The mind picked up strange things, Finders Keepers reflected.

It was as beautiful a day as a pony could ask for, the scent of grass and wildflowers carried along by the gentle breeze that rustled across the plains. This part of Equestria wasn’t so much of a wasteland anymore, and it was remarkably free of rubble or other bits of debris like sky-carriages or even roads. Much like the ground below the sky itself was also unmarred, not a single cloud to blot out the radiant sun as it hung in the crisp, blue sky that endlessly stretched out above the earth below.

The view would have been a much different sight during her childhood, she knew, even if she hadn’t experienced it herself. There was no doubt that an area like this would have just been another near-lifeless, muddy landscape with what little life there was being roaming animals and pale, stunted plants that struggled for lack of consistent light. The grey skies above were only fitting for such a dreary landscape, a permanent cloud cover ensuring a steady source of rain but only weak, filtered sunlight for the world below.

If one listened to what few ecologically-minded ponies there were — and they sure did love to be listened to — the Equestrian Wasteland could soon drop the second part of its name, and she couldn’t disagree with that after seeing places like she was in now. That didn’t mean she much cared to listen to them, no matter how loud they were. The one thing that they always seemed to gloss over was that Equestria wouldn’t be the way it was if it weren’t for one particular unicorn and her motley gang of heroes.

Without ponies like Littlepip, Calamity, Velvet Remedy, and all the others those very same ecologists conveniently ignored, the Equestria of today would have looked very much the same as it had in the past two-centuries. Thanks to those aforementioned, selfless ponies, Finders Keepers and future generations could appreciate a quiet, peaceful view of a healing land, one that she had no doubt even a pony from before the Great War could appreciate.

Another gunshot cut across the plains, breaking her reverie and bringing her mind back to a less picturesque reality; one that involved herself and Kiako running away from a pack of monstrous things.

They probably wouldn’t be expecting that,] she noted with grim amusement, for a moment unsure if she meant the converging mutants or Kiako. She pushed the errant thought out of her head, fully focusing on her job.

“Moving back,” Kiako called out, paws dropping to his sides as he removed himself from the bipedal firing stance that was — if one ignored the obvious differences — not too dissimilar from that of her own.

She felt the pat through her barding as Kiako ran past her, the touch probably more to act as a signal than as an act of reassurance. It was appreciated either way, and she leveled the block of metal in her mouth — her IF-22 chambered for .38 caliber ammunition — even as the man’s heavy bootfalls faded with distance.

The two of them had been running ever since early morning, a pack of mutant dogs of some sort nipping at their hocks all the way to where they were now. Unfortunately, whatever kind of breed the mutants were, they were smart. Smart enough to hang just out of range of their firearms once they had figured out that pistols weren’t all too useful past a certain point of range.

Their current plan consisted of one individual covering the other while they retreated, with the one covering making sure that the rabid beasts didn’t try to get too close. The roles then switched so that the one that had held their ground could catch up and the process could go through another cycle. Neither of them had actually planned it though, and instead it had been something that had come naturally to the two of them after realizing that just running wasn’t going to cut it.

It was sort of nice, Finders Keepers had to admit. She wasn’t used to working with others, scavengers like herself eschewing those who could potentially take a cut out of their profits. With all the dangerous radiation and pockets of Taint scoured away by the Elements of Harmony, scavenging was beginning to look more and more like a dying profession now that a great many risks had been removed and more areas were opened up. Even so though, whatever Kiako did as an “applier” or that other word he used, the two of them had managed a sort of synergy over the morning hours as they meshed into a team to protect one another. Maybe it’s just because we’re not really talking.

Her thoughts scattered once more as another gunshot broke out across the plains, this time her own. One of the mutants let out a pitiful, snarling whimper as it was struck, its legs crumpling beneath dead weight as its momentum sent it plowing into a tumbling roll that ended only a couple body-lengths from her, a blown-out eye socket staring back at her accusingly. It was a grisly sight to be sure, but that didn’t stop her from letting out a muffled cheer from around her jawgun.

It was a brief victory though, her ear twitching as it heard the mournful howl of one of the fallen mutant’s packmates, a grim reminder that despite her brief victory there were still more of them just waiting to rush in and make her a meal. Her eyes snapped about, homing in on the dark shapes stalking just out of her pistol’s effective range. She wasn’t sure how many of them there were, but the last time she had made a count there had been six — minus the one she had just taken down herself.

Kiako himself was busy too it seemed, despite the fact that she was the one supposedly taking charge of covering the both of them. She didn’t have to see the human to know there was trouble behind her, the panicked footsteps and the rapid clicking of a hammer striking at empty chambers going tail-in-tail with the pained scream that went with the sound of falling bodies scuffling in the grass.

Her heart leapt into her throat as she spun about to the sight of Kiako and a shaggy beast rolling about the ground, the latter having its strong jaws clenched tightly on the man’s flailing arm. The biped’s usual dour look was gone, face contorted into a twisted, open-mouthed scream of anguish as he repeatedly whipped dark steel across his tormentor’s face and muzzle.

This is bad, this is bad! her mind panicked, indecision rooting her in place as her head moved about to try and get a clear shot off without hitting the beleaguered man. Uncertainty clouded her mind as opportunities popped up momentarily only to be wasted after waiting too long, and for a heartbeat she was frozen, forced to just stand there and watch as wide eyes drunk in the violence.

The massive, hulking canine’s slavering, growling jaws drew ever closer with the man’s face as the vambrace and under-barding clad arm was forced back beneath its constant assault, and Finders Keepers could see the faint sheen of sweat on the man’s face as he both tried and slowly failed to hold back against the animal’s raw strength. His pistol that had previously been bludgeoning against the creature’s skull had fallen by the wayside, the man scrabbling desperately at his belt even as he turned to face her, one side of his face obscured by the grass but not enough to hide the desperation etched on his flushed face.

“Behind you!” the man screamed, spittle flying from his mouth before a meaty paw pressed his face deeper into the dirt.

That was enough to shake off her hesitancy, and just in time for her to catch the sound of pounding paws right behind her, her head snapping back to catch the faintest glimpse of a dark shape nearly upon her. It was already too late to turn any further to fire off a shot, but where conscious thought had failed her, countless generations of equine instinct took over.

Like lightning and almost as fast her hind-legs shot out from beneath her, hooves striking out and making contact with her assailant with a frightening amount of force that was enough to send a shock of pain up her legs and through her spine. Bone gave way before the power of her steel-shod hooves, the sickening crunch of a splintering and collapsing skull felt more than heard in its grotesquery. The roar of triumph that might have come howling out was instead something else entirely, more like a surprised whine that could no nothing but gurgle from a devastated muzzle.

Up until that moment, the monsters that had been hounding Finders Keepers and Kiako all morning had kept their distance. Still, the pack of mutant dogs outnumbered herself and Kiako several times over and it was only a matter of time until they finally went all out. With her partner fending off the literal jaws of death snapping at him, Finders Keepers’ racing mind came the terrible realization that things were about to get a whole lot worse for the both of them.

It got worse a whole lot sooner, too, as she tried to turn her body toward the thundering paws of another attacker trying to blindside her. Before her rear hooves even touched the ground again the world suddenly entered a violent spin, everything briefly becoming a blur as she slammed hard into the dirt. Her teeth clacked painfully together as the weapon slipped out from her jaws, falling into the shadow of the beast that had so suddenly knocked her down.

The hot, fetid breath on her neck barely registered as she pitched herself forward just in time to escape those snaggletoothed jaws that snapped shut right where her neck had been less than a second prior. She had barely managed to get back onto her hooves before yet again being struck down, the throaty growl of her assailant only a low drone over the sound of rushing blood that filled her hearing.

Up close and so personal it was still unimaginable to her that these hulking brutes were in any way related to the more common wild dogs of the wasteland, the thing’s proportions all wrong. Tree-trunk thick legs corded with muscle kept up an equally massive torso up off the ground, dwarfing the rest of its body to a degree that might have been comical if it hadn’t been so terrifying. It was as though a dog had been reimagined from a foal’s nightmare and hopped up on a lifetime supply of Buck to create the grotesque animal before her, its form positively exuding raw, primal power. The look in the monster’s eyes — for that’s what it truly looked like at that moment, a monster — held an unmistakable need, its sickly yellow eyes containing a yearning hunger that threatened to swallow her whole if she stared too long.

Equine instinct tore at her mind, urging her body to run, to escape the monstrosity that was already barreling toward her for the last time. She was practically defenseless, her pistol gone and her body sprawled out on the ground in an unfavorable position. There was nothing to do but to run, to desperately try and put some distance between herself and those glistening jaws that eagerly snapped open and shut in anticipation for the snap that would end her life.

And yet it was already too late to run, the gap between herself and her attacker short enough that not even a pegasus could have gotten away before being brought down to earth and being torn apart. Adrenaline fueled instinct and muddled thought warred over her mind, creating a moment of indecision that would cost her dearly if she didn’t act now.

Her world became a small dot of light at the end of a long tunnel, dimness creeping around her vision and swallowing everything up in darkness just as the beast-dog leapt out at her, its powerful jaws fully intending to take in her head and crush the life from her skull. She wasn’t about to give up though, not even when literal jaws of the death were about to close in on her. In the end, it came down to quick she was on the draw.

The weight hanging from the pony’s neck was gone, the weapon that had once been a burden at that moment becoming her savior. The IF-44 gripped in the mare’s clenched teeth was battered and scratched up, the passage of time and the nature of the weapon’s function having taken its toll. Still, it was a testament to the sturdy engineering of Ironshod Firearms’ weapon designs that even an apocalyptic war and two centuries later the weapons were still in constant use.

Though chunky and relatively heavy for a submachine gun, the weapon was compact enough to pass for an overly large pistol if somepony were unaware of the weapon’s specifics. Straight-blowback and operating from a closed bolt, the weapon held up to twenty-one rounds of ammunition chambered in .41 caliber. Unfortunately there was a downside to the weapon’s compact nature, the barrel being relatively short in comparison to other firearms of the same size.

Still, accuracy wasn’t what the IF-44 was known for — but at just over four-hundred rounds per minute, it didn’t need to be.

In one second half a dozen lead slugs belched from the weapon, travelling from out the muzzle at a speed of over thirteen-hundred feet per second before crashing into the mutant’s face, the hollow-pointed rounds wreaking catastrophic tissue damage as they traveled through the back of the skull and deeper into the beast-dog’s hulking body.

Finders Keepers never got a chance to fully appreciate the grisly end result, the canine’s momentum carrying it forward even in death. The pony didn’t even have time to let out a panicked yelp as the corpse crashed into her, the world exploding into stars as she was sent into a violent tumble across the ground.

Her tumble degraded into a short-lived, messy slide just before she came to an abrupt and painful halt as she bodily collided into something hard and unyielding. She nearly gave in to panic right there, addled senses making her a poor judge of the growling and fighting around her. A muffled, guttural bark of expectation and urgency sent a fresh jolt through her, the smothering fog of panic temporarily lifted from her mind as she leapt back up to her hooves to rejoin the fight.

The solitary blast of Kiako’s nearby shotgun might have raised her hackles were she not already fighting for her life, but as it was Finders Keepers couldn’t help but feel the thrill of elation running through her at how welcome that extra firepower was at the moment. Her own weapon replied in kind as she dove forward just as a wounded beast-dog leapt out at her, lead stitching the animal down the belly. Another blast of the break-action signalled the death of the creature she had probably only wounded, and once more she was back on her hooves and waiting for the next attack.

Over the course of minutes, possibly seconds, the pair had drifted close to one another, hindquarters-to-hindquarters as they kept what few canines remained at bay. Like the ammunition in her weapon she didn’t know how many of their attackers were left, knowing only that the growling and barking and gunfire had stopped so that she was left with only the grating rasp of heavy breathing and her own blood rushing through her ears. They stayed that way for a while, the pony’s nerves wound tight enough to act as a spring and urging her to shoot at anything moved even a trace, real or imagined.

She was the first to break the silence that had creeped up on the both of them, the mechanical clicking of an empty weapon felt more than heard startling her enough to open her mouth and call out for help. The clatter of the submachine gun quickly brought her attention downward, a startled gasp spilling from her mouth as she laid eyes upon the bleeding, ruined bodies of the dead and dying beasts before her.

“We did it,” she whispered in awe, lips curling in a beatific smile as relief surged through her body and making her feel as though she were dancing on air. “I can’t believe we’re alive!”

The elation of victory was fleeting however, the brief burst of energy it had given her a meager thing in comparison to the overwhelming exhaustion that suddenly hit her like a hammer. Her smile fell off her face as her eyes drooped in fatigue, a light sigh escaping her as the adrenaline finally wore off and unmasked the exertion that had built up in her body. With that exhaustion came awareness of the injuries she had sustained during the battle, unseen bruises that throbbed painfully with every breath reminding her just how close she had come to death.

Finders Keepers wasn’t alone in that either, her ear twitching involuntarily to the sound of the human collapsing in a heap behind her. She took that with guilty comfort, a foalish part of her relieved at the fact that she hadn’t been the one to take all the punishment that had been dished out.

The pair sat in silence, back to back as they collected themselves to continue on. Finders Keepers’ expectations of a pleasant day had been immediately dashed upon hearing the dreadful hunting howls, and it seemed as though the day itself was taking the same route. The sun still hung at its apex above them, not a single cloud to shade them from a gentle warmth that suddenly felt oppressive against her barding and coat. Likewise, the cool breeze had slackened off to nothing, doing little to carry off the growing stench of blood that hung heavily in the air.

Settling for breathing through her mouth, the pony begun to check herself more thoroughly for any wounds and injuries that went beyond the uncomfortable-though-bearable bruises all over her body. She was both fortunate and unfortunate that her coat was the color it was, dirt and sweat showing up quite easily against the beige, though at the moment it did work to her advantage as she checked the blood that was already beginning to dry in her fur. After a few moments she let out a small but heartfelt breath of relief even as she felt a shudder run up her spine; aside from a few cuts and scrapes she was hardly injured, but it also meant that most of the blood on her was foreign.

A single look at the mangy, savage creatures nearby was enough to convince her that a bath was in her best interests, with plenty of soap. She did not want whatever they might have had. Kiako was as practical minded as she was at the moment, the pony turning around to see the man in the process of checking himself for injuries, of which the man had many more than she did, at least visibly.

The man no doubt looked like how she felt right then, pale face a mask of exhaustion complete with drooping eyes and the complete abandonment of that tight-jawed, stoic expression that he always bore. In fact, Kiako looked incredibly relaxed compared to how she usually saw him: he was even slouching!

Well, I guess fighting a pack of wild monster-beasts will do that to anyone, she thought, chuckling aloud to herself.

“What?” the man in question asked as he turned a dirt stained face toward her and raised a brow, his voice carrying a note of accusation in it despite the low and half-mumbled tone it had been delivered in.

Finders Keepers was about to shrug off the question when the man began to roll up the heavily stained under-barding that covered his forearm, revealing pale skin slick with fresh blood that was flowing from an uneven crescent of dark puncture wounds. She couldn’t help but take a quick intake of breath upon seeing it, the memory of Kiako pinned to the ground with a set of massive jaws clamped around his arm still sharp in her mind even through the haze that was already setting in at the edges of those memories.

“Far worse than I thought it was,” Kiako hissed, lips peeling back to reveal clenched teeth.

The pony was already clumsily working buckles that secured the straps of her saddlebags to her, hardly noticing the distinct crack that sounded when the leather bags fell to the ground in a heap. Unbuttoning the flaps with her teeth, she was soon nosing her way through the dark confines of her saddlebags, picking through the mess of odds and ends that were her stock and trade in search of the one bit of merchandise that she never let herself go far without. The quiet clink of glass against metal clued her in on the location of the bottle, and a moment later he teeth found themselves clamped down on a slender glass neck of what she needed.

Her face and muzzle left the cool confines of the saddlebag as she tossed her head back into the light of the afternoon sun, the dark, viscous purple liquid inside the bottle almost seeming to glow as light rays filtered through one side of the bottle and out the other, subsequently tinting the ground in a faint purple hue.

“He’er, tay’ th’as!” she insisted from around the bottle, spitting it out onto the grass to roll toward the bleeding man, who appeared to already be in the process of treating himself with a first-aid kit. “Oh. Don’t worry, you probably won’t be needing much of that.”

“What do you think I am going to do with grape juice?” the man asked irritatedly from between gritted teeth, giving the mare a flat stare as he ripped open a small paper package and poured what looked to her to be yellow flour into his wounds, whilst completely ignoring the healing potion within arm’s reach.

There was a faint rustle of grass as Finders Keepers drew back upon hearing the absurd comment, her face contorted into a look of bewilderment as her ears shot straight up. She couldn’t help but wonder if the man was serious, or just being rude and stubborn for the sake of some inner need to be petty at inconvenient times. Surely he knew what a potion was, right?

Her eyes dropped down to inspect the neatly ordered rows of medical devices tucked into leather loops and pockets of the open first-aid kit. Most of the objects were generally recognizable in some form, from the gleaming metal scalpel and forceps to the glass-bodied syringes sitting next to the bandages. Among the things she didn’t recognize though were several small glass bottles with unrecognizable squiggles of what was probably writing, but they hardly looked big enough to be used in quantities needed for a healing potion.

As Kiako plucked one object after another from the first-aid kit it occurred to her that there were far too many tools in the kit, looking almost like what she imagined a medical-pony might carry with them on house calls.

“You’re not a doctor, are you?” Finders Keepers asked seriously, watching as the man continued to work on himself with practiced ease. “You wouldn’t need all of that if you weren’t, and it would be easier to just use the potion.”

Kiako was already halfway to administering some sort of fluid on his arm when he heard her suggestion, hand gently setting aside the syringe as the rest of his body went stockstill. What had previously been a perfectly neutral — if pained — expression on his face slowly shifted into that of annoyance, eyebrows drawing together slightly as he turned a pair of withering steel-grey eyes upon her.

Eyeing her all the while he leaned forward, plucking the healing potion off the ground with his wounded arm, a fresh wince of pain crossing his face as he closed his fingers around the plain glass bottle.

“Am I right to say,” the man began as he presented the bottle, “that this will somehow help me? With the power of magic that you so continuously bring up?”

The earth-pony let out a nasally snort, narrowing her eyes as indignation welled up within her. Any previous desire to help the man fell away in the wake of his staunch refusal to trust her over something so minor, especially so soon after they had fought together against a pack of mutants!

Does he think me a liar? Trying to poison him? she wondered, the possible implications of Kiako’s refusal only serving to fan the flames of the indignity she was feeling at the man’s mistrust and scepticism whenever she brought up the topic of magic.

“That’s right,” she ground out, exasperation leaking into her voice to give her words the rough note of impatience.

She didn’t get an immediate response, the man watching her with a wariness that made all too clear his distrust for her at that moment. His eyes flickered this way and that as he searched her expression, as though trying to find a trace of deceit that simply wasn’t there to begin with.

Kiako never broke eye contact as he finally caved in, the man giving a weary shake of the head as he let loose a sigh of resignation that sounded as sweet to the ears as any Velvet Remedy song. Finders Keepers couldn’t help but let a small smirk play across her lips as the man popped the stopper off the potion, the tension she felt leaving her well worth the dirty look she got as he caught her expression.

“So,” the man said plainly, picking out a large glass syringe with a disconcertingly sized needle. “Intramuscular, or subcutaneous?”

“You’re supposed to drink it!” she gasped, eyes practically bugging out of her head in shock on hearing the question. “Why would anypony try and inject a potion?!”

“How else would one use it?” the man asked quizzically, nostrils flaring.

She rolled her eyes, letting out a huff of annoyance at how much of a spectacle this was becoming. They were fortunate that the Kiako’s bleeding had stopped, the flour-like substance having apparently done the job. Leaning forward, she raised a hoof and tipped the bottle toward the man.

“Drink,” she repeated.

“I suppose you aren’t the type to follow recommended dosages,” the man drawled looking at her lazily as he ripped the stopper off of the bottle. “Just know that if this kills me, I will come back to wherever this place is and find you.”

“Can you just trust me right now? It’s not like I didn’t save your life or anything!” the mare replied, again pushing at the bottle insistently.

The man’s lips twitched in response to that, and she wondered if he was going to try and draw this out any longer. Thankfully, and without another word, the man tipped the bottle back as he brought it to his his mouth, much to her gratification. She watched as the man’s throat worked the liquid down, the conspicuous metal collar rising and falling.

While the man had curiously immobile ears and no tail, let alone a similar body, he had a face that was close enough to a pony’s that Finders Keepers had little to no trouble at all distinguishing his expressions, which seemed to mostly just be variations of annoyance and discontent. Still, she at times thought she sensed something else beneath the air of dourness that the man put out, the muscles in his face occasionally twitching just below the surface as though trying to get to the surface before being suppressed.

Or maybe I’m just overthinking it, she mused. There was still a lot she didn’t know about the human, though that was to be expected with how long — or short — they had known each other, only for a couple of days.

The pony had no idea what actually went into the healing potions that ponies and others used, only knowing that the production of the lifesaving medicine was an alchemical process involving chemicals and certain types of plants. One thing that was known far and wide though was that as beneficial as healing potions were, they certainly didn’t taste it.

Kiako was finding that out for himself, and Finders Keepers was there to watch in amusement. As the man forced the liquid down she got to see the burgeoning disgust on his face, from the corners of his lips drawing inward as part of a grimace to the raised, spread eyebrows lifting up in surprise as the incredibly bitter liquid hit his tongue. With the man’s head tilted back she had a good view of his neck and jaw, and she should even see the muscle tensing up below the jawline as the man finally finished.

“See? That wasn’t so bad was it?” she sniggered, the hoof over her mouth doing little to prevent the laugher from leaking out.

Kiako’s disgust was gone, replaced with a pair of baleful eyes that shared none of her humor at his expense.

“For your sake, this better not have been a prank,” the man said icily, dropping his gaze on down to his arm. “You said it was a potion. A potion for what, exactly?”

“It’s a healing potion, what else would it do? It won’t fix bones or remove bullets, but it will heal flesh,” she answered, also keeping an eye on the man’s wound.

Kiako’s head shifted slightly, brow furrowing as he stared at his arm. No doubt that the alchemical formula was well on its way to beginning to repair the damage the canine’s had done to him. What would have taken weeks or months became a timelapse of tissue regeneration, skin around the puncture wounds first turning pink with inflammation, before the injury itself began to slowly knit itself closed.

The scabs forming over the wounds were already starting to flake off when the man’s eyes practically bulged out of his skull, eyebrows reaching for the sky in surprise as his lips parted to let out a quiet gasp. Finders Keepers could already see the scarring lose its light pink hue and grow just a touch paler than the undamaged skin around it when the man brought his arm up to get a closer look.

Whatever doubts the man had voiced earlier were obliterated by the almost foal-like wonder that lit up the man’s face, an emotion far removed from the man’s usual iron cold stare and demeanor. Indeed, the human looked as though he had completely forgotten that she was even there, his attention focused solely on the impassioned investigation of his arm. After having to spend several days with the man, she couldn’t help but appreciate the sudden change.

“See?” she chirped, unable to help crack a wide smile of her own on seeing the human’s reaction to alchemical concoction. “I told you it would work.”

If it were possible for somepony — or someone in this case — to jump out of their skin Kiako would have certainly succeeded on hearing Finders Keepers’ words, the man’s body jolting with a jerk as his eyes flashed over to her in startlement as if he had forgotten she was even there.

Whatever wonderment the man had that wasn’t immediately swallowed up by his surprise began to fade away, expression dropping back into its usual dour countenance and his posture straightening as he squared his shoulders to fully face her.

"Well,” the man spoke softly, with a calmness that was obviously forced. “You have my apologies for doubting you.”

Finders Keepers nodded her head, ignoring the undertone of embarrassment in the man’s voice. She could have probably jumped on that and use it as ammunition to tease the man, but at this point in her journey all she wanted was to get to Stableside with a minimum of fuss, and that meant not stirring up any resentment in the human. Besides, it felt good to get that apology out of the man after all of the backhanded remarks and general callousness that he had shown her.

Without another word the human began to pack up, putting away his medical supplies before rolling down the blood-stained sleeve of his under-barding over the now scarred over wound and then strapping back on his vambrace. She herself had several things to do as well, and she spun around to move about the bodies of the dead canines.

The mare had lost her IF-22 earlier when one of those beasts had slammed into her, a weapon that her father had given her as a going away present when she had first set off to become a scavenger. It might not have been worth much, but leaving it behind was out of the question. Thankfully for her, all she had to do was find a specific beast and search around it for the weapon.

Even as she stooped her head low to pick up the shiny brass shell casings and toss them into her saddlebag, she kept a wary eye on the corpses around her, keeping an eye out for any signs of movement that went beyond the occasional death spasm. The dull ache of her bruised and battered body served as a painful reminder of how dangerous those things had been, and she had no intention of trying to go for a round two.

Amidst the collection of spent shell casings, Finders Keepers continued to search for a particular beast. All of them were intact in for the most part, the weapons she and Kiako had used not being nearly destructive enough to tear them limb from limb. Still, a lot of the corpses sported nasty wounds that were already attracting flies, and with the buzzing swarms flitting from body to body it was difficult to get a good clear look at what she was looking for. It was only when the earth-pony mare swept her hoof through a swarm of flies for the fifth time that she was met with what she needed, though it was certainly not what she wanted.

Being a pony, she was already blessed with a good sense of smell, meaning that she was bombarded everyday with both scents pleasant and repulsive. In some ways she wished she had the sense of smell of a griffon — that is to say, hardly any. Walking about the corpses had already made her stomach churn, but the fresh blast of fetidness coming from the demolished skull and exposed chunks of brain was something else entirely.

By the time her ears twitched at Kiako’s approach, the mare had already released her last meal back into the world, nothing at all coming out of her mouth save the empty retches of a stomach with nothing left to give.

“There’s a reason as to why they are called blight wolves, you know,” Kiako noted from above and behind her, and even through the buzzing of flies the man’s tone made it clear that he held no love for the corpses around her.

“You’ve seen these before?” she croaked, wiping her mouth along a foreleg as she asked.

“Plenty. Rather hard to avoid them, in fact,” the man replied, taking a knee beside her and waving a hand over its mange-ridden body. “Notice the general patchiness of the fur and the sores all over its body, which you will notice is a commonality shared with the others.”

Finders Keepers had noticed that — it was impossible not to what with being in such close proximity to the “blight wolves”, as the man called them. She merely nodded her head as he continued to speak, her lightheadedness from the overwhelming stench making it difficult for her to concentrate on what the man was saying, as she was more concerned with trying to find her pistol.

“— heavily polluted and irradiated environments being their preferred hunting grounds, so you can see how they earned the moniker. Not only that, but they have adapted to these areas to such an extent that they are in some ways reliant on them. I think that even you can realize how unusual it is to find adolescent blight wolves in an unspoiled plain like this.”

At that point she was mostly ignoring the man’s oddly lighthearted commentary, the mare only picking up every third word or so as she continued her search. Something she would have continued to do had a particular word not caught her attention.

“Hold on a sec, did you say adolescent? As in young?” she balked, turning her head to face the man. “How big can these things get?”

Finders Keepers couldn’t help but shoot the man a narrow-eyed scowl as he casually held up the pistol that had eluded her searching for the past several minutes. What was worse was that she wasn’t sure if it was a trick of the light, or if there was something like mischief in the human’s eyes.

“Large enough that if we had faced even one of them you would be dead and I would be back home,” the man said without missing a beat, features softening enough to deliver a rare smile that was empty of all comfort the gesture should have had.

“What in Equestria is that supposed to mean?” she asked incredulously, brow scrunched up as she watched the man get up and start to walk off.

What a mule, the mare thought as she glared at the departing human, her cheeks blowing out in a rush of air. She let the man wander off for another minute or so before he finally realized something was amiss and turned to face her.

“Wrong way!” she sang mockingly, voice carrying across the distance between them.

Kiako didn’t have a witty response for her that time, and the pony could just make out the hint of a frown playing across the man’s face from where she stood.

Just as well, Finders Keepers thought with a light chuckle, before turning to go the right way. If they were lucky, they might be able to get to Stableside the next day.

*** *** ***

Much to Kiako Lalene’s chagrin, they did not get to Stableside the next day. Or the day after. Or even the day after that.

It was another bright and sunny day, the bright blue sky holding not a single cloud to shield them from the sun’s unceasing rays. Not that the temperature was particularly high, but it was damnably humid, a far cry from the dry heat that he was far more accustomed to the Plateau region of the Canyon. It had been like that for the past several days, and the only thing that kept the man from being boiled alive in his armor was the fact there was a light breeze to take the edge off from potential heat stroke. Not to mention that there were plenty of water sources — all of which were seemingly pure, for he had tested every single one — for him to dunk his head in and refill his canteen.

Since their encounter and ensuing running battle with the pack of blight wolf pups, the duo had come across very little trouble in the form hostile life, sapient or otherwise. In fact, save for the occasional small animal and flying bird, the man hadn’t seen anything that was worth his attention in the vast, grassy expanse that they had journeyed through. If it weren’t for the mountains in the distance — the humorously named Unicorn Mountain Range, he had learned — or the complete lack of infrastructure in the form of roads, monorails, or even the occasional dilapidated structure, he could easily imagine himself back home and walking through the Union Plains territory in the northwestern part of the Northfields.

Not that he knew exactly where home was, just that it couldn’t be that far if his body had been dumped out of the side of a biplane. That was the prevailing hypothesis at least, and he certainly wasn’t going to accept Finders Keepers’ claim that he had simply appeared from thin air and fallen to the ground!

Still, as logical as his biplane hypothesis was in the absence of any other explanation, it had a set of problems of its own. Having only recently been reinvented and put into production by the Union — and not at a manufacturing rate that inspired awe — the amount of operational aircraft in the Union’s burgeoning air force could be counted on both hands, and none were being sold for private use. While it was true that the Enforcers and Techs had worked in partnership to create a smaller version well suited for recon roles, they were specifically designed to be piloted by a single person, with the rest of the aircraft’s space taken up by the advanced electronics suite that made use of a variety of technologies that ranged from LiDAR, radar scanners, and whatever else the pilot thought they could cram into the airframe.

He wasn’t exactly what one would call a nobody, not after an illustrious career as both a troubleshooter and, well, a troubleshooter. The LifeNet collar alone made him very well-inclined to hazardous work, whether it required him to be a suicide-bomber or just another pair of hands to dispose of toxic waste. Plenty of clones were more famous than he, either due to their bloodthirstiness or raw intellect; whereas he himself was perfectly content with the niche he had carved for himself, that being an experienced technician who not only knew his way around a weapon but could actually hold his own even against the best of them.

As accomplished as he was, he still didn’t think that he himself was enough of a high-priority target for a kidnapping that ended with him being flung from a low-flying aircraft and dropped into hitherto unknown territory, especially with most of his equipment on him. There were plenty of ways to get rid of a troublesome clone, but nearly all of such methods never managed to stick, and most often it just resulted in the clone coming back angry. No, if someone had really wanted to get rid of him for any length of time beyond the time it took for him to undergo a technological resurrection, the only real option was to capture him — and not just lock him up in jail, for not even that could hold a clone determined enough for suicide — and make him undergo a chemical lobotomy before putting him away.

Another nail in the coffin for his biplane hypothesis was simply a matter of logistics. While he himself wasn’t qualified to be a pilot, he had devoured every scrap of information he could on their construction and operation, which was how he knew that the farthest the current generation of biplane could travel was roughly 480 kilometers. That in itself was no mean feat, but given the fact that the areas beyond the Death Zones that surrounded the Province were just as hellish as the zones themselves, he highly doubted that someone had set up a refueling station for aircraft.

That meant the aforementioned operational range of 480 kilometers was cut in half to only 240 kilometers, and that was only if the pilot had maintained maximum fuel efficiency and wasn’t affected by things like unexpected drag or other variables during flight. The Province was nowhere near the technological level of radio infrastructure from before the Fall, but it was certainly not a dead spot when it came to putting out radio waves. His collar was an inordinately powerful receiver, capable of picking up radio signals from within deep caverns or the many long forgotten GlobalTech installations that dotted the Province, but from his current elevation he wasn’t even getting the faintest of human broadcasts, not even garbled speech.

Not that the airwaves were lacking, though: far from it in fact. The air around him — sensed neither by eyes nor ears but instead as an ever-present tingle at the base of his neck, beneath the collar — was inundated with that of radio waves carrying the broadcasts of the natives, their messages spoken in that same foreign, lyrical tongue that Finders Keepers had spoken when they had first met. There was unfortunately very little useful information he could glean from prying into the electromagnetic spectrum, the multitude of broadcasts unknowable in content save for the fact that most seemed to be a source of news or recreation. Still, at the very least he had a steady source of music to sample and enjoy as he traveled.

A stranger in a strange land he knew himself to be, that much had been made clear to him early on. The point had been driven home even deeper as they got farther from Haybale, and as the days dragged on after their encounter with the blight wolves the man grew more and more weary with being alone with the thoughts that swirled in his mind. Despite the uncaring and resolute facade he put out, his craving for knowledge dug at him like an itch that his mind cried out to be satisfied.

That meant talking with Finders Keepers, to go beyond the social obligation that small talk required of him and to actually initiate meaningful conversation on his own. He had long since dropped the “equinoid” categorization that he had placed Finders Keepers and the rest of her kind in, much the same way that he had in the past dropped the mutated Shiva’s Blessed and the apes of Monkey Town from their own dehumanizing categorizations.

Finders Keepers, fortunately for him, was relatively easy going when it came to him assailing her with his questions, all too helpful in answering them and almost seeming to take a certain amount of pleasure in doing so. He had little doubt that the pony was in similar straits as himself, having gotten the impression that she was more of a social animal than himself by a fairly wide margin.

Through his poking and prodding he learned a great many things, about ponies — or ponykind, as Finders Keepers called her species — and their lands, from the growing pangs of the emerging New Canterlot Republic to the species and subspecies that made up its growing population. Recent historical events also were made known to him, most of which seemed to involve a particular pony — a unicorn, much to his embarrassment at realizing that Finders Keepers had in the past been entirely serious in her statement about them — named Littlepip, who had apparently grown from being a technician to acquiring a seeming messianic reputation as the “Lightbringer,” whatever that meant.

A lot of what she told him couldn’t help but amuse him in some ways, even while he paid her serious attention whenever she explained something to him. He heard tales of incredibly destructive magic, and of dark magicks that had horrific results on those afflicted by them, all while realizing that in reality the mare was unknowingly speaking of nuclear and biological weapons that had been used in the many wars as the Fall went on.

Still, the mare — she was an earth-pony, so he had been told, no doubt the species baseline of ponykind — had told him some strange things that simply didn’t fit in with the actual history of the world, and couldn’t just be written off as interpretations her kind had been manipulated into believing. Then again, if the GlobalTech megacorporation and its many subsidiaries had uplifted and tinkered with genetically engineering a swathe of creatures and then created tailor-made infrastructure for them, he wouldn’t put it past the group in charge of the project to create a fictional history for them either. Many of the things that GlobalTech did were beyond him, even if he and his ilk were a direct product of their technological breakthroughs.

He wasn’t the only one to be asking questions though, and despite his misgivings in tampering with the grand experiment that she and her species had no doubt been created for — along with the society that had in the absence of human oversight developed — he realized that the time for scientific mindfulness for this particular experiment had long since died along with the rest of the old civilization.

So he reciprocated. He told her of a great dam that had become the last of known stronghold of a powerful nation, of the remnants of militaries and of the smattering of technicians and scientists and tradesmen that formed what would one day be the Enforcers and Technicians respectively, and of the atrocities committed against peoples outside of the Hoover Dam Garrison that lit the spark of a revolution from within and the invasion that came from without, and of the subsequent exodus that came after.

He told her of the factions that were deadlocked in a struggle not for something so simple and trite as living space or resources, but for the future of the Province and the war of ideologies that were either simply incompatible with one another or required too much compromise to be acceptable by those holding them. Spirituality, progress, conservation, freedom, rule of law, simple monetary gain, and everything in between — the ideals held dear to so many people simply ran counter to what others on the opposite side of the spectrum believed. Human beings had never much been known for their tolerance when they knew themselves to be right.

Still, despite the damage that the rampant ideological divide created amongst the populace there were still people who managed to stay independent of it all, whether they be the smattering of towns and villages who resisted all efforts of integration and subjugation, or the variety of organizations that served everyone impartially. It was because of groups like these that human civilization could continue to advance within the Province, rather than become the war-torn landscape that the factions would have made it were it not for neutral buffer zones to impede their rampant conflict.

Progress was being made though, and while this Equestria had its New Canterlot Republic, an experiment in self-government for a society that had supposedly once been run by a principality, the Union within the Province was taking a different tack, branching off from the United States’ hundreds of years of proven governance to move onto something else entirely.

Based at the heart of the Northfields in the city of New Flagstaff was where the Union began. Originally, the Union had simply been a group of organizers, who sought to bring the city’s population together in a unified organization, to improve infrastructure and general quality of life. In the years since, it had become an authoritarian technocracy, with streaks of kratocracy in its makeup.

Whether by force of arms, political subterfuge, or simply offering to “protect” a town from the very same bandits they hired, the Union had spread across the Northfields to swallow up those who were weak and could hardly defend themselves in order to expand its influence to areas beyond mere borders. All that while avoiding direct confrontation with the factions, who had in the past come together to form uneasy truces in order to deal with a larger threat, something that the Union would most certainly become if left untended. Already they had the largest air force of the Province, largest standing army, and the greatest population and resources to draw from if it came to a protracted war.

The New Canterlot Republic seemed to be the Union’s antithesis in a great deal of ways, offering hoof and claw to those who wanted to be a part of something greater while meanwhile respecting the wishes of those who still wanted to remain independent of it all, no matter how foolish and shortsighted such desires were. The fact that the Republic held elections in much the same vein as that of the old United States only amplified the man’s feelings that however earnest such a government could be it simply wasn’t ruthless enough to survive let alone thrive in a world such as this.

Even as Kiako and Finders Keepers asked questions and exchanged answers on their respective homelands and countrymen, the man took great pains in carefully steering around certain subjects of discussion, all while painting a picture of strength and solidarity in the face of external threats. The existence of LifeNet and its cloning facilities were things that - along with a few other choice bits of information - were not even mentioned, let alone hinted at.

It was a common assumption that beyond the monolithic Wall — itself a holdover from a near-forgotten time when the Grand Canyon National Park had been a corporate-feudal state — and the Death Zones were lands too blasted and disfigured for human habitation, an assumption only reinforced by the landscape immediately beyond the Wall itself.

To outsiders, that made the Grand Canyon Province and its relatively untouched lands a paradise beyond all others in known existence, and most of all a target for invasion. In fact, such an event had happened once before when peoples from the faraway land of Texas had banded together to put together a massive invasion force in order to take the Province for themselves and their kin.

It was only through the factions putting aside their differences and the fact that pseudo-immortal clones were able to live through multiple deaths per battle that the Province was able to survive despite the Texans’ numerical advantage and the massive amount of firepower they brought with them. Kiako himself had fought in that graciously short conflict, acting as a hopelessly undertrained shock trooper and — when desperation called for it — as a suicide bomber.

Despite his generally vague recollection of that conflict — perhaps a side effect of LifeNet having to churn out a new body and mind for him so many times every single day — he remembered with painful clarity the times he had joined the Texans in their foxholes and trench lines, and the looks of surprise that quickly transformed into that of mortal terror as they realized the end had come for them in the guise of a man covered in explosive belts. It was a look he had received far too many during that early period of his life, and he tried his best to wall up those painful memories and push them to the back of his mind.

The fact that Equestria was in far better shape in an ecological sense than his homeland was a bit of a swerve in common consensus in how other people thought about the world beyond the Province. Arable land was always in short supply with all the contaminants hovering around, but the fact that Equestria had actual sources of running water that lacked any trace of contamination would be enough to turn heads back home, and with it the eyes of both the factions and the Union.

In contrast the Province was rich beyond measure not necessarily in material wealth but in the infrastructure that its corporate masters had left behind; in the potential that the infrastructure had. Cities and towns and electrical grids were one thing, but immortality and nanomanufacturing were quite another: already accessible to a minority of the population, it would only be a matter of time until both were unlocked for the greater whole. One did not need to be human to want that sort of power, and were the Equestrians to ever find out what the Province had they would no doubt turn their own eyes back at the Province.

The last thing any sane individual wanted was another war the likes of that the Texan’s had brought upon his homeland, whether the aggressors were diminutive horses or otherwise. In a lot of ways it was people like Kiako and those at the frontier who had the unenviable duty of having to reign in their excitement over newly opened possibilities that lay in discovery, in order to ensure that those very same discoveries didn’t pose a threat to home.

But am I really the first person, the first human being to explore this place? Or am I some sort of guinea pig dropped off in a land of other, smaller guinea pigs? It was a question — no matter how unbidden it was — that bore further looking into it.

Regardless of how he had gotten there, he held very little doubt that he was the first human being to actually know of this place, this Equestria. It was only a matter of time until more humans came, or possibly that the natives’ Republic would catch wind of foreign noses being stuck into their business and decide to do some investigation for themselves.

Kiako could only hope that future contact between whatever groups came should meet would be more amicable than his meeting with Finders Keepers had been. Unfortunately for him such considerations inevitably drew him back to a question that he couldn’t help but stray from, always serving as an anchor to lead his mind astray from the events of the present.

If I ever happen to meet the pilot who brought me here, the man thought with a faint frown, I am honestly unsure as to whether I will smile and shake his hand, or give him a black eye.

Of course, compared to everything else that was a question, that ranked so far down on the totem pole that it hardly bore further consideration.

...Or maybe I will just flip a chip.

*** *** ***

The third day or so of their travels had brought an end to the grassy plains, the terrain gradually changing into that of a more rocky and hilly environment that eventually led them to a set of railroad tracks which apparently belonged to the Galloping Gorge line, which in itself was part of a larger network. When the man had asked Finders Keepers where the eponymous gorge was, he was told that it was actually behind them in the opposite direction.

They thankfully didn’t have to contend with moving trains, the only obstacles being in the form of long rusted-over shipping containers sitting on their flatbed cars, a common sight even in the Province. Sometimes the cars were alone and other times they were still connected to one or two others, giving him the impression that sometime in the distant past they had once all been connected together to form a chain that had since been broken.

Of course, the railcars’ mere presence slowed them down even further as Finders Keepers insisted on checking over each and every one despite the obvious signs of already being broken into and scavenged. A laborious process to be sure, one that the man had to suffer through each and every time they came across a railcar.

It was only ten-or-so cars later down the line and many kilometers after the first one that the broken chain came to an end in the form of a locomotive with yet another railcar attached behind it. Finders Keepers again insisted on picking through the rusted-over wreck, but for once Kiako hadn’t bothered to try and dissuade her exploration and instead actually joined her. Whereas though the mare was determined to search for items of value, his own search was of a more scholarly pursuit and dedicated to inspecting the locomotive itself.

It was a quaint little thing, a far cry from the formidable towers of steel that sat unmoving on the rails back in the Province and far less utilitarian-looking than he would have ever imagined a freight-hauler could look like. The base similarities were still there of course, the two machines obviously serving the same function and having an arrangement of wheels set below a metal platform that carried both crew and means of locomotion, but beyond that the two machines couldn’t be any farther apart in their differences.

His own knowledge in regards to railroads and locomotives was sorely lacking, having relied on a multitude of other forms of travel to get around without need for rails — a fact of life true for undoubtedly everyone in the Province considering that there wasn’t a single working train left to operate, and the specific knowledge to do so had long since been lost. That didn’t stop him from understanding the general theory and process of how they worked though, that being a diesel engine connected to an electrical generator that in turn powered the electric traction motors that propelled the entire assemblage down the rails.

That was an entirely different beast in comparison to the one he found himself clambering over, the machines in the Province always having the same general look of a steel block encasing the complicated engineering within. Not so much with the current locomotive, no boxy superstructure to hide the long cylindrical boiler that ran down the length of the machine and connected to a furnace that no doubt fed fuel directly into the steam engine. Were it not for the fact that Finders Keepers was busying herself in the crew cab located in the aft section of the locomotive he would have have happily gone and done a more hands on inspection, but as it was he doubted the pony would appreciate him trying to squeeze into the quadruped-sized crew compartment.

Instead he contented himself with further exploration as he waited for the mare to finish her looting, the man walking the length of the locomotive to inspect the rusted pistons and cylinders that would have once served as means to get the heavy steel wheels turning and whatever cargo they bore to its destination. The very same attributes that made the locomotive interesting were the same ones that confused him however, not in their function but instead their purpose for even existing at all.

To call the locomotive before him primitive would have been a grave insult offered to the engineers and firemen who tended to its ilk in back in the Province, such machines often providing power to settlements with plenty of combustible material to spare but still lacking in more advanced equipment. The competence in its construction could not be denied, the joinings and fittings that brought it all together far too uniform to be the handiwork of a few knowledgeable ponies to come up with, and was clearly assembled in a factory elsewhere.

Still, the longer the man stared at the rusted hulk the more it stirred within him a sense of unease that was difficult to shake off and served only to consider what was bothering him even more deeply than before. The locomotive was entirely anachronistic when put alongside everything he else he had been piecing together about the area at large and its uplifted population, like that of a warped puzzle-piece that just barely fit with the greater whole.

While not at all fitting the requirements to be a geneticist or mutagenicist, he had frequented enough of such circles himself to pick up on knowledge both common and more specialized, not least of which were certain tidbits of information that were of a more historical interest than practical. The age of steam had long came to a close by the turn of the 21st century, the approximate point when the human genome had finally been sequenced and scientists had begun to tinker with it proper before again doing the same with a variety of other animal species.

If the same scientists who had tinkered with equines to create a species worth uplifting — and apparently also created chimaeras in their free time — into sapience were also in charge of creating and providing infrastructure and tailoring human devices and equipment for their use, then why had they decided on an antiquated piece of technology when there were far more efficient and suitable alternatives already in existence?

He clearly understood the scientists’ decision in limiting the computational technology the uplifts had access to — the man remembering the rather primitive looking terminal computer in Haybale — and he could even see the reasoning in giving those very same uplifts firearms that were custom-tailored to fit their anatomy. No doubt that there were plenty of old and faulty firearms that GlobalTech’s GlobalArms subsidiary could retool to fit into mouths and talons, but at the very same time there were plenty of old diesel-electric engines sitting in scrapyards across the country that could have probably found a better use in the hands — hooves and talons after — of whoever was running the grand experiment.

It wasn’t as though locomotives — steam-powered at that — could just be left to sit around somewhere for a long period of time before handed off to the next generation like that of an action figure or other such toy. Things of that size and nature needed routine maintenance and repair if they were going to be in any way usable after a long period of disuse, whether that period be ten or even a hundred years.

Everyone knew that quality — and quantity — of living and production before the Fall far exceeded that which was current, but even Kiako had trouble believing that someone would try and bring back an obsolete technology on the scale needed for that of a functioning railroad system. Perhaps if it were just the one train it would have been more believable to him, but the other set of train tracks set parallel to the current made that unlikely, and hearing what little Finders Keepers had to say about a Galloping Gorge route lead him to believe there were many others like it. He had walked through a wide variety of factories and refineries during his short life, and whether they were the humble cranking and creaking of dozens of men and women hand loading ammunition, or the ceaseless roar of powerful machinery in one of the newer automobile plants he could hardly even begin to imagine what the interior of a train factory might be like, and knowing how secretive GlobalTech was he had no doubt that it would be a factory.

Singular. GlobalTech was just one corporation among many, having its fingers in weapon manufacturing, food production, and practically anything else that men and women might interact with during their day to day activities. Even if it were bigger than most, that wasn’t to say they had no enemies, and people who did even the barest research into old archives were well aware that the international megacorp had made a great deal of enemies, whether they be competitors or otherwise. Leaving a paper trail for people with an investigative nose was a problem even in the present, and from what Kiako understood the world before the Fall practically ran on paperwork and number counting.

The Vista had been one of those with an investigative nose, a group of eco-terrorists that had settled in a number of communes within the Province back when it was under GlobalTech control and sought to fight the megacorporation through sabotage and more direct means. Of course, they hadn’t been successful in stopping the corporation before the general fall of the world had, but their descendants carried on the name and creed of that same organization and had since become feared wilderness warriors who had become masters of rifle and blade in their mission to protect what little remaining ecosystem remained from the ravages they believed had caused the Fall in the first place. They were a group that were nothing if not determined, and they had a very long memory of other’s transgressions; the fact that the Vista had very little to say in regards to uplifting animals probably meant they simply didn’t know about GlobalTech’s secret project in the first place.

The entire situation he found himself in was the kind of puzzle that seemed to have no answer, becoming more and more frustrating the more one thought on it. With nothing new to occupy his time while he waited the man was driven to pacing back and forth impatiently, the lack of any real information regarding the locomotive’s reason for being only serving to gnaw at his mind even further. Fortunately for him and his sanity, Finders Keepers offered the distraction of her company as she poked her head out from the crew cabin, a smug and self-satisfied look on her face that went hand-in-hand with the bag of valuables she had pilfered during her search. While the question as to the train’s existence wouldn’t be going away anytime soon, he was all too eager to drown it out with inane conversation as they traveled.

And travel they did, twin strands of iron leading them through a long and twisting mountain pass of such uninterrupted length that it could be nothing but artificial in formation, the rock faces craggy and furrowed from where explosives had long ago been used to blast a massive stone corridor through the face of the mountain. The only beaks in that cut of rock were when the blasted walls opened up into the occasional narrow, enclosed valleys that offered a brief reprieve and a clear view of the sky before the train tracks continued on into another cut of rock.

Working train or otherwise, such a neat cut through the Unicorn Mountain Range — a name that continued to amuse him — should have made the route a hotspot for travelers like himself and Finders Keepers, but all the duo were left with were the sound of their own steps echoing ceaselessly off various stonefaces, with not another intelligent creature to be seen. The mare had at several points commented on that fact, but in Kiako’s eyes the lack of traffic was an unexpected boon, and with little to no merchants or travelers to prey upon he figured that their chances of suddenly being ambushed and robbed were far less than what he would usually have had to deal with.

The rest of what little daylight remained filtered in from above the near-vertical cuts in the rock face bordering the sides of the railroad, uneven and protruding chunks of rock creating a queer edge that lent the shadows a sharp and jagged look to them as they bisected the tracks in darkness and light. Even that faded away to nothing, and soon man and mare were entrapped in a corridor of darkness that not even the strong starlight above could ease. It was there that the duo made their camp for the night, refusing to light a fire in favor of letting that same inky blackness that halted further travel be their cover.

Night became day, and with the rise of the sun so too did the man and mare awake from an uncomfortable sleep, a brief breakfast punctuated with little speech before they set off again. Like the afternoon and evening before the pair travelled in relative silence with only the occasional talking, the only sound other than that being of echoing boots and hooves against gravel and stone. It was like that for some time, the rocky walls flanking either side of them seeming to capture the early morning stillness and torpor and carry it on until the early afternoon when the sun finally rose high enough in its daily arc to banish the shadows entirely, at least for a time.

It was during that brief period that Finders Keepers and Kiako came across a fellow traveler by the side of the rail, a clearly well-fed, chestnut stallion with a garishly blue mane that wore a double breasted vest that had clearly seen better days. There had been the start of a small panic when the stallion actually saw them the two of them, but Finders Keepers had managed to reassure the stallion enough between his bouts of obnoxious, high-pitched screaming to get him to calm down and introduce himself.

Like Finders Keepers herself, the stallion was of the earth-pony variety, sporting none of the phenotypical traits that separated the unicorns and pegasi from Finders Keepers’ own breed. Also like Finders Keepers, the other pony — who had quite nervously introduced himself as Steady Bit whilst avoiding direct eye contact — had an emblem or perhaps a family crest dyed onto the fur of his flanks, though whereas Finders Keepers had a spade stuck into a pile of multi-colored rocks Steady Bit’s was that of a generic coin sitting at the center of a wagon wheel.

Were the stallion not so clearly terrified of the man, Kiako would have asked the trembling stallion if his markings denoted him as a merchant or if it meant he was part of some larger organization. He was fairly certain that the markings were related to their names in order to share a theme, perhaps as part of a ritual when they reached adulthood. Such practices and rituals weren’t uncommon amongst the barbaric CHOTA, who sometimes ritually scarred themselves on reaching manhood.

Still, quaint as the practice of marking oneself was he couldn’t help but appreciate the simple charm and effort it took in order to create a unique and personal mark to show off to the world and he could honestly say to himself that he was looking forward to seeing what other markings awaited in Stableside.

While the stallion’s name had nothing at all to do with making money, the marking on his bare flanks were a good an advertisement as any for the cart full of goods that sat waiting to be perused by a potential buyer, an opportunity Finders Keepers leapt at with clear and unrestrained zeal that made him pause.

The stallion reacted as appropriately and predictably as any shopkeeper would in the Province at the prospect of a customer, though at a much higher intensity. Whatever nervousness Steady Bit had was obliterated the moment Finders Keepers asked to look over his wares, and faster than even Kiako’s good eye could register the tarp was pulled away with such flourish and grace that were he anywhere else he might have applauded.

Both ponies were already embroiled in their haggling to such an extent that the man couldn’t even get a word in to inquire about the stallion’s wares, the duo’s words going back and forth so fast that the translation device implanted in the medallion was already having trouble catching up with them, certain words becoming jumbled and nonsensical or otherwise sped up in order to keep in pace with the unreadable movements of equine mouths. The entire thing happened with such abruptness that the man was forced to stillness, the beginning of a headache forming behind his temples as complete and utter bafflement took ahold of him as he watched the surreal spectacle.

Finders Keepers was already stuffing a jar of some sort of vegetable into a saddlebag when Steady Bit turned his attention to the human, despite the fact that Kiako could quite clearly still hear the ongoing haggling. The male pony’s confidence undoubtedly took a hit when the man ignored him for a few seconds longer, the headache soon fading away with the conclusion of the haggling. Only then did Kiako actually reply, breathing through his nose to take a breath deep from his diaphragm to subtly regain his composure in the wake of what had just he had just experienced.

Unlike with Finders Keepers the stallion took a far more simpering approach when it came to dealing with Kiako, though whether it was due to genuine nervousness around the human or just a way to try and ingratiate himself to a customer Kiako wasn’t sure. He had fortunately enough presence of mind to notice earlier how the two ponies were using the caps to beer bottles as a currency, so he was spared the faux pas in trying to pay with actual money.

Most of the merchant’s inventory hadn’t been particularly impressive, having neither the variety nor the abundance of stock an actual store might have had were it not set on a pair of wheels and pulled by muscle power alone. It was almost more trouble than it was worth in trying to find something that was both useful and affordable whilst also being doted upon by a pony that should have for all intents and purposes taken up an acting profession instead of hauling carts through mountain passes.

Kiako had about all he could stomach of the pony by the time his stomach settled on a purchase for him, a gloved hand drifting over to a jar filled to the brim with thick cuts of jerky. The apples and chicken noodle soup were the only bits of food that he had had in his backpack before getting dropped off near Haybale, and since having left that area he had lived on nothing but canned foods either too inedible for his stomach to handle — such as hay, of all things — or didn’t require a utensil to eat. To actually get to sink his teeth into something and chew was what he wanted most in a meal right then, and the jerky jar had more than enough to satisfy that gastronomic urge as well as that of the protein his body craved.

Before Steady Bit got another chance to try and stroke Kiako’s ego — so patently obvious that the man could practically feel his last nerve fraying — on selecting such a delectable purchase the man immediately thrust a handful of water purity testing strips into the stallion’s face, much to his confusion. On explanation as to the strips’ purpose the male pony thankfully dropped the irritating sales-act and took on a demeanor far more befitting of his profession. It was only due to Finders Keepers helpful vouching and a brief showcase as to what the stallion was buying that the transaction even went through — the fact that a nearby puddle contained trace amounts of urea in the water was only proof that the strips worked, and that an animal had clearly been through the area earlier.

With an open jar of dried meat and the warm glow of getting something for a bargain — the test strips were easy enough to make, after all — they were well on their way again, Finders Keepers and Kiako Lalene having left behind a curiously flustered stallion. Haggling with the merchant hadn’t taken long or been worthwhile ultimately, but it did wonders to break up the monotony of constant travel and helped to improve his mood somewhat as he busily teared away on thick cuts of dried meat. Finders Keepers’ mood had improved as well, the mare’s storm of haggling seeming to have given her a bit of pep in her step that went along with the good cheer that she exuded.

They continued through the pass until they had the mountains looming over their backs and another, smaller set of mountains looming ahead of them, the train tracks leading them out toward a landscape of hills that rolled all the way into the grassy horizon. That was the route they travelled until the sun began to dip beneath that very same horizon, the skies taking on a beautiful multitude of warm hues that the man thought absolutely nothing of.

Once again they settled to sleep on the grass beneath a field of stars, a crescent moon giving them enough light to see some distance away even with the sun having long left. The duo didn’t bother with a fire, both realizing that the smoke and flame might bring unwanted guests to their location, and so they did as they always did and kept nearby but firmly separate from one another. When the moon dipped beneath the Unicorn Mountain Range that loomed over them still, both man and mare got up and went about their morning rituals before breaking their fast with a light meal, before once again getting underway.

Finders Keepers had told Kiako just as they readied for bed the night before that they would both make it to Stableside that day, and unlike the prediction she had made earlier that week she was right. Like with the mountains earlier the tracks cut right through the hills, earth and rock either pushed aside or blasted away when it wasn’t economical to go over the hills. Of course, the trains didn’t run on time let alone at all but it still gave the pair a straight shot to Stableside.

It was not long after noon had come that their destination came into sight, their travels taking them closer and closer to what he had learned to be a large valley set between a pair of wide, coniferous mountains that came close but not-quite to reaching the clouds in the sky. Kiako had asked the pony how the mountains had gotten the eponymous “Smokey” in their name, but the mare only looked at him and shrugged, apparently not knowing herself.

The tracks lead right into a valley forested with a curtain of dead trees that did a great deal to hide the settlement from view, but the man could see it clear enough even if the buildings were a tad on the blurry side and the figures milling around were indistinct blobs of color.

“You can’t see it yet, but the settlement is up ahead in that valley, past the trees,” Finders Keepers piped up from beside him, the quiet creaking of wood occasionally heard between words as they both walked along the railroad ties.

“Is that so?” Kiako commented, intentionally straining some of the extraocular muscles of his right orbital — which contained what he liked to refer to as his “good eye” — to bring the vision in that eye back to normal.

“And you have never been there before, correct?” the man asked, nearly stumbling after a brief moment of vertigo when he had opened his left eye. “And you also know for certain that they have no tomography devices? Not even able to take a simple radiograph?”

“I still don’t know what that first one means, and I have no clue what the second is,” the mare replied with a note of annoyance in her voice, “Like I said, I haven’t actually been here before.”

“Perhaps I’ll be lucky, then,” Kiako mused. “Also, for your information tomography is a way of taking an image of something through use of penetrating waves. Have you ever broken a bone before and needed a doctor to take a look at where the break was?”

“Oh, you mean like in a clinic?” the mare replied with sudden understanding as to what the man was getting at. “Only once, and that was when the potion I drank healed the bone wrong and a unicorn had to open up the leg to fix it.”

The two continued to chat away as they got closer and closer to Stableside, their conversation beginning with the effects of the potions and from there went on to what kinds of injuries the two had received in the past. For Kiako, of course, the wild tally on injuries he had collected throughout his life was short and specifically non-crippling.

As they entered the valley proper they were immediately swallowed up by a forest of dead, stunted trees, the railroad tracks like a spear piercing nature’s bosom. Kiako himself had walked through far more livelier valleys that were rich in flora and game, but to say that the one he was walking through then was lifeless would be wrong. While dead trees sagged and tilted at precarious angles, their roots exposed to the air due to rains that had long since washed away the uppermost layers of soil and created an unnerving patchwork of roots that looked very much like that of veins creeping out of the earth in search of sustenance, the area was still very much alive.

Whatever had happened to the forest in the past, nature was already well on its way to make a triumphant return to what had once been barren. In a reversal, where there had undoubtedly once been a lush canopy among the treetops, it was the ground that was the greenest in the area. Hardy weeds and scraggly bushes fought with the tangled roots of trees that even still maintained a death grip on the forest floor, life trying to find purchase in soil already choked with the dead.

Amongst the gnarled roots and precariously tilted trees were other signs of life as well, fauna having already made a home for itself amidst flora that was either struggling or already dead. The man caught glimpses of movement going in and out of small burrows, curious eyes looking back at him from dark little holes, some of which had slick red trails leading into them. There were no large animals that he could see, none of the snuffling boars, rabid porcupines, or any other of the wide variety of animals that would have lived in this area were it back home in the Province.

The steady, rhythmic knocking of axes biting into wood brought their already petering conversation to a full stop, their attentions focused more on what lay ahead than on anything else. The tracks continued taking them for some ways before they suddenly ended with that of the forest, a field of stumps marking where there had once been a great many trees standing before the entrance of the settlement. While there were no stables that Kiako could see outside, what he saw certainly gave credence to the other definition of the word.

One look at the walls surrounding the settlement itself told him where all the lumber had been going. Made up of large trees used wholesale and driven deep into the ground before being piled over with dirt, the stockade was a formidable defense against any bandits or marauders that tried to get into the settlement itself, but maybe not so much against explosives. The ponies within had obviously thought of that weakness themselves, the space that had been left behind after the dirt had been removed to create the earthen embankment being filled with sharp wooden stakes to prevent anyone from getting too close.

Add onto that by having ponies and the occasional griffon patrol the ramparts above — those very same blobs of color he had seen earlier from a kilometer away — and one had a formidable as well as stable fortification that also served to hide what lay within from prying eyes.

As far as eyes went though the man was already drawing plenty, some of the guards atop the walls and a couple of woodcutters having stopped to gawk at him. Kiako gave each and every single one of them a polite nod before making a show of where he had his weapons, and then disarming himself. He turned to look down at Finders Keepers beside him.

“And here we are, Miss Keepers. I will admit that our meeting was more rocky than I would have otherwise liked, but in the end you did save my life and bring me here, and for that you have my gratitude.” As he said that the man took a knee and began to undo the straps of his backpack.

“I think that’s the only time you’ve ever actually thanked me for anything,” Finders Keepers said with an amused snort. “I’ll admit that the first few days you were a real pain in my rump, and even after you nicked that medallion off of Rosewing I was thinking of just ditching you.”

“Well in that case I am glad that you were able to tolerate me for just a few days more,” Kiako remarked wryly, the faintest quirk of a smile playing over his lips before quickly suppressing it. “Interacting with you has been a most enlightening experience, and to help repay your help in not only saving my life, bringing me here, and telling me about the land, I have this for you.”

From within the confines of his backpack came his hand, the fingers uncurling to reveal a pair of small metal bars that were pale in tone and gleamed in the afternoon light. He offered both of them to the mare, holding them out in front of her.

“Unfortunately I cannot pay you in chips, my people’s currency, but I might be able to do you one better in regards to repayment.”

The mare accepted the proffered bars with the underside of a hoof, the man obliging the gesture and letting them slide out of his palm.

“Is this…” the mare’s words trailed off for a moment as she squinted at what she held, ears perked up before a smile played across her face and she turned a pair of radiant pink eyes up at him. “This is silver, isn’t it?”

“An order of magnitude better,” the man said with a purposeful sly smile. “Platinum, actually. I just so happened to have them on me and was supposed to hand them over the next time I visited the University, but I feel that they will just have to do without them until I find my way back home.”

If Finders Keepers’ face had been one of pleasant surprise before when she had thought she had been offered silver, then the one she bore when learning the bars were made of platinum was that of genuine joy. The mare was already hurriedly tucking them away into her saddlebags, the edge of a wide smile planted on her muzzle visible even with her head turned mostly away from the man.

Brushing some dirt off of his kneepads the man turned to face the gate, hoisting up his backpack and bringing the straps over his shoulders. He took several forward to make clear his intention to enter, and raised an arm to wave up to the silent guards who had been watching him with equal parts confusion, curiosity, and caution.

“Greetings! I mean no harm and only wish to enter your settlement!” he called out loudly and concisely, the sudden volume of his voice causing a stir among the guards up top and even a couple of nervous, startled jumps.

One of the more skittish guards popped their head up from behind the wall, their head and neck having an odd smoothness to it as a pair of goggled eyes sitting beneath a large helmet sought where the voice had come from. Kiako rocked back and forth on his heels, unable to help but take some amusement from the stir he had caused all the while hoping that none of them were particularly jumpy enough to shoot him dead right there.

It was only when the aforementioned guard directed its face and bore its eyes on him that the man felt that something had gone awry. The man looked right back at it, the inner corners of his eyebrows tilting inward ever so slightly as he made note of what he had once thought a pony being something else entirely. He had spent enough time with Finders Keepers to get a sense of how their heads were formed, as they certainly were not as bulbous as what he was looking at. What had previously been mistaken for a mask turned out to be entirely metal, unpainted bits marking where screws held the plates to the thing’s skull.

Kiako was only beginning to think the guard up top was not a pony at all when its eyes suddenly began to glow an ominous, incandescent pink that bathed the rest of its metal-plated face in an almost demonic aura of light. Was it some sort of camera or another type of scanning device?

He was about to ask what was going on before the device’s eyes began to flash on and off in unison with blaring words that were harsh and tinny to his ears. Had the man been wearing the medallion from the very start of his arriving into this land he would have simply chalked up the machine’s voice as gibberish or some sort of flaw. That wasn’t the case though, for while he could clearly hear and understand the cries of alarm coming from the ponies nearby, he also knew that what the machine was blaring out at him was the ponies’ raw and unfiltered language.

Whatever the case, he knew that somehow and in someway he was in danger and his instincts screamed at him to run. And run he did, managing to move several paces before twin streaks of light shot forth from those brilliant pink eyes and struck him dead in the chest in an explosion of heat and fire that sent him to the ground.

Author's Note

Wooo. Took me a little bit to get out, but I said I'd be working more on the story, didn't I? The first part of the chapter probably took me the longest, in fact.