2165 A.D.

Outskirts of New Flagstaff, Grand Canyon Province

It had been over nine years since the man had given himself a name.

Nine years of learning the skills necessary to be independent. Nine years of seeing the extent of human cruelty, and the height of human kindness, sometimes paradoxically in the same person.

Nine years of dying, again and again.

As the man let these thoughts roll through his head, he examined the pale flesh of his face, letting his gloved fingers trail their padded tips across his nose and cheekbones, the scars of his life's work conspicuous by their absence. Of the thousands of people living within the Grand Canyon Province and just a little bit beyond, several hundred of those souls had most likely become intimate with death in a way that the rest could never experience. Those several hundred, like himself, had died.

Died, and then come back.

The side-effects that each clone felt after respawning in a LifeNet pod tended to be different, and sometimes their equipment didn’t translate with them, forcing them to go back and get it before someone else did. A technological marvel before the Fall, most assuredly, but of those who LifeNet kept close to its cold, mechanical bosom, they could have no release from death.

For the man known as Kiako Lalene, that was perfectly fair. After all, an existence of pseudo-immortality was all he had ever known, and the thought of anything different was best not thought upon too much.

This was an ability that came with a small amount of baggage though. A person who could die but then come back, usually with their memories intact, made an excellent mercenary or worker, and the people of the Province had made the best efforts to exploit this unusual and relatively new addition to the populace.

If an explosive needed to be dealt with, a clone was sent to inspect it and try and dismantle it. For things that needed a rougher touch, a heavily armed and armored clone could be sent in to deal with whatever problem that came up, and eventually it would be solved: the clone had multiple tries, after all, to get it right. If there was something that needed to be dealt with that normal people couldn’t handle by themselves -or simply were loathe to do so- then all one had to do was wave down a passing clone and offer them a job. For this, clones were appreciated and a highly sought-after resource.

There was a drawback, though, when it came to fighting said clones: the same thing that made them excellent workers for dangerous situations also made them a foe to be reckoned with. Clones were just like any other human being, and had the same flaws that anyone else did. A fight between a group of people could result with deaths on both sides, and the survivors would then pick up the pieces. But if a clone was thrown into the mix, then the survivors of said battle had to be careful, as revenge is a seemingly inevitable human-like trait. People who could die with almost no consequences tended to not take things as seriously as for those where death was the truly end.

For all the respect that clones had gained, they had also gained the animosity of others. This was something that clones such as Kiako had learned to take in stride, because railing against things that couldn’t be changed had throughout history proved to be a fruitless endeavor.

This was also one of many reasons why clones were known to drink. Heavily.

*** *** ***

Kiako Lalene rested his elbows on the scratched countertop of Beauville’s Tavern, staring at the rows upon rows of alcoholic beverages that lined the shelves behind the bartender.

The bartender, seeing another customer, approached the staring man. “Anything in particular ya int’rested in, glitterneck?”

Kiako ignored the slur against him, and pointed a gloved hand at a green bottle sitting on one of the upper shelves. The bartender looked up, raising the tip of his stetson a bit so that it didn’t obstruct his sight. He gave a brief glance toward the bottle that had been chosen before looking back at the clone.

“Grain alcohol, aged two months in a plywood barrel. Expensive stuff. Got the chips for it?”

Several blue poker-chips clattered on the top of the countertop in response.

“Fair enough,” the bartender said, swiping the currency off the counter-surface and into a pocket. “I’ll get you a glass, or three.”

The clone nodded in response, thrumming his fingers happily against the countertop as he waited for his drinks. He took a moment to look around the tavern.

Sitting on either side of him were other patrons of the establishment, all of them wearing various forms of armor and weaponry that ranged from trenchcoats and shotguns to laminate armor and assault rifles. The more heavily armed ones had a more likely chance of being a clone, Kiako mused.

Behind him were several crowded pool tables, throngs of people excitedly cheering or booing the players every time the sound of billiard balls violently clacking against each other could be heard. The whole building was like that, with crowds of friends and family drinking and playing together that created a backdrop of overlapping conversations that made it difficult for one to eavesdrop on any specific one.

The sound of glass clinking against wood drew his attention back toward the bar, where two glasses of colorless liquid sat on the counter. Wrapping a hand around the first glass, he lifted it up towards the bartender - who was currently serving someone else - in a salute before downing it. He shook his head slightly as the harsh alcohol burned its way down his throat before settling in his stomach, and he immediately regretted not having something to eat earlier. Shaking his head for a moment, he set down the empty shot down before reaching for the second one.

Hunching his body forward over the counter, eyes closed, he brought the glass up to his lips and let the noxious fumes of the uncut alcohol burn their way into his noise. With a final wrinkle of his nose, he downed the harsh liquid.

And then he no longer felt the stool beneath him.

*** *** ***

Ten Years After the Day of Sunshine and Rainbows

Outskirts of Haybale, Equestrian Wasteland

Even two hundred years after the violent conclusion of the Great War, life had managed to find a way of making do with what was left of the aftermath.

While it was true that the few cities actually hit by the megaspells and balefire bombs were heavily damaged if not outright destroyed, the actual destruction of the resulting magical energies being unleashed upon their targets was constrained in a certain radii, depending on the make of the weapon. That being said, until recently many areas of the Equestrian Wasteland were contaminated with the fallout from magically irradiated debris that had drifted back down from the atmosphere to settle upon large swathes of territory, creating areas that only the highly prepared or foolish would even dare enter.

Magical radiation wasn’t the only “natural” hazard that had blighted the landscape though; there was also the magical mutagen that had lovingly been dubbed “Taint” by the inhabitants of the Equestrian Wasteland. Combined with the mutagenic qualities of Taint, and the deadly magical radiation that blanketed the lands, there was no shortage of both sapient and non-sapient creatures that had been transformed into slavering monstrosities over the generations.

With the Day of Sunshine and Rainbows, such afflicted areas had been purged of their corrupting contaminants, making them almost as livable as they had been over two-centuries previous. Now, with the Equestrian Wasteland cleansed of magical radiation and Taint, new areas had been opened up that had previously been unreachable. Buildings that had once been too dangerous to enter had quickly been scavenged for everything of potential value, as Pre-War goods and supplies were still in heavy demand.

The scavengers that hoofed through the wreckage of the past were only too happy to supply the demand.

*** *** ***

The mid-afternoon sun was doing its best to dissipate the unusual chill that had hung in the air since morning, its rays casting long, shadowy silhouettes of objects along the ground. A decade ago, the mere sight of the unfiltered sunlight would have been a moment of startling beauty to those who had lived on the surface all their lives. After having the sun no longer obscured by a pervasive cloud cover though, the sight had become commonplace and was no longer a rare treat. Just one of many changes that the Day of Sunshine and Rainbows had brought.

A lone earth-pony mare searched along the edge of a quarry, her body casting long, flickering shadows against the rusted iron fence that lined the lip of the long-abandoned dig site. Seeing nothing of interest, she moved on, trotting softly over to a small building that was elevated on a quartet of stilts that would have allowed one to oversee the area.

Thick leather padding covered the mare, starting at the base of her neck and trailing down to protect her chest, continuing from there to wrap around and envelop the trunk of her body, leaving only the beige coat of her hindquarters, head, and legs exposed. The only additional protection she wore were the leather bracers that ran from hock to fetlock on her hind legs.

The mare stopped at the edge of the ramp that lead up to the elevated single room building, her large, expressive pink eyes inspecting the weathered wood for any indication that it might not take her weight. The ramp looked to have once been solidly built, with large wooden supports hugging the sides of the inclined surface, keeping it above the rocky ground. Wooden slats ran along the center of the ramp, presumably once to provide traction in wet weather.

Letting out a small huff, she took several tentative steps up the ramp, the sound of her metal ponyshoes softly clunking against the wooden surface of the ramp raising a sense of unease within herself. She dipped her head, keeping her eyes on where she placed her hooves, the sudden and uncomfortable awareness that the ramp didn’t come equipped with railings being at the forefront of her mind. When the end of the ramp was in reach she quickly skittered up to the top as fast as she could, a light keening noise escaping from her mouth as she did so.

“Hate heights,” she muttered, shivering slightly as a chill that had nothing to do with temperature ran down her spine. “Brrr.”

Having ascended the ramp, she found herself at the entrance of the building. A dusty placard was nailed into the wall beside the door, and with a few wipes of her hoof she was able to read what it said. Apparently this had once been an office for whatever foremare had been in charge of the quarry during its operation. A quick glance from her elevated position and down into the quarry gave her a good view of numerous bits of machinery sitting around piles of rocky debris, the signs of disuse clearly evident by the layers of rust that had accumulated over the years.

Shaking off the chill that ran down her spine, she averted her eyes away from the quarry below her, doing her best to discourage the morbid thoughts of falling to a painful death. Turning to face the door, she tried the tarnished brass door lever with a hoof only to find that it wouldn’t budge. Muzzle wrinkling in irritation, she spun around so that she was facing away from the door and was looking down the length of the ramp instead. Instinctively lowering her center of gravity, she lowered her head closer to the wooden floor before quickly raising her hindquarters up in the air, the hooves of her hind legs slamming into the door with a terrific crack!

Letting her hooves fall back to the floor, she turned to inspect the damage she’d caused. She felt her mouth work itself into a cocky smile as she saw what she had wrought upon the door, which was currently dangling crookedly from its hinges but was no longer an obstacle blocking her path.

With a muted woop of victory, she dashed through the doorway to pillage whatever lay inside, quickly finding that perhaps she had been a little too enthusiastic about what she was expecting to find. Instead of the rows upon rows of gun lockers layered in jewels that the naive part of her fervently wished for, she found herself in a dusty little office that had only a desk and a few filing cabinets, the only layer of anything being a thick coat of dust that sat on every surface.

Her first few steps into the room kicked up a great amount of dust into the air, the silence of the room quickly broken by the sound of a series of whinnying sneezes that sent the mare’s body into a fit of violent spasms.

“I hate dust”, she muttered nasally after having recovered from the sneezing bout, her head drooping miserably as she walked toward the desk at the corner of the room.

A set of blinds covered the only window in the room, the staggered rays of light only serving to remind the mare of the allergens that drifted lazily above and around her. The scavenger began to pull open the various drawers that lined the sides of the desk, her muzzle scrunched up as she tried not to inhale any of the dust that she was displacing and sending into the air. She took a moment to shake her head in an effort to displace the dust that had settled on her shortly cut and auburn colored mane. As the dust was shaken free from her mane, she could feel it settling onto the fur of her muzzle. A tingling sensation in her nostrils warned her that another sneeze was due and, not wanting to blow more of that damnable dust in the air, she quickly brought up a foreleg to bury her nose into the coat over her knee before letting out a muted sneeze.

“Bleh.” She could feel the moistness of mucus on her knee, and in disgust she wiped the slime against the edge of the desk where it belonged.

Looking back at the drawers she started at the top drawer of the left side of the desk, rummaging around through the pencils and other office supplies that were within. Finding nothing useful, she hooked her hoof onto the drawer handle and proceeded to completely remove it from the desk, sending it to the floor in a clatter of pencils, pens, and notepads. The next few drawers were filled with more of the same: office supplies that were useful, but common enough that they wouldn’t bring in too much of a profit, considering the space that they would take up in the saddlebags hanging over her sides.

With several empty drawers and office debris scattered around her, she was faced with the one final drawer that had yet to be opened. Based on her experiences with the others, she wasn’t really expecting much when she drew the last drawer open. Her lip quirked as she stared at a dusty package laying at the bottom of the drawer, the small box’s brown parcel paper being as mottled with age to the same degree as all of the other pieces of paper she had found in the drawers.

Glancing around the room first, she hesitantly placed a hoof on the box before giving it a little shake. Her ears perked up as she heard the sound of a number of metal objects rattling noisily against each other, the sound akin to a bag full of bottle caps. Smiling at the mental image, she lifted the box clumsily from the drawer and set it on top of the desk before gripping a fold of paper between her teeth. Soon she was busy tearing away at the package, her front hooves set along the sides of the rectangular package to prevent it from sliding away as she sought to discover what lay inside.

With a final nip and tear, she tore off the last piece of paper, revealing a cardboard box that was missing its top. Paper fluttering down toward the floor as she spat it out, she set her front hooves on the edge of the table, bracing herself as she looked down into the box.

Numerous little rectangular tins sat at the bottom of the box, the paint of their orange and green lids starting to peel away in places. The writing on them was still plain to see though, to anypony who knew how to read:

Mint-als: Refresh your mind and your breath!

On top of the pile of tins was the folded shape of yellow paper. Curiosity piqued, she dipped her head into the box to retrieve the paper, setting it down onto the desk so that she could unfold it. After running a hoof across the paper to smooth out the creases, she saw that it was a note. She stared at it for a moment, her eyes narrowing as she read the messy writing:

Dear Pummice,

Here’s your weekly allowance of goodies for you to distribute amongst the staff. Make sure that you only give it to those who’re on our payroll. We don’t want another incident like last month now do we?

P.S. We changed the containers so that if anypony catches wind of what’s going on they’ll just think that these are the normal kind of Mint-als, not the usual PTMs we give out.

She felt a bad taste enter her mouth as she finished reading the unsigned note. Lips working themselves into a deep frown, she stared down at the pile of intentionally mislabelled containers. It left her saddened knowing that even before the Last Day, some ponies were thinking only of themselves.

Disheartened though she may have been, she knew that caps were the name of the game, and despite her misgivings about chems and the side-effects they had on ponies she knew deep down that if there was significant profit to be made, she would become a supplier.

Making her decision, she dropped back down onto all fours, just narrowly avoiding slamming her chin down against the edge of the desk. Moving a hoof over to one of the saddlebags hanging over her back, she worked at the clasp on her saddlebag before peeling away the leather flap and securing it to a piece of velcro that lined part of her barding. With the saddlebag open she moved her body against the edge of the desk and knocked the cardboard box onto its side, spilling its contents in a clatter of metal. With another sweep of her hoof, the metal tins were inside the awaiting saddlebag.

“Got that done, what else is there?” the mare asked once she had closed her saddlebag, the empty room giving no response.

Spotting the filing cabinets that she had overlooked earlier in favor of the desk she began opening the drawers, rifling through folders and papers with her hooftips noisily as the entire cabinet wobbled and groaned from the shaking the mare put it through.

Unlike the desk, the cabinets had nothing hidden away inside them, and instead only contained files of information that had long since become worthless, the papers themselves unusable even for drawing.

That being said, they made for great homemade confetti.

*** *** ***

Mouth still tasting faintly of old paper, the scavenger mare relaxed amidst the carnage of the office. Dozens of torn-up sheets of paper lay scattered throughout the room, their multi-colored scraps creating a layer of autumnal colors that obscured most of the hardwood floor. A draft of air drifted in from where a filing cabinet had been kicked through the office’s only window, the breeze sending a flurry of multi-colored paper across the room and eliciting a giggle from the mare when a piece of paper occasionally brushed over the exposed portions of her coat.

Shaking off a piece of paper that had settled on the end of her muzzle, she stared across the devastation that she had wrought upon the confines of the office, a small smile touching the corners of her lips as she did so.

While she had enjoyed acting like a foal, she knew that such things didn’t last. She was an adult, and even if she sometimes let her inner filly run free she knew that such carefree feelings had to be reigned in. The Lightbringer may have saved the Wasteland, but she hadn’t made it safe. Letting out a low groan, she reluctantly got up onto all fours and shook her body of any remaining bits of paper that clung to her before moving through the door, leaving behind the mess for nature to deal with.

As she stepped out onto the wooden platform that the elevated office sat upon, she took a moment to take in air that wasn’t tainted with the scent of mildew and dust. Sitting down on her haunches, she looked down at the quarry that was spread out before her, admiring the patterns that layers of rock made on the quarry walls.

Getting back up onto her hooves, she tore her gaze away from the quarry and began to make her way down the ramp, the rattle of tin on tin accompanying her every step down the weathered incline. The silence of the area she was in gave the rattle of metal an almost hypnotic quality about it, so hypnotic in fact that it took her a few moments to realize that the relative tranquility of the dig site had been broken by the sound of sudden screaming.

Body tensing up at the sound, she snapped her head towards the source of the sound, her ears pricking forward. A chill ran down her spine as she stared wide-eyed at the sight of some sort of flailing thing plummet toward a mound of gravel. Her heart skipped a beat, and she gasped in shock as the incomprehensible jumble of long limbs crashed onto the top of the mound, its screams cut short in a ragged gasp. Before her mind could struggle to formulate just what she had witnessed, the creature began moving once more, its limp body sliding down in a cascade of flowing gravel.

Giving herself a violent shake, she got out of the stupor she had found herself in and quickly galloped for all that she was worth toward a nearby slope that led into the quarry, knowing that whatever that thing was, it needed her help.

*** *** ***

The world was tumbling before Kiako Lalene’s eyes, both the sky and the ground seeming to revolve around him as his body failed to correct the spin it found itself in. Heart pounding frantically in his chest and his body stricken with terror, he let out out a piercing, wailing scream of fear as his view of the ground got closer each time he saw it.

His scream suddenly cut off in a wheezing gasp as the air was expelled from his lungs, his body coming to an abrupt halt as he slammed into something. The man was fortunate that his body had been spread-eagled when he made contact, the force of the impact spreading across his whole body rather than a specific area. Dazed and confused, his senses muddled and unreliable, he was unable to stop himself from sliding down the incline of whatever he had landed on, the only thing preventing him from tumbling down in an uncontrollable roll being that his backpack was in the way. The shifting debris beneath his body quickly delivered him to a flat surface, and he continued to slide for several meters before coming to a complete halt.

With a detached sort of awareness for his own well being, he had just enough time to watch as a cascade of displaced gravel flowed down toward him, quickly blocking the light of the sun as he was buried, trapped.

*** *** ***

The lone mare’s hooves pounded into dirt, a cloud of dust forming behind her as she galloped down the path that hugged the wall of the quarry. Her saddlebags rattled with every pounding hoof-fall, her knotted auburn tail rising and falling whenever her hooves did.

The view of the quarry was different when one was actually within it and not looking at it from above, as it is much easier to solve a maze when one is looking at all of it, rather than being in it. While the quarry could never be referred to as a maze by any stretch of the imagination, the mounds of gravel, machines, and equipment certainly did provide plenty of obstacles.

Good place to play hide-and-go-peek, the mare thought distractedly, bringing up her forelegs as she leaped over a rusty wheelbarrow.

It wasn’t too difficult to find the right gravel mound; the one that the creature had crashed into was smack-dab right in the middle of the quarry, and all she had to do was occasionally glance up at the foremare’s office to get her bearings. In a short amount of time she made her way over to the mound that she had been looking for, her metal shod hooves creating shallow furrows in the dirt as she skidded to a halt in front of the spot where she assumed the creature had been buried.

Shoving her hooves into the loose material she began to dig, sending a steady stream of gravel through the space of her hind legs, the gradually accumulating pebbles forming a little mound of their own behind her. Her hooves soon came in contact with something less yielding than loose rock, and soon she was on top of the pile, scooping away at the top layer to free whatever had been buried beneath.

If she were any other type of pony, like a pegasus or a unicorn, she may have found herself breathing hard from all the frantic effort. Earth-pony constitution being what it was, she found herself breathing only a little bit harder. Covered from head to dock in a light dusting of grit and dirt, she stood at the edge of the hole she had dug.

Curled up in a ball with its forelegs wrapped protectively around its rear legs, the creature was a definite oddity for sure. Forcing her front hooves underneath the creature’s shoulders, she began to awkwardly half-hop and half-drag the creature out from the shallow pit that it was at the bottom of, the large saddlebag that it wore making the whole thing more difficult as it dragged against the lip of the pit.

With a grunt of exertion, she dug her hind hooves into the gravel and wrenched the balled up creature from out of the pit, causing her to stumble backwards and land painfully on her side, the sound of crunching that didn’t come from landing on gravel making her wince.

“I really hope that wasn’t anything important,” she muttered, turning her head to look at the saddlebag that she had landed on.

Not being able to tell what - if anything - had broken, she turned her gaze toward the creature lying the dirt before her, its body no longer curled up in a ball but now awkwardly splayed out on its side.

She turned her gaze back to the creature, she saw that it still hadn’t moved. She stared at its armored chest, her breath hitching in her throat as she saw that the rise and fall of its chest was absent.

It wasn’t breathing.

Gasping at the realization she dashed over to the creature, skidding to a halt before laying down on the ground beside it. Staring down at the creature, she found that the only part of its body left uncovered was its head and upper neck, which was devoid any fur or hair save for the flat-top mane cut that it sported atop its head, and a pair of eyebrows above its currently closed eyes. The flesh on its disturbingly flat face was unusually pallid, almost sickly looking even. She flinched when she saw that the creature’s pale lips were tinged with blue, and she knew immediately that she had to stop gawking at the alien or whatever it was. Bringing an ear close to the creature’s mouth, she listened.

She waited a long moment, the silence of the quarry around her making her feel slightly uneasy. The light, fine hairs that lined the inside of her ear felt the tickle of air blowing against them, resulting in her ear twitching in reaction. A quick smile lit up her muzzle, a bit of pressure lifted off of her withers. The smile was short lived, as even though the creature was still breathing something was still wrong.

Gulping nervously for a moment, she moved her head away from the creature’s face, taking one of her hooves and craning its head to the side to further reveal the pale flesh of its neck. Gently pushing her muzzle to it, she ignored the scent of stale sweat and the earthy smell of dirt, instead focused on feeling for a pulse through her nose. She kept her muzzle firmly pressed against the spot on its neck, waiting several seconds before moving on to another spot, repeating the process until she finally found the creature’s pulse.

Weak, but steady.

A deep sigh of relief escaped from her muzzle, and she let her body sag against the creature’s chest, thankful that she wouldn’t have to try anything that would be out of her limited medical expertise. Laying there in the middle of the quarry, on top of a creature she had never seen before, she wondered what other surprises the rapidly fading day would have in store for her.

Lifting her head from the creature’s armored shoulder, she craned her head to look at its face, examining the large, fleshy nose that sprouted from the middle of its face. She noted with interest that its nostrils were simply two little holes at the bottom of its nose and above its upper lip. As she continued examining its face, she noticed that the bridge of its nose continued upward until it stopped, flanked by two small and very pale blue eyes that seemed to take on an almost grey color in the fading sunlight.

Staring into its eyes, she felt as though she were forgetting something. As the bushy little eyebrows on the bony ridges above its eyes lowered into a glare, she realized that that “something” was that the creature was awake, and seemed none too pleased that she was on top of it.

“Uh-um hey,” she grinned sheepishly. “Name’s Finders Keepers, what’s you- URGK!”

*** *** ***

Kiako Lalene shoved the animal off of him after he delivered a quick chop to its throat to deter whatever designs it had for him. Lifting his head up off of the ground, he groaned as he felt the world’s worst headache apparently giving him a personal call. Along with the headache, he felt lightheaded and his vision was a bit dim. Was it him, or was it later in the day than he remembered?

Rolling onto his hands and knees was a bit of a chore for him in his current state, the unwelcome weight of his backpack shifting against him as he struggled to not fall right back onto the gravelly ground beneath him. Softly shaking his head in a futile effort to clear the floating motes of light from his vision, he slowly staggered up onto his feet, the sound of gravel crunching under his boots accompanying the sound of the hacking animal from earlier. Legs shaking slightly underneath him, he turned lazily in a circle as he examined his surroundings.

“Quarry... probably,” he muttered beneath his breath, looking at the piles of loose material and abandoned machinery around him, surrounded by rocky, granite walls. Running an armored glove through his dark brown hair, he closed his eyes and let out a low, soft moan of pain as he finally felt a throbbing pain slowly building up on his chest and thighs. He took a few steps forward before he couldn’t deal with the pressure of his breastplate on his chest.

Reaching up to the side of his ribs, he started to loosen up one of the leather straps that ran across his chest, letting out a low sigh as the breastplate was no longer tightened against him. His relief was short lived however, and by the time he finally noticed that the sounds of hacking and coughing conspicuously absent from the area he was face first in the dirt, slamming into the ground for the second time that day, the air in his lungs whooshing out of his mouth in a harsh wheeze as the weight of his backpack dropped down on him.

A flash of movement from the corner of his vision gave him just enough time to rear his head back, narrowly avoiding a metal-clad hoof crashing down into the dirt mere inches from his face. Now feeling a real sense of danger, his body’s fight-or-flight response kicked in, all other thoughts besides the preservation of his body temporarily insignificant. Unable to roll away from his animal aggressor due to his large backpack, fight was the only option he had.

His arm shot out to grab the offending limb the hoof belonged to and violently yanked downward, bringing the animal crashing down on top of him, resulting in a resounding thonk as two skulls collided together. With the animal suddenly on the ground with him he brought his knees to his chest and lashed out with his boots, not only eliciting another sound of pain from his bestial opponent but also giving him enough space to avoid those dangerous, flailing limbs.

Getting up off of the ground and rolling onto his knees, he slapped a hand against his thigh and whipped out a snub-nosed revolver from its holster, immediately squeezing the trigger.

*** *** ***

Head pounding and her mouth tasting like dust, Finders Keepers took advantage of the creature’s retreat to get back onto all fours. While her steel ponyshoes were great for squashing radroaches and cracking peanuts open - though probably not in that order - there were times when some problems required a less personal touch.

Hanging off the barding covering her shoulder was the home of just such a problem-solver.

With a quick dip of her head she retrieved the jaw-gun from its holster, the pressure of her jaw bearing down on the wooden mouthpiece, disengaging the weapon’s safety and preparing it to fire. Looking forward, she saw that her opponent had a similar idea. Wasting no time, she tongued the trigger... and was met with the terrifying sound of metal striking on metal, the exact opposite of what she wanted to hear.

The sound of her gun landing in the gravelly dirt drifted up to her ears as she stared forward in wide-eyed shock, the cold feeling of fear welling up inside of her breast all the while. All around her, the world seemed to grow silent, as if waiting in bated breath for her end. The dread fear that had overtaken her was absolute, and deep down inside, she knew it was the end. In the back of her mind, as she watched the two-legged creature aim its gun at her, she could almost hear the sound of a clock winding down somewhere, as though the mechanical ticks and tocks of the gears of life had finally run their course.

I just wish that ticking would stop, wherever it’s coming from, she thought morosely, before doing a mental double-take. Those are clicks, not ticks.

As that thought dawned on her, her eyes unconsciously drifted towards the creature’s weapon; a snub-nosed revolver with a black finish, clasped between two spindly paws. The only movement other than the subtle shaking of the creature’s paws was one of its toes periodically squeezing the revolver’s trigger, the sound of the percussion hammer on the back of the weapon striking down with a resounding click with each depression of the trigger.

Her eyes slowly drifted away from the somehow faulty revolver and back toward the creature’s face, where their eyes locked in mutual bewilderment and fear. She felt a bit lightheaded, and realized that she had been holding her breath the whole time. Reluctantly, she finally exhaled, fearing as though that even such a minor action as breathing might ruin her unexpected stroke of good fortune of not being brutally murdered by an equicidal creature.

As the sound of metal striking metal continued, her terror gradually began to be replaced by something different, a feeling of something infinitely warmer than the cold fear that she had experienced: indignation. How could this creature - this thing - pull a gun on her! Her, who had rescued it from the death it would have surely soon gotten if she hadn’t come by when she did! As her body began to tremble in not only indignation, but outrage, she felt her hooves move as though on their own, her body advanced on the slowly backpedaling two-legged creature. As the creature’s backpedaling increased in pace, so too did her own hooves.

She wasn’t about to die with her tail between her legs, not today! She was going to give that thing a piece of her mind!

*** *** ***

Kiako Lalene’s anger at his somehow malfunctioning weapon had been replaced by a steadily increasing nervousness at the slowly advancing animal. Tearing his gaze away from the horse-like animal before him, he worked the cylinder release latch on the grip of his weapon, backpedaling all the while.

The man felt his heart sink at the sight of what exactly he had put into the cylinder. While it was true that the weapon had indeed been loaded, the rounds that had been loaded were themselves incomplete; all rounds were missing a primer cap for the revolver’s hammer to strike, making the projectiles completely useless.

Kiako’s lips twisted into a grimace of disgust not only at his current predicament, but also at himself for such a careless mistake. The weapon was useless as it was, and he didn’t have any additional rounds that were easily accessible.

Dropping the weapon to the ground he stopped backpedaling, positioning himself in a fighting stance of no particular kind, spreading his feet in the dirt and balancing on the balls of his feet as he withdrew a knife from his belt, ready to defend himself from his attacker. Which, oddly enough, was dressed far more than most animals he had encountered.

Indeed, the animal before him was dressed much more practically than many actual people. The sight before him gave him pause, and he couldn’t help but be impressed with the practicality of clothing that was worn by what was obviously an animal. His curiosity soon began to rise above his previous nervousness, and he found himself examining the animal with a more detailed eye. From the equine’s neck down was what appeared to be leather padding that ran over its chest and around the main trunk of its body, leaving the rest of its beige furred body exposed, save for a few bits of leather on its hind legs.

A hoarse bark startled him from his examinations, and his attention was quickly brought to the animal’s head. When he had previously been fighting against the animal, he hadn’t the time to appreciate the creature’s short-cut auburn mane, or its startling, forward-facing pink eyes. Now that he was actually staring at it, he could see that there was more that made this animal different from ponies or horses than mere pigmentation. The creature’s head seemed oddly disproportionate with the rest of its body, and instead of the longer and more angular muzzle that most equines tended to feature this one had a much shorter and slightly more rounded snout. Add in the fact that its eyes were positively huge and that it had a very expressive face, and it could be said that this was definitely a strange kind of animal.

It also appeared to be yelling at him in an oddly lyrical but still thoroughly incomprehensible jumble of sounds that may or may not have been a language. None that he would have understood, at any rate. Doing his level best to keep his shock from rising to the surface, he kept it in check behind a sullen expression that had faithfully served him throughout the years as a facade to hide his true feelings behind. Crossing his arms across his chest, he stared down at the apparently indignant equine, noticing that its shoulders weren’t as broad as a normal horse, or even a pony.

The shock of seeing the creature before him had faded away rather quickly, as it was by no means the strangest thing he had seen or experienced. Discussing philosophy with uplifted gorillas and fighting an irradiated chupacabra were still on top of that list.

A poke to his knee-pad made it clear that the equinoid in front of him didn’t think he was paying attention enough.

“I don’t know what you are saying, nor do I know Español, so you’re out of luck,” he finally said, a touch of harshness in his voice.

The quadruped immediately drew back from him at the sound of his voice, its ears pinning back slightly as it stared at him in what appeared to be wide eyed surprise. Very expressive faces, he noted to himself, watching the equine-like creature before him quickly recover and send him a not-so withering glare.

“I take it you’re angry about me kicking your ass, then?” he asked conversationally, a dollop of false sweetness added in for good measure.

*** *** ***

Finders Keepers didn’t like the way this creature spoke to her. It spoke with an air of indifference mixed with the smug superiority of those who thought they were better than others. That, along with the fact that she couldn’t understand a single word of its guttural gibberish only made it so that she was beginning to dislike this tall, two-legged creature more and more.

Although she and it were no longer wailing on each other, that didn’t mean that it wouldn’t happen again, and now that the creature was standing still she could more easily see what she may have to deal if - or when - that time came again.

Standing at about twice her height on a pair of long, slender legs, the creature made an imposing sight, especially so in the late-afternoon sun, where everything cast long shadows.

As she began to inspect it more closely, she saw that it was wearing some sort of armor that covered most of its body, with cables and wires snaking over portions of it. Its upper chest was covered by a breastplate made up of two large overlapping plates that were aligned side-by-side, with a series of small overlapping plates running from its upper chest down over its flat belly and to its waist.

The biped’s broad shoulders were topped with a pair of shoulder pads that connected partially to the creature’s breastplate. Its arms appeared to be armored as well, although not quite as much as the trunk of its body seemed to be: elbow pads, vambraces, and armored gloves that covered its paws.

Although not armored to the same extent as the trunk of its body, the creature's legs were far better protected than its arms, though not as much as its torso Hanging from its waist and between its legs was a piece of groin armor that served to protect whatever... genitals it had. On its thighs were large plates that seemed to be attached via leather straps, which also seemed to be connected to kneepads. Most of its lower leg seemed to be taken up by a pair of black, roughly L-shaped boots that seemed to sport a variety of straps, presumably to tighten them.

All in all, the creature’s penchant for the color blue was all too apparent by the dark blue tint that had been applied to many portions of its armor. In the areas where there wasn’t any armor was what Finders Keepers assumed to be a one-piece grey jumpsuit showing, predominantly in areas where freedom of movement was more important than protection.

Her ears registered a cough coming from above her before she herself did, and it took another cough to bring her out of her examination.

“Huh?” She looked up at the owner of the noise, which was currently making no efforts to hide its annoyance. At least she thought it was annoyance that it was showing. Who could tell with a flattish face like that?

“Hey,” she started, giving it a glare of her own, “It isn’t my fault that you chose to dress the way you are. Maybe next time you should think about what you wear before getting angry at ponies staring at you?”

If the bipedal creature understood anything of what she was saying, it made no sign of it, and instead chose to continue staring at her.

Sitting down on her haunches, she clumsily began to work her hooves on the leather straps that wound around her barrel. If she was going to be having a staring contest with some sort of foreigner, she’d be damned if she was going to suffer it while being weighed down.

*** *** ***

As Kiako Lalene idly watched the animal fumbling with the straps secured to its underside, he quickly - and uncomfortably - became aware as to what gender it was. Averting his eyes from the sitting equine, he took the moment to better examine his surroundings.

He already knew that he was in a quarry of some sort, based on all the piles of rocks and the few still-recognizable hulks of metal that had once probably been digging equipment. Beyond that though, he wasn’t aware of where he was, and despite knowing of a few quarry locations in the Province, he was getting a little bit nervous.

As far as he was concerned, he had been minding his own business and taking a few shots before somehow slamming into a pile of gravel and getting smothered. There were many strange things that could happen to a person in the Province, but spontaneous transportation wasn’t really one of them, as far as he knew.

Perhaps I had more than a few shots, he mused to himself, although it occurred to him that if his drunken body had been tossed into a quarry, he would have most likely been stripped down first. Waste not, want not.

The sound of something falling to the ground brought his attention back to the present, and more specifically to the furry creature before him, who apparently had successfully shed the weight of its saddlebags. In truth, he found himself steadily growing more and more uncomfortable at the fact that this... equinoid, seemed to display many of the same emotions that he would normally attribute to something more sapient, like a human being, or gorilla.

That said, he couldn’t deny that the creature before him was of considerable intelligence, at least compared to the horses he had seen and ridden during his earlier years. Grudgingly, he began to slowly accept the fact that, perhaps, this creature was intelligent to the same degree as he was.

The fact that it had spoken to him earlier, albeit in a language he didn’t understand, precluded him from denying that it was sapient. Knowing what he did now, he was already starting to regret the first impression he had made on the creature that had saved his life: one to the neck.

Feeling the onset of the first twinges of guilt begin to set in, he brought a hand to one of the nylon straps that ran over his chest - its purpose being to prevent the backpack from easily being shrugged off - and unbuckled it, letting shoulder straps slide off his shoulders and down his arms so that it could be set down onto the ground. Like the equinoid, his belongings were now on the ground as well.

Turning his back on the equinoid, he got onto his knees and began to dig through the external framed backpack, looking for a way to perhaps gain a little trust with his unusual rescuer.

Really starting to wish I had bothered to keep one of those Rosetta Stone BDs, he mused to himself, the image of those dusty packages depicting a blue rock with two horizontal white streaks annoyingly at the forefront of his mind at the moment.

He shot a glance over his shoulder. “Don’t have any carrots, but how about an apple instead?”

*** *** ***

Finders Keepers took a moment to arch her back as the biped turned away from her, the relief of getting free from the saddlebags and their constricting straps, even for a moment, being a welcome distraction.

Letting a soft sigh escape from her muzzle as she rolled her shoulders, she took notice of the creature’s exposed back. It seemed to have the same amount of armoring that the front of its body had, except instead of a series of overlapping plates there was a segmented, spinelike protrusion running down the center of its back down toward where its presumably missing tail would have been. Several pieces of what looked to be metal framework originated from its segmented spine, wrapping around the creature’s ribs and apparently connecting to the front of its armor.

Unlike the front, the back of the creature’s head was entirely covered in the short brown hair that made up its mane. The back of the creature’s strangely shaped and immobile ears could be seen peeking out from the sides of its head, the pale cartilage forming a structure that she hadn’t seen among any other of the Wasteland’s inhabitants.

Finders Keepers nearly jerked back as the kneeling biped partially turned to face her, showing off only one half of its face as it seemed to ask her a question in its guttural way of speaking. Unlike before however, its tone seemed softer and had lost the smugness that had been permeated it.

“Um.” She still had no idea what it was saying, and decided to go with the most-used answer for when somepony wanted to keep the peace. “Sure?”

The creature stared at her for a moment longer before turning back around to rummage in its saddlebag, leaving her to wonder what she had just agreed to. She didn’t long to wait, as the creature pivoted on its knees to face her, a yellow-skinned apple sitting in one of its paws.

Setting its other paw on the fruit, it pinched the stem between a pair of digits and removed it before jamming the shorter digit of one paw into the location the stem had previously been. It continued to mess with the apple a bit more, gripping it in boths paws, until the entire fruit split with a loud crack that sent her ears perking up in startlement.

Finders Keepers let out an impressed whistle as she saw that in each of the creature’s paws was half an apple, perfectly split down the middle. The mild, wet smell that apples of all kinds shared with one another became more apparent as the biped offered her a half. She raised a hoof up toward the creature, the bottom of it facing the sky as she let the creature place the apple half onto it. Bringing it up to her face she took a moment to examine it, more out of suspicion than of any curiosity: an apple was an apple, wherever anypony went.

The sound of a wet crunch temporarily took her attention off of the apple-half in front of her muzzle, and her eyes glanced over to see that the biped had already started in on its half, its attention focused more on the fruit than her.

What the hell, she thought. Who ever heard of a poisoned apple, anyway?

With that thought out of the way, she dug in.

*** *** ***

Several apples later and a mutual understanding that both appreciated the labors of orchard growers everywhere, Finders Keepers felt that she and the biped had come to view each other more favorably than when they had first met.

Running a tongue over her lips to remove some of the stickiness that had built up from eating multiple apples in one sitting, she began to reacquaint her saddlebags with her back, grumbling softly under her breath as she worked to get the straps secured underneath her body. Sometimes she felt that she had gotten the short end of the stick in life, rather than the carrot. Being born to pair of unicorns, it was difficult to not be envious of their abilities when it came to doing things that should’ve been simple.

Fortunately for her, even if she was missing the one thing they both had in common, they still loved her for who she was, something she was infinitely grateful for. So many fillies and colts had grown up without knowing who their real parents were, and she was glad to have gotten an opportunity that so many hadn’t.

With a final snap of plastic she got her saddlebags squared away, her attention brought back to the present. Turning around to the sitting biped, she waved a hoof.

“Thanks for sharing the apples,” she said. “I know you probably can’t understand me, and I know we started out a bit rough, but I’d just like to say that this has been interesting.” She shot up a quick glance at the darkening sky.

“Its getting to be that time again, and I shouldn’t be out after dark. Neither should you.” With that, she began to walk away, scooping up her discarded pistol as she headed toward the quarry exit.

That was interesting, she mused to herself as she steered herself around a large mass of machinery. In truth, she sort of wished that she could linger a bit longer with the strange being, but the fact that she couldn’t understand a thing it said made sticking around with it more trouble than it worth.

Still, at least she had done her good deed for the day. She didn’t even have to shoot anypony in the process! Her muzzle formed into a soft smile at the thought at the minimal amount of violence that had occurred during the day, as opposed to the usual avoidance of traps and snipers. With the soft beat of her hooves against the dirt to keep her company, she continued forward.

A short, piercing whistle brought her to a halt, her ears perking up at the noise. Looking behind her for the source of the noise she saw the tall form of the biped fast approaching, the straps of its saddlebag hitched over its shoulders once again.

She waited for it to catch up, her lips curling into a frown as she noticed that the creature’s thigh holster was no longer empty. Admittedly, she realized that the entire fight that had happened earlier had probably been a mistake, but the fact of the matter was that seeing the weapon that could have ended her life once more in hoof’s reach was upsetting. Nervously tearing her gaze away from the sidearm, her large eyes met with the two-legged creature’s much smaller eyes.

“Sorry pal, but I don’t understand a word you’re saying. That may make things a tad hard, if you know what I mean,” she said bluntly.

The bipedal being probably didn’t understand a word of what she said, but it seemed to have figured out what she was meaning. It made a motion of looking around the quarry, and then scratching its head before giving a dramatic shrug.

“No idea where you are, huh?” She began to feel a sense of dread beginning to build up inside of her at what she was about to say. “Well... I guess you can tag along, at least until you find your bearings.”

The creature’s brow furrowed as she said that, as though trying to figure out what she had meant. She had hoped by its seeming understanding of what she had said earlier that this would have been easier, but instead the opposite appeared to be true instead. Lifting a hoof to her head to soothe the headache that was beginning to set in, she let out an annoyed sigh, her knotted auburn tail swishing back and forth behind her in agitation. She was going to have to be really direct when it came to communicating with this thing, wasn’t she?

Removing the hoof from her head, she lifted it up and made a beckoning motion for the being to follow her. It seemed to have understood that, something for which she was eternally thankful for. With a single, jerking nod it sidled up beside her, making it suddenly more apparent at the size difference between the two of them; she only came up to its waist.

Lifting its arm forward in a ‘lead on’ gesture toward the dirt slope that made up the quarry exit, it waited for her to move ahead so that it could follow.

Raising her eyes toward clouds stained pink by the sunset, Finders Keepers let out a silent prayer for whoever would listen to her to make things easier from there on out. Dropping her gaze back down to earth she began trotting ahead, gesturing for the biped to follow.

Just what have I gotten myself into...

Author's Note

As foreshadowed by the chapter title, things have started off to a rough start, and communication has become a bit of a problem. It will take more than a few apple slices to form a bridge of complete trust, but it is a start.

As always, questions and comments are not only wanted, but encouraged. Remember, if you like the story or favorited it, be sure to click Like so that there is a more tangible form of support!

Edit: I've only just now noticed that some of the

(horizontal rule) placements aren't actually doing anything when not in edit mode. If you happen to see a whitespace between paragraphs that seems slightly bigger than normal, that's because an

is there but not doing its job. Really not sure what to say, but if you can help solve this issue it would be much appreciated.