum, figure out whatever you can. Tell me everything. Even the smallest details will help.” She gave a firm nod of her head. And so we headed out another time.

* *           * * *        * *

If this former worker was out hunting, then we should have been able to hear the shots. We wandered the desolate Neigh City trying to listen to any sounds. After almost an hour of walking, we heard nothing more than the sound of our hooves clopping against the asphalt.

“This is exhausting,” Minum said with a sigh. “Is this what it’s like to be an adventurer?”

“This is what it’s like to be a bounty hunter… Don’t become a bounty hunter by the way. All you do is this… walk around looking for a pony… forever,” Shadow said lethargically. This was boring. Another ten minutes and I’d be thinking about calling it quits. We might have been headed in the wrong direction all this time.

A sound echoed between the skyscrapers. I couldn’t tell if it was a gunshot or not, it sounded so distorted. My ears perked up, and I stopped walking and put my hoof in the air to signal everypony else to stop. The sound echoed again. Nothing appeared on my E.F.S.

“Minum, fly ahead and tell us if you see anything.” She responded with a ready nod and rocketed to the skies. “We need to keep moving toward that sound.”

The sound rang through the air again. We kept walking. The echo wasn’t helping us find the sound’s origin. “Suthain,” Cor called me, “I think we need to talk.”

“About what?”

“Minum. I think you’re pushing her too hard,” he said. I turned around to face him. “I know we’re in the Wasteland. I know this world is hard to live in. And I know you want to toughen her. But I think you’re pushing her too hard. She’s been in the Wasteland for less than a full day, and you’re already expecting her to kill.”

“Yeah, kill a mole rat. I asked her if it was too much, remember? She said she was fine. You stepped in and took the shot for her after she said that.” I checked to make sure she was fine, but somehow I was still wrong?

“Dammit, Suthain. Aren’t you supposed to be able to figure ponies’ out just from their face? She was obviously having a hard time doing it.”

“She was going to do it though. She had a choice to do it or not. Why would she do it if she didn’t want to?”

“Because you pressured her into doing it!” he yelled. Shadow had been staring at us awkwardly since this whole thing transpired. “Shadow, who’s right here?”

She looked at everything but us for an answer. “Um… Yeah, I think I’ll stay out of this. I’m just going to… go that way. Hope this doesn’t get too out of hand while I’m gone. Bye!” she said in an unusually cheerful voice. It wouldn’t have been too unusual, but it was Shadow; I didn’t expect that from her. She trotted away in the same direction Minum flew and in the same unusually cheerful matter.

Shadow’s weird.

“Please, Suthain, just go easier on her. She’s lost her family, friends, home, everything, and now you’re making her adjust more quickly than she can. Just slow it down,” Cor said.

“I’m just trying to get her ready for the life she’s been forced into. She’s going to leave us eventually to search for her mother, and I want her to be ready when she does,” I told him. Another dissonant sound rang through the air. “Cor, trust me. I know what I’m doing.”

“You don’t this time, Suthain. Let me spend some time with her,” he said. “I trained you, I can train her.”

“Yeah, but she’s not me, and she hasn’t been accustomed to the Wasteland yet. It’s going to be harder to teach her,” I said matter-of-factly. “It’s like you have a damn crush on her or something.” His face instantly reddened when I said that. “Wait, do you?” I asked.

“What? No! I mean… All right so she’s kinda cute. So what? This isn’t about that. This is about you doing a bad job of making her ready for what’s ahead,” he said. How? I was teaching her the one thing any Wastelander needed to know how to do, shoot. “Just let me take care of her for a while.”

He did a good job of changing the topic from his romantic desires to my failing ability. I almost forgot about it for a moment.

The orange pegasus we had been talking about dove down and landed between us. “OK, so I might have found the guy we’re looking for,” she said to us. Cor and I looked between her and each other. “What’s up with you two? And where’s Twisted Shadow?”

The sound echoed around us again. “She… ran ahead of us,” I said vaguely. “So what did you find?”

“I found this buck shooting at weird mutated… things.” Animals that absorbed too much radiation became mutated and eventually led to a new species, like the mole rats we had been fighting. “He’s far from here, but it’s not too far. Just follow me,” she said, and she started walking down the street.

I noticed four red bars and a single green bar over my compass. If they were on my compass, then the walk couldn’t be that long. We walked down a block and turned the corner, and we bumped into a group of Samdiny and Shadow who was the one green bar.

Slightly confused, I gawked at the group in front of us. “Uh… and there they are,” Shadow said and pointed us. Guns pointed at all of us. What was happening? Shackles appeared on my forelegs and I didn’t even notice it.

“What the fuck is happening?” I asked Shadow. Why was she with them? She barely gestured her head toward the white coated officer next to her.

The white earth pony officer said, “By order, you are to be captured alive.” I knew it. Shadow more aggressively gestured her head toward the officer. Yes, that was a pony, Shadow. Good observation…? What was she trying to tell me? “And you,” he turned to Shadow, “are to be captured dead or alive.”

“Awh… what? I helped you though!” she complained as shackles wrapped around her forelegs too. “I’m one of you!”

“You also murdered half a safe house while it was packed and destroyed half the safe house itself,” he reminded her. “One of us? Do you even believe that?”

“That’s what you get. Karma’s a bitch ain’t it?!” Cor yelled at Shadow.

“Minum, get out of here,” I commanded her. Her wings were free. She could leave. But why wasn’t she? “Minum?”

“Tape her wings down,” the officer commanded another Samdiny.

“Oh, shit,” Minum murmured. She took a few steps back before the Samdiny pony pushed her onto the ground. “Get off me!” she yelled as she tried to fight the pony off.

“Don’t worry. It won’t hurt too much, but we all know that’s a lie,” the mare on top of Minum said with a chuckle.

I wasn’t going to let this happen. I hopped behind the pony, wrapped the chain of my shackles around her neck, and brought her to the ground so she was on top of me. She struggled to get the chain out, but I wasn’t loosening up. I didn’t even think about letting go until—BANG!

It felt like I went deaf out of my left ear.

“Let her go,” the officer said with his combat shotgun pointed at my head. The smoking shell of the previous shot was in the ground a few inches away from my head. “In case you haven’t noticed, we’re Samdiny. We don’t care that much for orders. I’ll kill you if I have to. That’s what they’re going to do in the end anyway.”

I needed a furtive way of getting a gun and dropping all of them at once. It wasn’t like my horn was damaged to keep me from getting Mom’s .44, but I couldn’t do that without a shotgun shell blowing its way through my brain first.

“You’ve got five seconds.” Shit, I needed a plan fast. “Five.” He could see my horn light up if I used my magic to grab a gun. “Four.” I could turn my entire body and take him down with my hind legs. “Three.” I could let her go and take him down with my forelegs. “Two.” Somepony else could shoot him. I took a quick look around, but nopony else was even moving. “One.” I let her go. The chain restricting air and blood flow loosened, and she rolled off me. She groaned and rubbed her neck. “Good,” he said, “now stand up.”

I took another quick look around before I stood up. No pony had a gun up except for the officer. If only I noticed this while I was still choking her.

This was my chance to take him down.

I stood up and tapped the ground a few times with my hind leg. C’mon, Cor, you know what that means: shoot. Shoot, dammit. What are you waiting for? I couldn’t wait any longer for him.

I leapt through the air and pushed the officer to the ground. I knocked the shotgun out of his mouth and grabbed it with my magic. Shotgun shells flew through the air at the other Samdiny ponies, and their bullets flew at me. Bullets flew into my body and a few into my head. I wasn’t going down though. I was going to kill all of them except Shadow because I needed to know what was going through her mind. I kept pulling the trigger, but I only heard a clicking sound. I was out. I hit the side of the officer’s head with the shotgun three times. He wasn’t knocked out, but he was rocked.

I threw the shotgun away and pulled out Mom’s .44. A quick use of S.A.T.S., four bullets later, and all the Samdiny were on the ground. I beat the officer over the head with the revolver. He was out cold now.

“What. The. Fuck. Were. You. DOING?!” I yelled in Shadow’s face. Blood dripped from the side of my face into my eye. I waved Mom’s .44 in front of her face. Her eyes widened in shock.

“She fucking sold us out!” Cor yelled. “I told you we shouldn’t have fucking trusted her!”

“Get the key off the officer, Cor,” I told him. “Minum, get me a healing potion.” He tripped toward the officer’s unconscious body to get the key. “You,” I turned back toward Shadow, “what the fuck were you doing?!” The shackles fell from my forelegs as Cor twisted the key he found on the officer’s body.

“I know this looked bad, but I can explain.”

“Oh, you can explain?” Cor walked in between us. “You better fucking explain before a bullet goes right up your ass!”

“Cor, calm down,” I said as I put my hooves on his chest and shoulder and made him take a step back. “He’s right though. You better have an explanation.”

“I ran into them in the road. They knew I was with you guys, so they made me sell you out. I expected you to drop them the second you saw them, not nearly get captured,” she said. She was the green bar on my E.F.S. Why would she be green if she betrayed us? “I’m sorry.”

Maybe she was telling the truth. Maybe she was trying to tell me to shoot the officer when she gestured at him. That would at least make some sense. Cor didn’t look happy as he finished taking everypony’s shackles off. Minum gave me three healing potions from her saddlebag. I drank all of them and felt the relief as my body began to heal itself.

“All the trust you had in me…” Shadow put her hoof in the air. As she slowly waved it through the air and closer to the ground she said, “And there it goes, gone… Fuck.” She wasn’t trying to sell her story by acting sad, this was genuine. “I’m sorry,” she said again. “Please, forgive me. If you leave me, then I won’t have anywhere else to go, and I don’t want to get involved in something as stupid as the Samdiny again.”

Cor was going to hate me for doing this, but he was wrong here, not me. I put my hoof on her shoulder, and said, “It’s all right. Just don’t be that stupid again.”

Cor stared at me in pure shock. “You’re fucking kidding me, right? How can you actually believe her?!”

“Dammit, Cor, trust me! I’m your own brother. You’ve seen me able to pick apart a pony with ease. I did it when we paid a visit to Carmine Coma and I did it again with Shadow. I get it, you don’t trust her, but trust me!” I said. Did he have something personal against Shadow? When it came to Carmine Coma he trusted me, but not with Shadow.

“I’m telling you now, Suthain. She’s going to screw us over eventually, and it’s only going to hurt more as we get to know her more. Cut the ties early,” he said.

“No. Learn how to trust her because she’s staying with us. I know what I’m doing,” I said.

“Oh, you know what you’re doing? Then why haven’t we been able to find anything on Red Rum?! All we’ve done is walk across half the Wasteland, find a stable, and run fetch quests for some dickhead!” he shouted in frustration. Maybe I didn’t know what I was doing. I hadn’t gotten us anywhere since Mom and Dad’s death.

No, I was doing something. I saved prisoners. I saved ponies from a stable. I gave those stable ponies a better home. I put ponies on a better path in their life. I was doing the right thing. I was doing Mom and Dad’s work. I was helping. I didn’t fail…

“Do you think you could do a better job leading us?” I asked.

“I didn’t say that.”

“Then trust me. Put your faith in me as your leader,” I said, “and as your brother.” His lack of faith actually hurt me. We were brothers, and he didn’t have any reason not to trust me.

“Fine, I trust you,” he said, “but that doesn‘t mean I trust you.”

“Cor, trust her. She’s not going to betray us. The only thing she’ll do is something stupid… again. Which I’ll make sure won’t happen, and if it does, blame me. I’ll take full responsibility,” I said.

“Geez, you make one mistake and suddenly everypony’s worried you’re going to make more mistakes,” she said quietly but loud enough for us to hear. “It was one fuck up, for Celestia’s sake! And you don’t have to worry about something like that ever happening again.”

I hadn’t heard the gunshot in a while. Maybe he heard ours and ran. “Don’t think you’re getting off scot-free,” I said to Shadow. “You almost got us captured, and our target’s probably gone now. You did a good job fucking us over. Is this why half the Samdiny hated you?” She turned away from me with a look of anguish. Was that too much? Too personal? “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said that.”

“It’s not that. It’s something else. And they don’t hate me. They outcasted me,” she said. She opened her mouth like she wanted to say something, but nothing came out.

“Do you want to talk about it?” I asked her. She gave a slow shake of her head. “Just help me figure out what’s wrong with you.” Did Minum and Shadow plan to look hurt and not tell me what was wrong?

“No. You asked me before and it’s still no. It’s not going to change.” She was saying that now, but she’d open up eventually. I just had to get closer to her and give her time.

“You have to open up eventually,” I said.

“We’ll see.” She dismissed the issue. “Let’s keep going. We have a pony to find, don’t we?” she said with a sad smile, and then started walking the direction we had been before our run in with the Samdiny.

Now we had to try harder to search for this pony. We’d get it done though. We’d find our pony. It didn’t matter if it was Red Rum or the ponies Cobblestone sent us after; we’d find them somehow.

* *           * * *        * *

We spent another hour walking down the roads of Neigh City while Minum flew over us to get a bird’s eye view. We already passed the road where Minum said she saw this buck with the gun we were looking for, but we weren’t able to find anything more than a dead brahmin and two dead ponies next to it. One wore leather armor while the other wore a yellow jumpsuit.

Perhaps he wasn’t just hunting other animals. It looked like he didn’t hold discrimination for what he hunted. He probably shot them then left as soon as he heard out shots. He didn’t even take the brahmin’s meat or armor. More food for us and armor for repairs.

Minum was slightly opposed to eating it, but after hearing her stomach rumble for quite some time she succumbed to the hunger. Even though she didn’t want to, she realized she had to. At least she was getting used to one rule in the Wastes.

Minum flew down to us. “We’re not getting anything,” Minum complained. “It feels like we’ve been doing nothing for ten hours.”

“Maybe we’d be closer if somepony hadn’t fucked us,” Cor said harshly. He was still mad at Shadow. I was too, but he refused to let it go.

“It was one fucking time,” Shadow said, clearly tired of us bringing it up. She stopped walking. “Sorry I’m not as flawless as you are, asshole! Unlike you, I make mistakes like a normal pony! What? Are you a fucking god among us? Are you equal to Celestia and Luna?”

“No, but unlike you I don’t nearly get us captured and killed, and let our guy get away! When I do that you can throw it back in my face, but it won’t happen. Do you want to know why? Because I use my fucking brain! Try it one day!” he yelled in her face.

This was going to get bad soon. Maybe letting them fight it out was better though.

“Why don’t you fucking let it go?! Huh? Why don’t you try doing that one fucking time?!” she yelled at him. Their faces were only inches apart. “Or is this to prove how much better you are than everyone else? How perfect you are?”

Suddenly Cor tackled her and started throwing his hooves at her. She covered up well, but she wasn’t a match for Cor. If he couldn’t hit her face, then he’d target her ribs, and vice versa.

Unlike her fight with that Samdiny leader, I was not going to let it go on.

I came from behind Cor, grabbed him and pulled him back on top of me. I wrapped my right foreleg around his neck and put the hoof of the other foreleg behind his head. I placed both of the hooves on my hind legs firmly on his hips.

I was choking my own brother, and this wasn’t one of our sparring sessions. It felt… unnatural.

“Cor, calm down!” I shouted in his ear. He struggled to escape from the chokehold. “Calm… down…” I said slowly. He stopped trying to escape, composed himself, and then tapped my shoulder a few times.

I let go of him, and he rolled his body off from on top of mine. He sat down and rubbed the sides of his neck where I applied the pressure to his arteries. He gave a sigh and said, “Shadow, I’m sorry. I was mad and I let that anger do something I wouldn’t have done otherwise.” He was too embarrassed to give her more than a glance.

She stood up and sat next to him. “It’s all right.” From the look on his face, I could tell he didn’t think it was all right. Mainly because he wasn’t acting like himself. “We all make mistakes, right?”

“I guess so,” he replied quietly. His head hung low and his ears drooped.

“I think it’s time to keep moving,” I said. Cor gave a slow nod of his head before standing up. He gave a sigh. Was he mad or disappointed in himself? He felt something, but I couldn’t tell what it was. He needed some comforting, but now wasn’t the time. We were on a ponyhunt. I’d help him after our job for Cobblestone was finished.

We kept walking down the asphalt road. Minum went back to flying over us. He still looked sad as we walked. Maybe he needed my help now. I let Shadow walk ahead of me.

“Are you all right?” I asked Cor. “We can talk if you want.”

He hesitated to respond, but he finally answered, “No, I’m fine.” He wasn’t fine, and he sensed my doubt after looking in my face. “Honestly, I’m fine,” he said. Anguish was quietly lurking among his facial features.

“Come on, Cor. We’re brothers. I know you, and I know when you’re hurt.”

“Can we talk about this later?” He looked at Shadow who was still walking in front of us. “Please?” I nodded my head.

All of us were slowly hurting more. All of us were struggling with our past demons or our new demons. I’d find out the truth in all of them eventually, and then I could finally help them. But until them, I had to suffer with them.

* *           * * *        * *

It was getting dark, and Minum had been gone for some time now. She flew away from us to try to find our buck while we rested in a small intact warehouse. Cor still didn’t want to talk. He just sat in a dark corner while we waited for her return.

That incident with Shadow must have bothered him deeply, but why? It didn’t bother any of us that much. Shadow forgave him, so why couldn’t he forgive himself? Unless it was something else bothering him, but what was it?

An orange streak zoomed past the open door of the building. It came back, this time going through the open door and coming to a halt in the middle of the open warehouse. Minum breathed heavily as she stood in front of us and said between breaths, “I think I found him. He’s holed up in a building that’s about two blocks away. He shouldn’t be going anywhere; it looks he’s getting ready for the night.”

“Time to go, then” I said. We all stood and got ready to depart. Cor was slow to stand and walked behind all of us. We needed to get this done quickly because I needed to help my brother.

Two blocks later and we found the parking garage Minum saw the buck in. It was pitch black inside, not a single light.

“Are you sure this is the place?” Shadow asked Minum.

“Positive. I saw him walk in and he settled further inside.” Maybe this was the perfect place to hide, nice and dark. Who would think a pony was in here? Not us obviously.

Three Pip-Buck lights turned on before any of us started walking in. The clopping of our hooves echoed throughout the parking garage. Our lights were on and we were loud. If this was the place, then he knew we were here. Surprise wasn’t an option anymore.

“Search every little section of this place,” I said as we walked down the ramp carriages once traveled down. Rubble from the ceiling and the walls occasionally blocked part of the entrance. How did he walk through this in the dark?

This seemed like a perfect place for ghouls to hide. If a metro tunnel wasn’t close, then similar underground tunnels that made a totally different parking garage would make do for anypony trying to survive a megaspell holocaust, but even those who did hide underground had to experience ghoulification. Anypony, even the sentient ghouls, considered that process worse than death.

A green bar popped up on my Pip-Buck. He was somewhere in here. No red bars though, thankfully. We started to make our way to the green bar. As we continued down the ramp, I could see a bright light that told my pupils to constrict themselves. So he did have lights.

We walked around the curve and saw the white light emanating from a booth. Upon approaching the booth, a bluish-gray buck arose and his battle saddle with two rifles, one an intricate connection of tubes with a green glow coming from the barrel, pointed at us. “Freeze, fuckers,” he said in an accent. We all froze and didn’t even think about taking another step. “What do y’all want? Ya here t’ kill me?”

“No, we want that gun you stole back,” I said.

In less than a second and without taking us out of his sight, he unhooked a sniper rifle from his battle saddle and threw it out from the broken booth window. “There’s yer rifle. Now git out ‘fore I start shooting.” Cobblestone said it was a magic rifle. My bets were that the fancier glowing rifle was the one he was referring to, not the simple black sniper.

“We’re looking for the magic rifle that you stole. Mind giving us that?”

“I didn’t steal no magic rifles. I took that there rifle on the ground, nuthin’ more, nuthin’ less.” He wasn’t even a good liar. I levitated the sniper and examined it. I suddenly turned it so the crosshairs were right between his eyes.

“Very strange how that gun in your battle saddle has the name ‘Cobblestone’ etched on the side. Your name isn’t Cobblestone though. Why do you have it then?” I was talking out of my ass. I could barely make out the intricacies on the rifle from here, but if he looked down to check, I could shoot. He seemed to know that too.

He paid a quick shift of his eyes down to the glowing rifle. “Ain’t no Cobblestones Ah know of. ‘Cept the rock, but Ah ain’t know of no rocks ownin’ guns neither. Now Ah’m telling y’all t’ leave ‘fore things get ugly. This gun’ll turn your body int’a pile of goo ‘fore you can say ‘Sweet Celestia.’”

“Somepony wants his gun back. I think you should give it to him ‘fore things get ugly,” I said, mocking his accent.

“No. I ain’t givin’ that bastard back none of what I took. That ass don’t deserve nuthin’, which is why I ain’t givin’ nuthin’.”

This was a chance to see what a pony knew about Cobblestone. “Why do you have a problem with him?”

“He’s a fucker gettin’ ready to destroy what used to be a great town. He don’t even know what he’s doin’ is wrong. Bedrock used t’ be a good place. Ah know it was when Ah first moved in there. But now that numbskull’s ruining it all. I wanna buck that buck so hard in the face that his head snaps in two.”

“How’s he ruining it?” I asked. I didn’t even care about the rifle anymore. I just wanted to know more about Cobblestone. It looked like he’d forgotten the reason I came here too; he was calm and the magic rifle wasn’t pointed near us. I aimed the sniper at the ground. Shots weren’t going to be fired.

“We went from hidden to militarized. That’s how he ruined it. We ain’t fighters. We could be, sure, but we’re s‘pposed t’ be hidden in the Wasteland, not ready t’ fight his war.” So he was starting a war. “He wants t‘ start conquering.” I needed to talk him out of this.

“Give me the rifle,” I said.

He kicked back into an alarmed state. “No! That buck ain’t goin’ t’ war without his gun. So I ain’t givin’ it back.” Our rifles were pointed at each other again.

“Don’t make this difficult. I’m not going to let him start a war, but I’m not going to let you get away with stealing a prized possession,” I said. “How would you feel if somepony stole something valuable to you?”

He thought for a moment, and then said, “That depends. Am Ah an asshole? Cuz’ if Ah am then what the hay am Ah complainin’ ‘bout. Ah probably had it comin’.”

“That’s not the point. The point is that you did something wrong. Now I want you to give that gun back. Do something right,” I said.

He looked at the gun then back at me pensively. “Why should Ah trust you? How do Ah know you ain’t jus’ trying’ t’ get in muh head. You might be helpin’ Cobblestone start a war.”

“Trust me because I’m not the villain here. Cobblestone is, and I’m going to stop him.”

“Then why do you need the gun? Let me keep it.”

“It’s not yours. Give it back. I promise I won’t let him start a war.” He thought again as he looked between the gun and me.

He took a breath before asking, “You promise muh town ain’t goin’ t’ war?”

“I promise.”

He took the glowing green rifle out from his battle saddle and tossed it my way. I levitated the sniper rifle back into his possession.

“Ah’m trustin’ you. If Ah find out that sonuva’ bitch is starting a war Ah’ll be comin’ for the both of you without any mercy,” he said gravely. In a sudden change of tone he asked, “Is that a pegasus without a battle saddle?”

“Unfortunately,” Minum responded.

“Ah think Ah got a spare with me. Hold on a sec,” he said as he turned and dug through his possessions. “Got it!” He held the battle saddle in his mouth and walked over to Minum with it.

“Oh, you don’t have to. I feel guilty taking it,” Minum said.

“It’s nuthin’, just a lil’ hospitality.” He put it over her and tightened it making sure it fit properly. “Fit all right?” he asked with a charming smile.

“Perfect. Thank you,” she said with a thankful smile.

“Ain’t nuthin’, miss. He outstretched a hoof toward me. “Well, pleasure meeting you, uh…”

“Suthain,” I said my name as I shook his hoof.

“Name’s Saber Tooth,” he said with a smile that showed one incredibly sharp tooth. Our hooves parted and we left the buck so he could sleep.

He seemed like a good buck. All he wanted was the best for the town he lived in. I wasn’t going to break my promise to him. I was going to stop Cobblestone from trying to start an empire. I wasn’t sure how, but I was going to stop him. I put innocent stable ponies in that town. They’d been through hell in their old home, and I wasn’t going to let them be put back through hell in their new home. I refused to allow that to happen.

We got a lot of work done today. Why couldn’t we get this much done on any other day? And now that our jobs were over, I could finally give Cor the attention he needed. And so we started our long trek back to Bedrock.

* *           * * *        * *

“Cobblestone, we need to talk,” I said as I pushed open the door to his office. He was up late, but it was fine with me. Now we had a chance to talk about this conquest.

“About what, friend? Before I forget did you get my gun?”

“Shut up about the fucking gun. Why are you arming your town? You’re making us get weapons for yourself, you’re town, and we’re killing off your enemies. Why are you making us do this?” I asked. Saber Tooth told me about his war, but I wanted him to hear him say it.

“Slow it down, kid,” he said. “They’re just precautions I need to take. I don’t want my town falling apart from a few enemies.”

“I killed your enemies already. What are the precautions for?”

He hesitated to speak, but he managed to say, “You know, just in case.” My eyes stared into his, but he wasn’t intimidated at all.

I leaned over his desk and said into his face, “You’re going to tell me what you’re planning, or I level this building with everypony inside of it.” He still wasn’t intimidated. He just sat there with the same charming smile that was always on his face. “I’m not joking,” I said grimly. “This shitty mess of stone won’t withstand a few grenades and a specialty bomb.”

“Do it,” he said intrepidly. “You won’t.” Maybe I wasn’t going to blow up this building, especially with ponies inside, but I had no problem hurting him.

I jumped over the desk and tackled him onto the ground. I put one hoof on his shoulder and the other on his body, lifted him, and pushed him against the wall behind him all in one fluid motion. We were both standing on our hind legs as I moved the foreleg that had been on his body against his neck. A little pressure and he wasn’t going to be breathing.

“What are you fucking planning?” I asked through gritted teeth. “I’m not playing anymore. I want answers.”

“What are you gonna do, small fry? Beat me up? We both know I’m much bigger than you.” Most bucks were bigger than I was. I matched his height, but I was much skinnier. He was much more muscular than me, but that didn’t mean I couldn’t deal strong blows. I threw an elbow to his left cheek. He grunted in pain. “What do you think you’re going to get out of me?”

“I was hoping you would tell me,” I said, and then threw another elbow at the same side of his face. A cut was already appearing; I was fairly disappointed with how quickly it took to break his face. He wouldn’t last a minute in a real fight. “Wanna talk?”

“Nope,” he answered. I grabbed the back of his head and pulled it down. I alternated between throwing my left knee and my right knee at his head while I kept it down. I threw an uppercut while I held his head down and he was rocked.

“Ready to talk?!” I shouted in his face. “I could keep at this all night, but can you?” I gave him a second to recover from being rocked, but then I immediately threw a hook at the left of his face and a headbutt. “Talk!”

Blood dripped down his face from right under his left eye. His nose was bleeding and maybe broken. He smiled to show his teeth covered with nothing but blood, and he said, “What do you want from me?”

“You fucker,” I threw another elbow at his cut, “just talk!” Another elbow. And another. And another. I didn’t want to stop. I was raining bombs on the one side of his face. His smile had already faded.

“Suthain,” I heard Minum’s voice call in worry as she grabbed the foreleg that was devastating his face, “I think it’s time to back off.” He was knocked out. I didn’t realize that until Minum stopped me. I gently laid him down on his back.

“Can you help him?” I asked her. She gave a nod of her before kneeling down to work on him. “I want him to feel the pain in the morning. Can you manage that?”

“Why? Maybe he’s not the best of ponies, but isn’t that a little too much? Knocking him out was too much.” Maybe it was too much, but I needed him to get the picture.

“I’m sending a message. Next time we see him, maybe he’ll talk when he thinks back to this.”

She sighed and said, “Whatever,” before going back to her work.

We waited for her to heal him. She didn’t use healing potions. They would alleviate all the pain. She simply cleaned the blood, bandaged the two cuts on his cheek and nose, and checked if he had a concussion.

After spending some time with him, she concluded he was fine. She also whispered something in her ear, but I wasn’t sure what it was. Minum advised him not to sleep. Greater suffering for him, but it was good for me. I hoped he got the message. And hopefully his head was still hurting tomorrow.

We left his office and headed to our sleeping quarters. Our bags dropped and we were ready for sleep.

* *           * * *        * *

I woke up in the middle of the night from the smallest noise. I looked at the origin of the sound, Cor’s bed. Cor got up from his bed and started walking out of the room.

“Where’re you going?” I whispered. The ponies in here were already asleep, and I didn’t want to wake them.

“I’m going for a walk,” he said. Something was still bothering him. “I’m fine. I know you keep thinking about what happened earlier today, between Shadow and I, but I’m fine. You don’t need to worry about me.”

“All right, you’re fine. I get it. I’ll leave it alone,” I said. A sad and slightly forced smile grew on his face.

“Thanks. Don’t wait up for me by the way,” he said before leaving. I wasn’t going to leave him alone. I needed to figure out what was going on in my brother’s head.

I waited twenty seconds before walking out of the room in pursuit. He headed toward the roof. The same place I went when I felt troubled yesterday.

He sat on the edge of the building. I could just barely hear the sound of him weeping. “Cor,” I called his name. He turned to look at me. His eyes were watery. I never saw Cor cry much before. This was strange. “What’s wrong?” I asked as I walked toward him.

“Um… nothing. Nothing’s wrong.” My hoof fell on his shoulder.

“I’m not an idiot, Cor. Besides, I think I know when something’s up with my own brother,” I said with a compassionate smile. “Just talk to me.” I sat beside him on the edge.

“Mom and Dad are gone,” he said sadly.

I wrapped my forelegs around and pulled him into my embrace. Unlike the night when Mom and Dad died, I felt like I had to be strong for him, not the other way around.

“I know, Cor. It’s almost been a week, so why are you only crying now?” I asked.

“I don’t know. I cried a little when Mom and Dad died. I thought that made me normal, but it hardly affected me. That’s not normal is it?”

“What do you mean ‘it’s hardly affected you’? It changed our lives completely.”

“I mean mentally. I didn’t feel different at all. The only time I felt something was around the Samdiny and occasionally around Shadow. Today when I thought she tried to sell us out, I just snapped. And when I tried fighting her… I don’t know. I just felt different and… sad.”

“It reminded you of how they died. Am I right?” He didn’t respond. He just looked at me for help. “I think you need to learn how to trust her,” I said.

“I do now though.”

“No, if you did then you wouldn’t be feeling like this. You think she’s going to get us killed. That’s what you’re afraid of. You don’t want to suffer the same fate as Mom and Dad. Death scares you, especially dying the same way they did,” I said. “It’s OK. I understand it. You just need to open your trust to her, that’s the cure.”

“It’s hard though. I want to trust her, but I just… I just can’t,” he said. “How do you trust her so easily?”

“Because I know I can trust her. I know I don’t have reason to distrust her. Even though she used to be Samdiny I know she won’t betray us.” She didn’t have anywhere to go. The only thing she had was us now. She didn’t have a past she wanted to go back to, so she couldn’t leave us without leaving herself with absolutely nothing.

“I trust you. And I trust you trusting her. I want to trust her, but… it’s hard.” The pain showed on his face. It was understandable to not have trust in her, especially for a pony who lost his parents to the faction she was previously affiliated with. It took me some time to start trusting her, but I eventually did with time. That’s what he needed.

“Time. You have to give it some time. Give her some time so you can see she’s our friend. You need to realize she’s not a threat to us, so you don’t have to fear what she’ll do,” I said. He turned to me and hugged me.

In the same sad tone he’d been talking in since his incident with Shadow he asked, “How did you cope so easily when we lost them?”

“I didn’t,” I said. He gave me a confused look. “I suppressed it all.” Of course the memory resurfaced occasionally, but I chose to keep it away from me most of the time. I didn’t want to feel so broken again, so I chose not to. I tucked that night away into the back of my head because I didn’t want to remember it.

“That sounds phsychologically unhealthy,” he said.

“It’s the Wasteland; do you really think it’s the worst thing we could do to ourselves? It just matters that we endure,” I said.

“OK.” He hugged me tighter. “Thanks for caring, Suthain. Maybe a little help was what I needed after all.”

“I’m your brother. I’ll always be here for you,” I reminded him. “Don’t you remember what Dad used to tell us?”

“‘We walk together?’”

“‘On the road that doesn’t end with the views that never cease.’ We’ll stick together, until the end,” I told him. “Even through the worst of things.”

We finally let go of each other. “It’s late. We should get some rest,” he said. We walked back together and he passed out almost instantly. I couldn’t sleep though.

So I figured out my brother’s problem, now I just needed to fix Minum and Shadow’s problem. Maybe they needed time too. Time so they could open up to me and realize that talking to me could help them.

* *           * * *        * *

Dull, washed out light came in through the single window in the room. I lethargically rolled my body rolled out of bed. I was still a bit tired, but we had to make the most of the daylight.

My friends were still asleep even though my Pip-Buck said it was noon. There was one pony I wanted to see that wasn’t asleep. Or at least he shouldn’t be.

I walked over to Cobblestone’s office and pushed the door open. The bandaged buck was sitting against the window with a half-empty bottle of scotch pressed against his head.

He swallowed upon seeing me. “Y-You,” he said with trepidation. He regained his composure and asked in his usual confident manner, “Can I help you?”

“I’m done doing you favors. Get some other pony that’s too blind to see what you’re hiding to do this work because I’m done,” I said.

“What a shame. What will all those homeless pegasi do now? Unless, of course, you’re willing to pay for their stay,” he said.

“How much do you want?”

“Oh, say… hmm, two thousand sound nice?”

“No deal.”

He shrugged. “Well, good luck telling those ponies they lost their home… again.”

“What happens if I settle this with a bullet through your brain and a change in leadership?” I asked harshly. He was taken aback. Now that he knew I wasn’t afraid to use force, my threats were actually intimidating him.

“Fine, you don’t have to do anymore tasks. Just leave before your very presence starts annoying me,” he said. One problem was solved, now I had to make sure another didn’t start.

“If anything happens to the pegasi while I’m not here, I will unleash hell on you,” I said with eyes that emphasized how thirsty I was for more of his blood. “I’m still waiting for an answer. What are you planning?” I asked again.

“Nothing of importance. Well, not anymore,” he said. He looked back out the window as if he was longing for something more. “You’ve already ruined that dream.” Maybe Saber Tooth was right about him only starting his war while he had his precious gun with him. I ruined his dream by not giving back the gun. Unfortunately for him, I still wasn’t giving it back until I got a proper answer.

I left the room and went back to the sleeping quarters. I plopped onto the bed I had been sleeping in the past two nights.

My body still felt sore, my legs specifically, but I would endure. We would all endure, even through the worst of the trials ahead of us. I fought to stay awake and wait for everypony else to finally wake up. It couldn’t take too long, right?

* *           * * *        * *

I was gently rocking from side to side, almost as if I was on a boat. “Wake up,” a familiar voice commanded. “Wake up.”

The water became choppier. It wasn’t a gentle rocking anymore. “Come on. Just wake up.”

The water calmed. Everything was peaceful on my boat.

I closed my eyes for a moment and reopened them to find myself in a different world. The trio was standing next to my bed and Cor had his hoof on me. He must have been shaking me to wake up.

“You guys are finally awake,” I said sluggishly.

“Could’ve sworn I just woke you up, but yes we are awake,” Cor said. I must have gotten tired of waiting for them and fallen asleep myself. “We still have to stuff to do, so let’s go.”

“All right,” I said as I sprang out of bed. “I paid Cobblestone a visit. We’re not helping him anymore, the pegasi stay here for free, and we got a free gun for anypony who wants it.” They all looked amongst themselves, trying to decide who would get the rifle that would ultimately destroy anything. “So…? Who wants it?”

“How about a new addition to somepony’s new battle saddle,” Cor suggested. “What do you say?”

“I’m not into guns. Maybe one of you should take it,” Minum suggested.

“You’re going to have to start shooting eventually, kid. And when you do you might as well have a kick ass gun,” Shadow said to Minum. Eventually needed to come quicker. Waiting for her to come around to the concept of fighting other ponies regularly was going to be slow. Cor wanted a gradual change, but I needed her to change now. She needed to adapt quicker.

“Fine,” she said, “I’ll take the gun.” I took the plasma rifle from out of my bag and levitated it to her.

Her battle saddle already her assault rifle rigged up. I helped her hook up her new plasma rifle and I made the assault rifle more secure. She was armed to be one of the greatest killing machines anypony in the Wastes could come across, but she refused to harm another pony.

Absolutely wonderful.

We started our walk out of Bedrock. Everypony we passed was staring at us, at me. Maybe word leaked about what I did to Cobblestone last night.

They were either scared of me or thankful. I put their leader, who wasn’t a very likeable of pony to begin with, in his place. Maybe they were glad I did what I did. They could sleep well for a while knowing they didn’t have to worry about him possibly starting a war.

I helped them. At least I thought I helped them. Maybe I didn’t. Maybe they were afraid. I beat everything out of their still not likeable leader. Maybe they thought I was coming for them next. I was still looking for answers to my question after all.

I was leaving the town for now. I didn’t have to worry about it now. But as we started walking back toward Mountain Dew’s shack on the other end of Equestria, I couldn’t help but feel like I did something wrong. I left him in control of that town. Nothing bad would happen, at least I hoped not. But if it did, I would be to blame for it.

Footnote: Level up!

New Perk Added: Rapid Reload – All of your weapon reloads are 25% faster than normal.