“So, after everything you had me do, you think you’re a ‘good pony’ now?” I laughed. The bindings that held me to the chair I’d been put in were too tight, and they ground against my fetlocks uncomfortably. I focused on this uncomfortable feeling to ignore the pain of my bruised and bleeding face.

“Oh hell, I know I ain’t!” Big Shot laughed in my face, pausing momentarily from the beating he and the zebra stallion from Steel Junction were giving me. “I'll kill a pony in a fair fight. Or if I think he's gonna start a fair fight.” He put a hoof in his chin and looked deep in thought. “Or if he bothers me. Or if there's a mare. Or if I'm gettin' paid. Mostly when I'm gettin' paid.”

I spat the blood that pooled in my mouth down onto the moldy carpeted floor. The room I’d been locked up in consisted solely of a table and three chairs. At first I’d thought it was an old world police station I was in, but the decor was far too homey for that.

“How are you still alive?” I grunted before I’d shifted my vision to the zebra getting ready to hit me again. “Either of yo..”

The hit that came impacted at the base of my horn, and I screamed out in pain. The force of it knocked me and my chair over onto the floor. The intense disorientation bled away quickly, and I quickly found myself staring at striped hooves as they stepped closer. With a firm grasp, I was pulled up and righted on the floor.

“Cut the bullshit, PC.” Big Shot had clearly been the one with the voice in this fight. While he had hit me a few times, it wasn’t anything like the zebra asshole had been doing. “All we want, is to take Flint down. You and his other hunters are simply in the way.”

“You think I want to work for him?” After everything I’d seen, knowing how he works, I couldn’t take it. I’d gotten a chance to finally have what I’d always wanted, and I was the one who’d been wrong. “You think I want to kill ponies the way he does? Bounty hunting when I did it was an art. What he wants? It’s not the way I want to work. Ever.”

“I think you are just saying things to save your own flank.” The zebra had finally spoken up. Again, he hit me, and again, I was sent down to the floor. My cheek burned from the hit, and I’d at the very least been thankful the hit didn’t break anything.

“You know, I don’t think that’s it.” Big Shot grunted as this time he’d righted me back up. He leaned close and looked curiously into my eyes. After a moment, he stepped back and took a seat. “I know how PC works,” He started, turning to look at his more violent partner. “She may have only killed, but she was efficient. Even earned herself a nickname among the slaves we’ve liberated.”

I perked my ears as even that was news to me. Seeming interested had been a mistake, as the zebra noticed. Another hit, not enough to send me over, but I felt a pop in my jaw that roused a whine from me. He got ready to hit me again, but I’d hit a lucky break.

“Dharma.” Big Shot’s words cause the zebra to pause.

“Je ne crois pas qu'il.” The zebra had taken to speaking fancy as he sighed.

The door to the room opened up, and in strolled the one mare I hadn’t wanted to see. “I told you to cut that shit out, Ficha.” Storm snapped at the zebra. “Speak normal around here. Nopony knows what the fuck you’re saying otherwise.”

He’d simply rolled his eyes at that. “Yes, yes. I get it. But you cannot tell me that your granddaughter is the pony who’s been picking off our slaves one by one.”

“She is.” Storm sighed as she walked up behind me and undid the bindings on my hooves. “Celestia, Ficha!” She put her hoof under my chin and turned my head so she could see my injuries. “I said make it convincing, not kill her.” Carefully, she reached up and slid the small black ring from my horn. I could feel as my magic pulsed up through it, and it was a small comfort amongst the pain in my head.

“You what?” Maybe it’d been the concussion I most likely had, but I’d gotten lost with that.

“You seriously don’t know?” Storm seemed almost aghast at me, and it served to piss me off. I wasn’t some goddess damned psychic! “The prison? How the fuck did we get you in?”

As had been happening quite a lot recently, the truth hit me like a ton of bricks.

“This was all a set up?” Painfully, I spat more blood onto the floor. “Really? Why the interrogation? Why the questions?”

“We needed to salvage the operation. I told them to work you over, make it look like you’d really been through the ringer.” She glared at me. “The questions were Big Shot’s idea. If you figured you were actually being interrogated, then you’d at least have a genuine story to tell.”

“I guess I missed that part.” Ficha muttered as he shifted uneasily on his hooves. “To be fair, she did shoot me in the head.”

“No, Caltrop was the one who shot you.” Not going to mention it was a lucky ass shot! “I was on the ground dying.”

“Oh, boo hoo.” Storm rolled her eyes as she turned back towards the door. “You’ve both been shot before. Get over it.”

“Can somepony please explain how the hell any of you are even still fucking alive?” I snapped.

“Let me make it simple.” Storm sighed as she whipped herself back around. “Big Shot was smuggled out of Filly before he was killed.” With a firm grasp, she wrapped her hoof around my neck and started to drag me off toward the door. “Ficha there has some sort of ancient curse thing that keeps him from dying until he figures out a puzzle or some shit. Happy?”

“No!” I wriggled my way out of her grip and stopped in the doorway. “What the fuck is going on? You all capture me out in the field and decided to drag me out here. Why?”

“It wasn’t the plan, but this is better because we need you on the inside setting things up for our assault.” Storm growled and tossed my gear at me. “Now come on, we have to go deal with your partner.”

After getting everything but my weapons sorted, I’d begrudgingly followed Storm. Both Big Shot and Ficha were quick to follow, but I felt uncomfortable with them around. The building I was in was of an odd design. The hallway we walked through lead to a large open room. Inside sat what looked to be a normal family room that you’d find in a residential ruin. Even odder that the design, was the fact that steel beams and rebar punctured this place like a raider den.

As we strolled casually across what had once been a green lawn, I looked around. The normal assortment of decrepit sheet metal shacks and buildings made me feel like this place was a fairly large settlement, but there were no ponies to be seen. Only our hoofsteps echoed through this place. Again, all the other shacks and buildings were perforated with steel, most to the point of collapse.

On the ground all around us, were old and shattered bones. Some with rebar rods still through them. It was a more grisly sight than one would normally find among the old world. At least those ponies died doing normal things. This looked more like they were slaughtered in the streets and in their homes.

All except one. Before us, sat a large domed building. The cracking, grey exterior had weathered the years well, even for the steel and rebar jutting from it. All up it’s curved exterior, sat row after row of broken stadium lights, and the faded words painted under them sat too faded from time to even read.

I found my curiosity forcing me to speak out. “What happened to this place?”

“It happened a few years back,” Storm sighed as we trotted towards the open entrance. “When the alicorn monstrosities first appeared, this was the first and only place that they performed a coordinated attack.” She shook her head solemnly. “No pony knows if it was to announce their presence to the wastes or what, but whoever might have known why, died with this place.”

If it weren’t for the carpeted interior, and the broken glass doors that lead out to a patio in the back, I’d have said that it could have been a military installation. On the patio, a small statue caught my eye, but we turned and walked down a set of stairs before I got a chance to ask. The stairs lead to a large circular basement, where two figures stood over the beaten form of Null. Bluejay had been one I’d expected to see, but the other, was my own mother.

“Mom?” I gasped out. She turned around and smiled up at me for a moment. Without even thinking, I trotted over and threw my hooves around her in a hug. I was so glad to see her alive, that I’d forgotten all about the pain in my face. When I stepped back from the hug, her gaze turned to one of concern as she noticed my injuries. “What the hell is going on here?”

“I told them not to hurt you too badly.” She scowled at Storm as she spoke. “Bluejay and I were just working over your friend here for the information. Care to give us a hoof?”

Null coughed and spit up blood onto the floor. “I understood that you wanted to run from your husband, but this was unexpected.” He breathed with wheezing gasps, looking up to me curiously from his chair. “Was this the plan all along?”

“No, they didn't even expect to see us.” I sighed and shot an annoyed glance back at Storm. “Well, maybe most of them didn't.” She deadpanned at me, and I thought to myself that I’d need to have a good talk with her later.

“So you have now defected to their cause?” He gave a sigh that didn’t match the smirk he wore across his muzzle. “What did they promise you?”

“Nothing. I want to take Flint down.” I spoke in earnest to him. It was an underwhelming thing to hear myself say, and I’d honestly thought that maybe I’d have felt better to hear it from my own muzzle. Then again, Null’s astonished look would have beat any reaction I could have wanted to have.

“He gave you legs, the ability to walk again!” Null spat at me.

“And I'm going to thank him right before I blow his head open.” With a light touch, I reached up and put my hoof on his shoulder. “Don't you want to choose your own jobs again? To not have to be told that you’re just a piece of property that he owns?” I stared right into his eyes, only seeing a burning hatred returned to me through his gaze.

“Why would I help? After all he has given me,” He jerked his shoulder away from my hoof. “After all he has done for me!”

“You would still work for him? Even when he asks you to kill harmless ponies who could have been spared?” I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. I’d thought that Null was the rational pony among Flint’s hunters.

“IT. IS. A. JOB.” He screamed at us all, turning his burning glare around the room to each of us who stood here.

With what sat between a growl and a yell, Ficha stepped past me and planted a hard swing across Null’s jaw. A muffled snap and pained yelp came from Null as he was sent down to the floor.

“Do you feel nothing for the ponies lives you ended in Steel Junction?” Ficha shook his hoof as he stood over Null’s whimpering form. “Did killing them help Flint in any way?”

“I…” Null’s jaw was broken at an odd angle, and I was surprised he could even form words with it. “I try not to think of it.”

I pushed Ficha aside and lowered myself down to Null. “Could Jala not think of it?” Null had to be the rational pony I knew he could be. “What would she want you to do?” Using her against him was a low blow, but I’d hoped that it could swing his view.

He spat blood on my hooves.

“She is dead.” He gurgled at me. “I work to keep myself from that pain. I tried to attach myself to you to shield myself from that pain.” The anger he held in his eyes bled off, and he directed his gaze to the floor below him. “I do what I must to keep from feeling.”

“Everypony has their pain here.” Storm snorted. “But nopony here goes and blows up towns to hide it.”

His fury returned in an instant. “You can not understand what she meant to me!” His watery eyes looked up at me filled with rage. “I loved her!”

“You're dancing around the subject here.” I was pushed aside roughly, and found my mother impose herself on Null. It was then that I noticed that she wore an old leather holster on her foreleg. In it, sat an oddly designed gun. “Will you, or will you not help us?”

Null closed his eyes and breathed in a deep breath. “I can not.”

With more speed than I could process, Mom pulled the gun from her holster and fired. The back of Null’s head blasted out and coated the floor with his brain. Besides the ringing in my ears from the shot, the room was silent.

Just like that, he was dead.

“Mom…” I couldn’t believe that she’d done that. She glanced down at my horrified look, and gave a sigh out around the bit of her gun. With a grace that had been lacking in her actions, she returned it to it’s holster.

“You heard him, PC.” She turned to me and spoke as if nothing was wrong. “He wasn’t going to join us.”

“But, you couldn't have just kept him tied up?” I realized that I was cold on a job, but this was different!

“And what?” Her calm demeanor melted away. “Fed him? Housed him? For how long would we have kept him here?” She facehooved with a tone of disappointment to her words that I hardly felt I deserved. “We're trying to bring down the most infamous slave ring leader this side of the wasteland. We don't have the resources to play foalsitter for some zoni who might have well tried to kill us when this was all over anyway.”

“And that justifies killing him?” It didn’t feel like I was talking to my mother. The mare who’d raised me, who spent so much time working to avoid this kind of life. I was ripped from my thoughts as she gave me a hard slap across my already bruised muzzle. The shock of the hit made me sit down hard.

“What would you rather I have done!” She snapped.

“I don't know!” I screamed back at her. “But he didn't have to die!”

“You don’t understand, PC. I've run Celestia’s Angles to make up for the mistakes in my life.” She stepped past me as she explained away her actions like they meant nothing. “We’re trying to help those who can’t help themselves in the wastes. That’s why Flint has to die. Killing this stallion here was a tough call. It may not have looked it from where you sit, but it's my burden to carry as a leader.” She sighed and spoke calmly. “I made the decision, his death is not on you.”

Everypony but me turned to follower her as she left. I simply stared at Null’s corpse as they did. He hadn’t been a bad pony, just one who’d dealt with his choices. In time, I was sure that I could have helped him see what we all saw in Flint. At the same time, Null was somepony who could have been me. Had Caltrop not changed the way I saw everything, I would have become like him. The killer Flint wanted me to be in the first place.

The soft hoofsteps of somepony behind me made me turn to see who it was. Storm sat down next to me and hoofed out a cigarette and her lighter. With a flick, she popped it into her muzzle and lit it. It had been so long since I’d had a smoke, I just didn’t care about them anymore. I met Storm’s glance with a confused look.

“You are just full of surprises.” She muttered before she took a long drag off of her cigarette.

“How could you let Mom do that?” For being the high and mighty hero that everypony made her out to be, I’d finally been able to question her morals for once.

“There was a point, back in the day,” She sighed, blowing a ring of smoke out as she stared off into nothingness. “When I was convinced I could save everypony. That if I just pushed myself hard enough, I could keep every single one of them alive.”

“How does…” I found myself cut off by her hoof.

“Thinking that way, only got more of them killed.” She continued, taking another draw from her smoke. “Sacrifice is necessary to create change, it took me losing too many friends to finally realize that.”

“This isn’t about something ‘greater’!” Storm’s brand of ‘wisdom’ was always long winded and pointless. There was no villain, no epic struggle to fight. The days of wasteland heroes were long gone, only stories that were passed down now. Flint was just another pony who needed to die for what he’s done.

“Isn’t it?” She asked almost casually. “For what it’s worth, I think he would have listened to reason.” She pointed down and looked over to me. “Meeting Caltrop changed you, PC. You’re not the cold mare that we all once knew. You think that ponies can be helped, saved even.” She stared into my eyes as she talked, the blue in hers seeming to shine. “You have the potential to be so much more, to do so much good in the wasteland.” She reached a hoof over at me. “Let me teach you what I know.”

“No.” I recoiled and pulled myself away from her. I couldn’t believe what I was hearing! “You talk about all the ‘good’ that you could do while you sit next to the corpse of somepony who you could have saved. He wasn’t a ‘necessary sacrifice’, he was a victim of your mentality.”

“That…” Storm blinked in surprise, and it was my turn to capitalize on her silence.

“If this is the way that you all want me to be, you can fuck right the hell off. You’re right that meeting Caltrop changed me.” I turned and walked for the stairs. “He may be misguided and stupid sometimes, but unlike me, he’s kind hearted.” From over my shoulder, I watched Storm’s gaze drop to the floor. “I’m going to kill Flint, with or without you, and then I’m going to spend the rest of my time with Caltrop away from all of you so I can finally get some Goddess damned peace in my life! Either being a hunter or hero, I fucking quit.”

With my point firmly made, I stormed off up the stairs and out the door. Fuck Storm. Fuck Mom. This was my life, and I was going to live it my way. A rumble of thunder punctuated the dark thoughts that brewed in my mind. With the rain, came an overwhelming sense that I’d laid everything out on the table. The cards were all down in this wasteland game, and it was time to find out who would win.

Even if I had to cheat, I’d make damn sure that it would be Caltrop and I who came out on top.

“PC, wait up!” Bluejay cried from behind me.

“Why.” I snorted and continued plodding through the dirt.

“Because you’re going the wrong way!” She groaned and panted as she trotted up behind me.

“Of course I am.” I never claimed that I’d been the best at directions, but this was just par for the course. Mother always told me I’d needed to invest in a compass, but did I ever listen? “What do you really want, Blue?”

If there was anypony out there like Storm had described, so full of potential for ‘good’, then it was Bluejay. She’d been a stable dweller, a slave, a free mare, and now a bounty hunter that I could now say without a doubt was far more successful than I’d ever been. She was the hero that the wasteland needed, not me.

“Other than turning you the right direction, your mother wanted me to give you this.” She opened her saddlebag and levitated out the holster and gun that she’d killed Null with. “Storm’s pissed that you left her rifle in that mountain hanger, and she’s keeping your revolver.”

“I don’t care.” I grumbled, taking the gun from her levitation with my own. Carefully, I drew it out of it’s holster too look at it. As I’d remarked before, it’s design was strange. It had a grip like the ones on a semi-auto pistol, but just in front of the trigger guard was the cylinder of a revolver. I don’t know why anypony would have wanted to mash the two designs together, but so long as it worked, I didn’t care. “Thanks.”

“Just, one more thing before you head back.” She worked her hoof over the pipbuck strapped on her other foreleg. “What can you tell me about why Flint sent you out? We had set up this operation hoping to take out just one of his hunters, but every site had at least two show up.” She looked at me in concern. “Why did he send teams of two?”

“Flint seemed paranoid that either you or Red Eye are going to attack him.” I shrugged as I strapped the holster to my forehoof. “He sent us out to find out what was going on while he got ready to defend the compound.”

“It has to be us he's worried about. Red Eye is the stallion paying for his shit.” She muttered to herself before she put a hoof to her lips in thought. “Still, why would he think that Red Eye was gunning for him?”

“Hell if I know.” I looked around at where I was. This wasn’t an area that I commonly traversed, and nothing looked familiar to me. Now that I thought about it, I was kinda glad that she came and stopped me.

“Without knowing what Red Eye's end game for all this is, I don't see why Red Eye would be a threat.” She sighed as she continued to talk to herself. With a scratch of her mane, she looked up to me and perked her ears. “Maybe Flint has plans to overthrow Red Eye, and Red Eye is catching on. What do you think?”

“Again, hell if I know.” This wasn’t something I cared to deal with. I just wanted to go kill Flint.

“If anything, you’re the closest thing we have to a reliable source on what either of them are up to.” She nodded and sounded like she wasn’t getting that I just didn’t care. “We need all the info you can bring down from that place. Defences, guard numbers, everything you can find out about Red Eye’s operations in Filly.”

“Look, I’m going to kill that bastard, that’s all.” I snapped, so incredibly tired of this conversation. “Do what you want, I don’t care about my mother’s gang. Find your own intel out because I won’t do it for you.”

“PC, you can’t just walk away.” She reached a hoof out in anger. “You owe me!”

“For what?” I laughed at the absurd notion.

“For Burst Flare!” She screamed at me. “She was my friend, and when you killed her, I just let it go. I wanted to make you pay for what you did, but I just let it go.” She eyed me angrily. “I promised her that I’d help her get free, and she died because of you. So you fucking owe me.”

“That was her fucking choice to help, not mine!” I shouted so hard that my head spun and my legs hurt. “I’ve made my peace with that mistake, and I refuse to let you or Storm fucking bring me down over it anymore.” Bluejay spun around in anger, her hooves shaking as she tried to stop herself from acting.

“I can’t believe that I felt jealous of you.” She seethed, not even looking back at me. “Storm still believed that you could be a good mare, but I see that she was wrong.”

“I am not the mare she wants me to be, that’s you.” Saying the words made me feel like I’d opened a valve inside myself, and all the pressure was just releasing now. “I don’t want to hurt anypony anymore. No hunting, no ‘heroing’ around the wastes.” With all that pressure going, I felt weak as my anger too left. “I just want to live my life with Caltrop, away from everypony else.”

“Then let us help you.” Bluejay’s voice quivered, but was calmer than before. “So long as we’re both working towards the same goal, there’s no need to go in alone.”

“I…” Without my anger to cloud my vision, I could think about what going in alone really meant. It meant trying to figure out a way to get Flint alone. Finding the time to kill him when he wasn’t ready. Even then, I had no plan of escape, no plan to get Caltrop and Sandy out of there. From where I sat, it had begun to look more and more like a suicide run.

“Just one more run of intel.” Bluejay turned her head back and looked at me, a warm expression on her muzzle. “Just find out what we need, and we’ll meet you at the forest road.” Her expression dimmed. “Then we can fight, and he’ll get what he deserves.”

“He’s already paranoid.” I sighed. “He might not buy the fact that I’ve escaped.” Flint was a lot smarter than I’d given him credit for. “What if he figures it out?”

“Then you have to sell it to him.” Her voice in that moment was just like Storm’s had always been. Cold, determined, and full of the authority that she believed herself to have. “Everything depends on you pulling this off.” The soft smile returned to her. “I know you can do it.”

“Everything I’ve tried to do since Burst Flare has ended in utter failure.” I muttered. Even so, I needed to try. “Just, be ready when I get there.” One last job, that was it. I could do it if it meant that I finally got to live a life of peace.

“Thank you, PC.” Bluejay nodded and pointed to a set of rolling hills that stretched off near the mountains. “Just keep heading that direction. It’s another day or so until you reach Flint’s from here, but there shouldn’t be too much in the way to worry about.” Simply starting up at a trot, I headed in the direction she pointed at. As I passed her, she reached her hoof out and stopped me.

“You know, you’re a better mare than you think you are.” She spoke as I looked over at her. “Even if you’re not the mare Storm wanted you to be, I know how well you work, how well you fight!” The a smile across her muzzle spread. “Just think about it. You and I could make a real difference not just out here, but everywhere.”

“I’m going to tell you the same thing I told Storm, so listen up.” I pushed her hoof down out of my way. “After this? I quit.”

“Don’t throw away your potential!” She snorted and called out from behind me!

“Not going to happen!” I called back without sparing even a glance. “Unless it concerns the wasteland as a whole, count me out.”

“I know you can feel it, PC!” She shouted. “Something big is coming in the wasteland! Help me fight it!”

I did feel it. I’ve felt like it’s been coming for quite some time now. Funny thing about it though, was that I no longer cared. Ponies that scrambled to be king for a day didn’t concern me anymore, nor did those who wanted to depose said kings. With a light touch, I reached into my bags and pulled out the golden ear of corn.

“Soon, this will all be over.” I muttered to myself. “And I can finally start living my life.”

Author's Notes:

It's been a while since I've done one of these, and it's high past time I did one again seeing as this story is slowly drawing to a close.

Many thanks to Kkat for the wonderful work that inspired so many to work in this universe. Thanks to Somber, No One, and Mimezinga, for crafting the wonderful stories that got me into writing! And thank you to so many other authors, some friends, some unknowing, for your other works that have guided me and helped to inspire me as well. Lastly, I want to thank all of you who have read anything of mine at all. Just giving these story a chance means more to me than you'll ever know.