They walk on, silently preparing their minds for the hell they now know could creep out of the tunnel. With the floodlights behind them fading, Dash takes out her flashlight and fiddles around with it a bit.

"Whatcha doin'?" Twilight asks, giving a confused look to the malfunctioning light.

"Eh, I took some batteries from the comm. booth, so I'm putting those in."

Twilight eyes her friend, disapproving of her thievery. This lasted almost a few seconds before she busted into laughter.

"ONLY you, Dash. Only you would think 'Hmm, I need some batteries, let's steal them from ponies that are already sad. Even better, let's steal them from a run down, falling apart communication booth!'" she imitates with a comic Rainbow voice. Dash starts to chuckle at the accuracy of that assessment of her thought process. As they walk further down the deserted tunnel, they don't say much beyond commenting on things that they see in the tunnel. A strange form here, a weird shadow there, not much. The flashlight scatters strange, menacing shadows across the sides of the tunnel as they pass. They half of jump at a clicking noise to their left, quickly leveling their rifles at the source of the disturbance. Nothing.

"The tunnels make ya jumpy," Dash states. They keep walking. Snap! Dash fires blindly behind her in panic, hearing a whining sound as the high ring the gunfire left in their ears dies away.

"I've heard of these things," Dash says, looking over the mutant's corpse, "Their usually called Lurkers, they're famous for not attacking any group larger than two ponies." She pauses for a moment, "Which means we're game for the bitches."

Refilling her magazine as they walk, Dash thinks back on the past week. What the hell happened? she wonders to herself, What is going on in my life? I used to be an element! Now what am I? A grunt! A piece of cannon-fodder city guard! Twilight seems to sense her friends thoughts.

"Yeah, what happened to the old days, eh? Now we're two scared mares going down a dark tunnel, shaking in their boots about what might jump out at them. The elements are useless, the princesses are dead, and the entire race is afraid of the nightmare that's hiding just outside their city, waiting to pounce, waiting to drain every hint of life from the area. And we still can't stop killing each other, tearing each other apart by the seams. Why? Where did we go so wrong?" The sadness weighs even heavier now. Even the sounds of their steady hoofsteps are going numb, the sound seamlessly becoming just another unnoticeable part of the glum environment. It this is just past their first station, what would it be like later on? What about when they haven't slept well in days, maybe weeks? What about when they could hear the battles raging with their own ears, when they could hear the cries of dying ponies? Would they still have the strength to carry on? They are both starting to have their doubts.

A low metallic clinking catches their attention, bringing them out of their brooding.

"Ready to fire!" a shout goes out.

"Wait! You two, mares, get over here! Hurry!" calls another, more gruff voice. They run towards the source of the shouting, still in a mental haze. With a disturbance in their vision, and a low, dull thud, their senses snap back into action. A spotlight is in front of them, along with a number of ponies and a large machine gun with a shining, oily barrel. There is a loud shuffling noise behind them, and a low monotone fills the air.

They dive over the short sandbag barricade, immediately turning and bringing their rifles up, ready to let hell on whatever horrors the tunnel is unleashing. A whole swarm of mutants are bounding towards the line as they switch their safety settings to full and spray burning led into the soft, flappy flesh of the creatures. Dash notices through the combat that only she and Twilight are actually shooting. Looking around, the others have wide eyes and lowered weapons. Even the MG gunner, usually a job posted to only the most level-headed and unshakable of soldiers could react. Cursing under her breath, Rainbow stands from her crouching position, shoving the gunner from her post, grabbing the handle/trigger and sweeping the mutants with waves of half inch bullets as the thunder of the .50 overtakes the tunnel. The roaring thunder of the discharging mounted piece of weaponry shakes the shock out of the guard. They look around, as if confused, and then remember their situation, getting into full combat position and discharging into the horde.

The corpses mount as the engagement continues, eventually leaving the tunnel free of the skittering of little, clawed feet and damp crumps of bullets hitting the fleshy skin of the radioactive defects of evolution. A familiar sizzling sounds in the suddenly quiet tunnel as a small spark of light flies through the air and into the small hill of torn up bodies. An explosion rocks the post, sending dead biomass in all directions around the area, spraying dark red, almost black blood across the scene.

"Whew, it's a good thing you two were here, the entire station could have been overrun," a muscular white colt says to them, smiling grimly, "We owe you our lives and our station."

Rainbow's stomach growls angrily. "Heh heh, maybe you could start repaying with some food?" she says/asks sheepishly, earning a light chuckle from the colt.

"That'll do. Follow me," he turns around, motioning Twilight and Dash to follow. "Oh, and welcome Thirdborne."

The station has a rather steampunk appearance, with clocks and clockwork dominating the wide station. It's as if the entire place had been molded out of brass, the light of small communal fires reflecting off of nearly every surface to give the whole place a very well-lit atmosphere. The two mares are caught up in the new and foreign atmosphere; they had never seen anything like it before, having been stuck at the mediocrity that is Outreach for so long.

"And here we are!" the voice of the colt makes them flinch out of their thought, looking at where he is standing. He's standing in front of a pleasant building, with a large clock dominating the walls on either side of the stretched hexagonal door, one round, the other square, both ticking along quietly at exactly the same rate. A shining, polished wooden roof extending a good seven feet out of the actual building itself, with twisting metal support beams coming u out of the floor on the corners.

"The best casual eatery in all of Thirdborne, the Clockwork Café and Bar." He swings the door open and stands to the side, motioning them to go inside.

They all sit at an empty table and look over the menu, ordering when a young mare comes over and asks. They get their food and eat quickly, enjoying the food. They overhear a conversation from another table. Apparently, the word of Dash and Twi saving the post has already found its way around the station.

"Ah," the colt sighs, "Well, hate to rush out without givin' ya the whole tour, but duty calls." With this, he stands up and leaves.

"Nice guy," Twilight says, looking after him.

"Vell finally, I sought he'd never leave." A scratchy voice says behind them, making them turn around. The colt they see there is leaning back in his chair which is almost touching the wall behind him it's leaned back so far, his arms crossed behind his head. His voice has a sharp accent, his 'r's heavily rolled. "I've been looking to get out of zis station for a vile, but guards orders, nopony comes in or goes out unless zey are in a group of two or more. But nopony vill go vis me. Too scared of ze tunnels, or maybe too scared of me."

That's understandable; the colt has a rather menacing appearance. His coat is charcoal black, with a single band of white hiding under a thin layer of dirt on the outside of his forefooves. His mane is rather long and very unkempt; the sight of it would probably make Rarity faint. His eyes are a confidant blue, and probably strong enough to out-stare Fluttershy.

"So? What do you want?" Rainbow asks apprehensively.

"I heard zat ze tunnel's shit doesn't affect you two. Care to join me to Rathaus?"

Twilight and Rainbow give him a confused look, to which he pulls out a map with two marks on it. One of the marks is labeled "Currant" and the other "Rathaus". The station is conveniently close to Central.

"Okay, we can do that," Dash says after a moment of looking over the map with Twilight. "But first, what's your name?"

He scoffs. "My name? Vell, I'm not sure about zat," he pauses, "But you can call me Bourbon."

---

Hurray! Bourbon is here! It sure took me long enough, jeez. And it's EXACTLY 1500 words. So that's cool. Anyway, until next time, Auf Wiedersehen! /)*(\