I managed to more or less calm down by attempting to knock myself unconscious in the bathroom's inadequate bathtub. Failing that I resigned myself to experimenting with how my freakish wings gave off light, at least it wasn't eccentric or blinding, It glowed for sure, but it was a calming blue rather than some of the neon bright lights that hanged on Geary's shop outside. Needless to say I hadn't gotten any sleep and Cait didn't blame me.

Apparently, as he told me, I had mutated from the heavy dose of radiation, he didn't know why I had merely gotten glowing wings, instead of as Cait described it, extra limbs, a third ear, or laser vision or green chitin and super strength. I didn't think it worked like that but I could hope, though I wasn't about to go and jump into another radiation flooded area if I could help it. No telling what other unpredictable effects could have. Didn't stop Cait from bugging me about it constantly though.

"Hey, cheer up." Cait began yet and I groaned, "At least it brightens up your day!" he had been going off one after another with puns against my wings since he had woken up. Even Scrapyard thought they were terrible, "With all the attractive ponies in this room, you're just glowing."

The urge to shove my hoof into his mouth harder and harder as he kept smart-mouthing me. It continued all the way up until we entered Geary's shop and he gave me his widest grin and moved forward to ring the bell again with the same maniac fervor he had done so not days ago. For the most part I put my hooves over my ears until he stopped this time. "For the love of Celestia Cait!" Geary shouted from another room, "You only need to ring once!" before long the metal pony in question came out of the back, an irked expression still on his face.

Cait waited until Geary was well glaring at him before sticking his lower lip out in a pout, "But..." Cait's eyes went wide, "How else would you tell it was me?"

Geary was unamused, "you're the only one who rings it anyway. Everything else has the decency of just shouting that they're here."

My curiosity perked up, "Don't you ever have any problems with thieves then if you're always in the back when they enter your store?"

Geary turned his attention to me, "I have charms in place in case they try." he gave a causal look over to everything in the room and nodded, "So what are you here for anyway?"

Cait grinned as I started messing with my saddlebag to get the Project MISS that he had wanted out while Cait explained, "So we went to the facility..."

"And...?" Geary responded, deadpan, as though he already knew what was going to happen.

"It exploded." Cait finished with a smirk as Geary's eye twitched, he couldn't help but add, "in a miniature balefire bomb."

Geary's head hit his table and I could of sworn I heard something crack. Cait merely grinned as Geary sighed irritably, "Really Cait. Really. You had one job."

I passed the small black chip to Geary, giving Cait a withering glare as his only return gesture was to stick his tongue out at me, "Don't worry about it, we still got your chip."

Geary looked up at me and immediately sat up, before giving Cait a whack upside the head, "Should of said so sooner." he all but growled but Cait merely beamed at him.

"Reward?" Cait asked, and you could of sworn he was acting more like a puppy than Scrapyard ever had with how much happiness was rolling off him, it was intoxicating, even for him.

Geary gave Cait a flat stare before finally relenting, "Fine, fine, let me count out the caps." he reached behind the counter and pulled out eight smaller bags, each labeled with the number 250. He tossed four towards Cait and the other four to me. How much did he fit all of this behind there? I wondered idly as I tossed the bags into my saddle and unloaded what we had to sell. I think I saw Geary's eyes bug out at the pile but he sighed, "Going to make me run out of caps at this rate." Geary remarked bitterly, "More than what I have in caps at least."

Cait grinned, "Well that's great, because like always we need new armor, how's the damage after getting some combat armor and a bit of reinforcement for the ladies Stealth barding?"

Geary nosed through the small pile, "If I throw in more ammunition with that, .308 rounds was it?" he looked at me for confirmation, and I nodded, "Then I can bring it down to 7950 caps for the entire pile."

That was a lot of caps, I noted that I would have to make an entire bag devoted to carrying those and began to adjust through and organize my saddlebag in order to compensate for the space it would require. Before long I found myself also trading in my armor and Cait was also trading in his for repairs, replacement, and reinforcement. My suit felt heavier when I got it back, the metal plates that had been woven over it providing new layers of protection and now reminding me more of an actual combat attire with the bullet proof vest that was also added on top of it. While not as stealthy, it was more than enough to deflect smaller caliber rounds as well as small blades. It was worrying however that it had lost some of it's reflective plating against Plasma caliber rounds but what were the odds of getting an enemy that wasn't robotic with such a weapon?

Among it I was also given some more ammunition for Ambush as well as a few rounds that had both a blue and orange band around them, my pipbuck identified them as mixed rounds, interesting. I replaced the first round in Ambush's clip with a mixed round and stretched. Dear Celestia was this barding tight. Definitely form fitting but the black armor was only distinguishable from my chitin by the pale shine it gave off in the morning cloudy light and the reinforced plating's bulges.

I slipped my hat back on as we left, Geary giving a small wave as we left after complaining on how we were driving him bankrupt. Though I had to consider, while I put on my still singed and shot up hat, that he was a merchant. Judging from his prices he'd have twice the caps at least once he sold everything we had traded him. My hat however was still burnt around the edges and had a hole through the center. Maybe if I find another white hat I could repair it... In the mean time I guess I could use the hole that was going through it as a place for my horn... Hmm...

I had let Cait lead us towards the main plaza which was still aglow from the large balefire flame in it's center. It was still bright enough to give everypony around a second shadow but at least It wasn't as blinding as it was at night. Curiously I noted that several ponies, both robed and not were gathering towards the western edge of the large platform that supported the giant green flame. My interest also peaked Caits and we headed towards the commotion, taking a few minutes to worm into the crowd that had gathered and the voices became clear as we finally got to see the center of the commotion, there was three unicorn ponies of the same stature in stable security barding passing out wanted posters that I couldn't get a copy of, I saw Cait pursue one of such posters.

While the fourth member of their group, a grey stallion who was facing away from the rest of the group was the most easily identified member, probably because the other three looked oddly identical and all wore stable 103 security barding and carried unloaded shotguns showing their tips in their bags. Wait Stable 103? My ears picked up, and I leaned my head a tad closer to catch their next spout of shouting as they threw wanted posters all over the place as though they were feeding chickens, "Changeling known as 13 wanted for being a prime suspect in the murder of twelve ponies! Reward of one years food and five thousand caps additional!"

"If seen engage with caution, subject is mildly dangerous," another said, sounding bored. I didn't blame him, it must be boring to say the same few things over and over.

The mob wasn't very relenting in their interest but as I began to move backward but my gaze was taken by their fourth member as he turned around and spotted me. The Cowpony duster of deep brown was covering a majority of his body excluding his lighter grey tail and mane while a similarly colored cowpony hat kept most of his bangs out of his face. His unkempt goatee framed his face and the grizzled earth pony's back left leg was replaced with a prosthetic one that looked harder than his normal one. But that solved any doubts of who I was looking at.

Straight into the eyes of Grey Iron, my old combat instructor, teacher, and savoir back in Stable 103. His eyes met mine and I felt the air chill a few degrees as a shiver went up my spine as though he was saying through them that I had messed up, badly. I could faintly hear him tell the changelings around him that he'd be back and he went off towards the right. Disappearing into the crowd as I wrestled my way through the rest of the crowd until I cleared the mob, Cait was already out and he all but dragged me into an alleyway for a discussion out of sight of the security dressed ponies. I could still feel Grey's eyes on me though, no pony or ling had such a natural icey glare quite like Grey's.

"So you've gotten a lot of infamousness suddenly," Cait stared at me, then at a piece of paper in his magic, a wanted poster, "Let's see... Five cases of sabotage, twelve accounts of murder, one attempted murder, two vandalism, and one count of 'Disobeying The Overseer.'" He rolled his eyes, "Any of those true?"

"All but the murder ones, if I recall, those were from the Bloatsprite nest she accidently let into the Stable." a voice behind us said and as I turned to face Cait I spotted Grey directly behind the three of us and both me and Scrapyard leapt back in surprise. He hadn't made a single noise and I wondered how he had been so quiet with his usually loud fake leg. Never had it occurred to me that he had been purposely loud around everypony.

"Who're you?" Cait asked Grey, flipping around and spreading his hooves to cover the way from Grey to me, despite what little I knew about Cait, especially that he was without his melee weapons due to the city's laws and weapon checks, he wouldn't stand a chance against Grey.

Quietly I resigned myself to the situation, "Cait, this is Grey Iron, my-"

I had begun the words to explain but Grey Interrupted me and finished it, "Mentor, Teacher, Combat Instructor, Superior officer, maybe Father figure on a good day. Take your pick."

"Father figure?" Cait asked, a slight look of mixed confusion and amusement both crossing over his angry glare before it returned on Grey.

"Tough love." Grey explained and Cait made an 'Ah' of understanding, "And let me guess, you want Aria to surrender herself to your organization?"

Now it was Grey's turn to look slightly confused and curious before looking at me, "Aria?" He saw Cait look back to me to give a comforting grin but I was looking into thin air trying to avoid freaking out, "Oh, 13's name then."

"Experiment 1993-13 chose Aria Web for her name." Cait reaffirmed, "Respect that."

Grey shrugged noncommittally but the point was taken, he resumed, "Didn't think she would head here of all places."

I opened my mouth to respond but Cait beat me to it, "Why not? Large, populated, full of ponies and resources."

"Easily identifiable, provides a quick recharge for her magic but at the cost that dozens of ponies can see her just walking down the street unless she's disguised." Grey shot back.

"No ammunition or close range weapons allowed within the city, it's a neutral zone." Cait replied a voice like venom, taking a step closer to Grey.

Grey smirked, though there was enough ice in it to freeze over Tartarus, "Anything can be used as a weapon youngster." he took a few steps forward, his duster billowing ominously in the wind.

"What are you? My grandpa?" Cait replied and that wiped the smile off Grey's face.

Uhoh. My ears flattened as I watched what happened next. Grey started it with gravely voice giving off an air like silk woven from a venomous spider, "Why don't you come and see what this 'grandpa' has to teach you. then Squirt."

Cait snorted, and I mentally compared the two, Cait was above average for a unicorn in muscle mass, meaning he was pretty strong, but then again appearances aren't everything, Grey was supposedly a bit smaller than the average earth pony and a tad bit thin, though that didn't mean h was weak. It was to the contrary that his muscles were wiry instead of thick. A fact he had showed my caste back at the start of training in Stable 103. That and when Cait charged forward I saw the familiar movement of Grey taking a step back slowly and lowering his head. Cait was nearly upon him when Grey suddenly moved forward and pressed his head under Cait before lifting suddenly, using Cait's momentum and his own strength in order to flip the Unicorn over him and onto his back behind Grey, it was only a few steps backwards then before Grey was standing on Cait.

I started to go forward to act but Scrapyard stopped me with his mass, looking briefly at me then back at his master. My worry was growing exponentially as events escalated as Grey bluntly told Cait, "I'm not even 40, so watch your mouth."

"Really now?" Cait queried with a smirk, lashing out with his rear hooves to knock Grey backward before rolling back onto his hooves, "And how old are you then."

"39." Grey deadpanned without a seconds delay he added, "Can I talk to my ex-student now or do I need to beat up 13's Coltfriend?"

"He's not my Coltfriend!" I shouted down the alleyway, still trying to get past Scrapyard who was still doing his best to be a furry blockade in my way as I tried to pass him. The overhead was a bit crowded with rusty pipes and bannisters to use my wings and even if I had the space I'd think I would rather save the whole glowing wings and responsibility around balefire lecture from Grey for another time if there ever was.

Grey rolled his eyes, "Right." He turned his stare back to Cait, "Well boy?"

Cait sighed and slowly moved out of the way, and Scrapyard got out of mine as well, "Fine, though lay a hoof on her and I'll tear you a new one."

Grey ignored it and trotted past, I matched him step per step until we were a few feet apart and he eyed me over, "Been busy haven't you?"

It was creepy, he rarely smiled and when he did it was without any warmth or utter sarcasm, Usually a neutral expression was his equivalent of a cheering crowd and that was what it was now, "Y-yes sir..." I responded, and he rose an eyebrow at the two word response.

"Something wrong?" He asked me the question casually, "Besides the obvious that is."

I felt like a filly again, a guilty filly who wanted to tell the truth but I didn't know what I was guilty of, my thoughts raced back to the science lab, to Maul and... sigh... Red Delicious, Dang it Luna that name was dirty in more than one way. My mouth however had a mind of it's own, and I blurted, "My wings glow blue." Cait snickered.

Grey gave me a long stare of mild confusion before he replied, as though I had commented that the ground was grey, "That all?"

I sighed, and shook my head, "No, Sir... If you want, I can tell you about what has happened since we last met. It's a long story though and I'd prefer it if we could talk about it from the tavern rooms."

Grey nodded and I began to compose myself for the long talk, nothing held back. Grey had a knack for knowing when somepony was concealing something, he was smart like that. Sure for his age he looked like twice it but the older stallion had experienced the wasteland for far longer than any of us. I was not looking forward to this.

Xp Footnote: 75% until level up.

Next Chapter: Chapter 17: On The Road Again Estimated time remaining: 12 Hours, 22 Minutes