Chapter 6: Collateral Damage

I was awoken from my slumber the next day by quite the ruckus. Or perhaps fracas would’ve been a more apt descriptor for the clamor. The sound of raised voices shouting urgently wrenched me out of the blissful painlessness of unconsciousness, and a sleep-crusted eye cracked open as I returned once again to the world of the living.

I appeared to have been moved to the clinic at some point after I’d passed out at New Appleloosa’s gates. It was immediately apparent to me that somepony had tended to my injuries while I’d been out. I felt a great deal less like death, and the dislocated joint of my right wing was nothing more than a dull ache—a large improvement over the stabbing, burning pain it had been causing me since I’d dislocated it. A persistent little ache at my fetlock caused me to look down, and I spied an intravenous line taped securely to a spot on my leg that had been shaved bald.

I rose slowly to a sitting position, the sheets from the bed I’d been placed on clutched loosely in my forehooves. A look down revealed that my jacket had been removed, and I could see nothing left of the gunshot wound but a bit-sized patch of bald, scarred flesh. I couldn’t get a good look at my ear or flank, but the sheets weren’t bloodstained, so they had to have been similarly taken care of. I twisted my neck around to get a good look at my wing and unfurled it experimentally, finding it to be stiff and mildly painful, but very much functional.

Flopping back against the pillow propped up behind me, I sighed in relief. I found myself thanking my lucky stars that the ponies of New Appleloosa had carried me off to their clinic instead of dumping me in a ditch somewhere. They’d patched me up and set my wing, and I was reasonably certain that I’d be able to manage flight now. It would probably be pretty stressful and painful this soon after the injury, but I’d gladly set my recovery back if it meant flying was once again an option. I didn’t have too many advantages going for me—aside from my military training and gear, my wings were just about it.

My head snapped over to the door of the clinic when it was suddenly thrown open. The clamor I’d heard from outside quickly made its way into the small clinic as a group of ponies stormed in. One—a unicorn—levitated a badly wounded raider mare over to a bloodied examination table at the other end of the clinic. I immediately started to panic, thinking the ponies of New Appleloosa had found the corpse of Garrote and were attempting to revive her, until I saw Calamity bringing up the rear—ears drooping, biting his lower lip and fidgeting like he didn’t know what to do with himself. I knew that look—guilt. This was his handiwork. Oh, thank the stars.

Now seemed like a great time to make myself scarce, so I carefully slid the IV out of my leg and oozed out from in between the sheets as stealthily as I could. The shouting over getting the mare stabilized made doing so a very easy feat. I snagged my jacket from where it was hanging on a nearby hook and threw it on, quietly plodding over to the clinic’s door before anypony could spot me.

I rubbernecked on my way out the open clinic door, peering between a pair of ponies to get a look at the wounded raider. My recently-healed wounds throbbed with phantom pain when I noticed that the mare had been dealt similar injuries. Calamity’s high-powered rifles were an entirely different story to a raider’s scavenged little snub-nosed revolver, however. I could see that, like me, the raider had taken two gunshot wounds—one to the hindleg, and another to the shoulder. They were clean hits, and given Calamity’s reputation and guilt-ridden expression, what had happened was abundantly clear.

I paused to gaze curiously at the little unicorn mare bleeding out on the exam table. Something about her was ringing a bell, but I couldn’t quite place what it was… I felt like we’d met before, but that was impossible—I hadn’t met anypony friendly since I’d gotten to New Appleloosa. If I’d crossed her in my travels while she was wearing raider barding, we most likely would’ve traded shots, so it wasn’t that, either.

As much as it was bothering me, I had no time to dwell on it. While these ponies had been tolerant enough of my presence to heal my injuries, it was crystal clear that I wasn’t welcome in New Appleloosa. If they didn’t want me here, I’d gladly leave. There was a wealth of plight to be resolved in the Wasteland, and I was positive I could find some ponies who would all too happily welcome my aid.

Leaving the ponies to tend to the wounded raider, I slipped quietly out of the door with the intention to make tracks. I made it about two steps before I collided with something so solid I could’ve sworn I’d walked straight into a tree.

“Oof!” I exclaimed, rebounding and stepping back so that my hindquarters were back on the other side of the door, inside the clinic. “What the—?”

Standing on the other side of the doorway was a black and grey earth pony stallion, impeding my progress with his hardy bulk. Railright. Shit.

“Goin’ somewhere?”

“Uh…”

“ ‘Cause it looks t’ me an awful lot like yer tryin’ t’ skip town,” Railright said, glowering at me menacingly. “Were y’ plannin’ on payin’ fer the treatment we gave ya? Or were y’ jus’ thinkin’ you was gonna exploit our hospitality an’ skedaddle afore anypony could ask y’ fer money? Ah seem t’ remember y’ sayin’ y’ could pay fer yer medical treatment.”

“L-Look, I…” I stammered nervously. I’d never been good at bouncing back when caught red-hooved. Figuratively speaking. “I was just—”

“Let’s see some money, Enclave,” Railright demanded. “Yer not leavin’ until y’ cough up enough t’ cover what it cost us t’ treat ya.”

My confidence immediately returned with my surging temper. This guy was honestly going to stand there and make me out to be the asshole? He’d been planning to turn me away at the gates until Calamity had talked him into helping me, and I was the dick for trying to slip away without paying for medical treatment he wasn’t even going to give me in the first place?

Okay, yeah, I was still a bit of a dick for trying to skip out on my bill, but Railright was hardly on the moral high ground himself.

“You didn’t even want to help me, why the hell should I pay you?” I snapped.

“Whether or not Ah wanted to don’t make much difference,” Railright said dismissively. “Ah still took ya in an’ had muh ponies tend t’ yer injuries. Ah dunno how they do things up in yer Enclave, but ain’t nothin’ come free in the Wasteland, feller. Now either y’ give me the money y’ owe us, or Ah’ll take it by force. Yer call.”

I stared him down for a good long while, but it was evident that he wasn’t going to budge on this. I was fairly confident that I could just simply fly away from him, but I wasn’t as confident that he hadn’t told his town guards to shoot me if I tried to split. With a frustrated growl, I dug a hoof into my jacket pocket and scooped up all of my Enclave bits. As a last act of petty spite, I tossed all twenty of the small gold coins at the stallion’s hooves so that he’d be forced to pick them up off of the ground.

“What in tarnation is this?” Railright scoffed as he turned a coin over with his hoof and examined the Grand Pegasus Enclave emblem minted onto the reverse side. “Ah said give me money.”

“That is money, genius,” I sneered. “Twenty bits. Haven’t you ponies ever seen a coin before? Those are all I have.”

“Ah can’t take these.”

“Why the hell not?”

“Ain’t nopony used bits fer currency goin’ on two-hundred years now,” Railright said with a smug smirk. “But Ah doubt you’d know that, holed on up in yer fancy li’l time-capsule paradise above the clouds.” I frowned angrily at him. I could practically see his thoughts laid bare with that expression. He thought he had me by the short hairs. “These days we use bottlecaps fer money. They’re easy t’ come by an’ damn-near impossible t’ reproduce, there’s no exchange rates t’ deal with, an’ they hold up pretty well all things considered.”

“Tough shit, then. I don’t have any bottlecaps.”

“Well then, it appears we got us one doozy o’ a problem here, muh little feathered friend. Iffin’ y’ can’t pay, then Ah’m afraid we’re gonna have t’ find another way t’ settle our li’l monetary dispute.”

“Look, I gave you money,” I snarled angrily. “If you don’t want to accept it, that’s your problem. I guarantee the gold used to mint those bits is worth a whole lot more than the steel in bottlecaps. What’s to stop me from just taking off and leaving you standing here like an idiot?” I said, adopting a crouching stance and spreading my wings to ready for an immediate takeoff. “I’d like to see you chase after me, earth pony.”

To my surprise, Railright chuckled. “Go on ahead an’ leave, Ah ain’t gonna stop ya.” I cocked my head to the side in confusion as he reached behind his back to grab something. “Ah’ll jus’ go on ahead an’ recoup muh losses by sellin’ all yer stuff. Reckon Ah should be able to get a whole heap o’ caps from most o’ yer gear. Them guns especially. Ah can’t rightly say how much somepony’d be willin’ t’ give me fer these, though.”

My heart skipped several beats when Railright produced my lucky goggles and twirled the band around a hoof, and I immediately slapped a forehoof up to my forehead to check if they were there. When all I came into contact with was the tuft of mane above my eyes, I darted forward and swiped at my priceless, confiscated family heirloom.

“Give those back!” I yelled, but Railright had anticipated my move. The stallion stepped back as I lunged, and my hooves met empty air, causing me to fall roughly to the dirt as I overbalanced. “Those have been passed down through my family for generations, you stupid dirt pony asshole! Give them back!”

“Iffin’ ya calm down, Ah got a proposal to make,” Railright said calmly, surprisingly allowing my slight to roll off his shoulders. “Ah won’t sell off all o’ yer worldly possessions iffin’ yer willin’ t’ work off yer debt.”

“What the hell do you want me to do, wash dishes?” I snorted grumpily. “For the record, I’m terrible at it.”

“You’d be washin’ dishes fer quite a while t’ pay back what you owe,” Railright snorted. “There was the wing relocation—that there’s a specialized procedure, givin’ we don’t ‘xactly deal with yer kind often, if ever. Bullet removal, blood transfusion, an’ saline t’ rehydrate ya. Ah believe the total cost came down t’ about three-hundred caps.”

My jaw dropped open. “What in the hell could I possibly do to work off that much debt?” I furrowed my brow and held a hoof to my chin pensively as a thought occurred. “That is a lot of debt, right? I’m not sure what the exchange rate is on bits to caps.”

“Yer from the Enclave, we done established that already, yeah?” Railright began.

“Yeah,” I confirmed, biting my tongue and exercising a monumental amount of effort to quash the snippy remark waiting at the tip of my tongue. “A fact you’ve been sure to frequently remind me of.” Well, I tried.

“An’ you was in the military, right?”

“Right…” I said, narrowing my gaze suspiciously. It was sounding like he was leading up to something that I wasn’t going to want to hear.

“Well, Ah recently caught word from our sister town—Old Appleloosa—that a group o’ li’l foals an’ their escort were captured by some raiders. Ah don’t much care fer their chances o’ survival in raider custody. Either the poor li’l young’uns will be killed by the bastards, or their innocent li’l minds’ll be warped by ‘em an’ they’ll prolly turn raider themselves. Ah’d like y’ t’ head on over an’ bust ‘em loose.”

“Foals?” I blurted loudly. “Foals? Why is it always foals? Let me guess, they’re tied to the railroad tracks while a train barrels inexorably towards them, and there’s also an evil little pony in a top hat twirling his curly moustache and cackling wickedly, isn’t there?”

“C’n y’ do the job or not?” Railright huffed impatiently.

“I could… if I had my gear,” I nickered. “I don’t know how you expect me to free a bunch of foals and their protector without a gun. I was barely strong enough to pass hoof-to-hoof combat training, and I sure as hell haven’t bulked up any since then.”

“Y’ c’n have this,” Railright said, tossing my magical energy pistol to the dirt at my hooves, much as I’d done to him with the bits earlier. “Iffin’ Ah give y’ all o’ yer stuff, then there’s nothin’ keepin’ y’ from just flyin’ on off without takin’ care o’ muh problem. Ah’ll hold it as collateral, an’ you’ll get it back when Ah hear that those foals have made it safely t’ Old Appleloosa.”

I bent down and retrieved my pistol holster, fastening it to my left foreleg while I thought over Railright’s proposition. He had me over a barrel, no question about it. Without my gear, I didn’t stand much chance of surviving out here in the Wasteland, so it was imperative that I reclaimed everything as soon as possible. I’d be damned if I let the bastard hock my goggles for a pile of stars-damned bottlecaps, either. I’d sooner shoot him in the face and incur the wrath of the town than be forced to part with such a treasured possession.

“All right, I guess we’ve got a deal,” I sighed as I finished tightening the holster and looked up to meet the stallion’s gaze. “Just tell me where it is I’m headed to and I’ll try to bust your little pack of brats free.”

“Yer gonna wanna follow the rails out o’ town,” Railright said, turning and pointing towards the distant tracks with a hoof. “Old Appleloosa’s ‘bout an hour’s train ride from here. Now. Them little young’uns was rustled while they was on their way from here t’ there, so them raiders must’ve taken ‘em t’ a place somewheres between the two towns. Reckon it’ll be a snap fer ya t’ find ‘em, what with yer wings an’ all.”

“Why not bug Calamity about this, then?” I asked. “He’s a pegasus, too. And you seem to actually get along with each other, though I can’t imagine why, given your prejudice against Enclave ponies.”

“Calamity don’t owe me money, that’s why,” Railright snapped. “An’ Ah known him a lot longer’n Ah known you. Calamity’s earned muh trust, but you… yer a wild card.”

"All right, fine, I get it,” I sighed in defeat. “I’ll do this for you, but I want your word that you won’t pawn off all of my stuff before I come back to claim it.”

“Iffin’ y’ come back after Ah catch word that them foals is safe, y’ ain’t got nothin’ t’ worry about,” Railright said, sticking out a hoof to shake. “Sure as muh name is Railright, Ah’ll keep yer gear safe so long as y’ don’t screw this up or try an’ run out on yer bill.”

Reluctantly, I grasped hooves with the pony who’d just made my life more difficult and shook to seal the deal.

“You’ll get your damn foals. Just make sure my stuff is ready by the time I get back.”

I kept an eye trained on the ground beneath me as I made my way slowly towards Old Appleloosa. A smile had worked its way onto my face despite the difficult situation I’d suddenly found myself in. The droning whistle of the wind moving past my ears and the feeling of pure, unadulterated freedom was enough to lift my spirits immensely. Even though it had only been a day or so and my wing joint burned uncomfortably with each flap, it felt so good to fly again.

The landscape lazily drifted by beneath me as I continued my sustained glide, flapping at regular intervals to keep myself at altitude. The object wasn’t to actually reach Old Appleloosa, but to fly as slow as possible without dropping through the air, giving me plenty of time to scan the wastes for any sign of the captured foals or the raiders who’d taken them.

There weren’t many options that I could see, even from my vantage point high above the ground. I looked to both the left and right of the wending rail lines beneath me, but there wasn’t all that much to be seen. This had to have been a rural area in pre-war times, as open wasteland stretched outward for kilometers beneath me in every direction. Every so often a dwelling would crop up, but none of them stood out to me or had obvious signs that anypony had holed up within.

Right around the time the waypoint marker on the ScoutBuck’s automap hit the halfway point between New and Old Appleloosa, something suspicious finally caught my eye. I was just passing over a relatively beautiful old private estate when a flicker in a window drew my attention like a shark to blood. I immediately banked hard, breaking off of my established flight path and speeding up, entering into an elliptical holding pattern over the estate while I examined it from above.

The house itself had two floors and a large second-story veranda that overlooked the massive backyard. Tall plate glass windows overlooked the front of the estate, which featured what must have once been a magnificent white marble fountain encircled by a paved pathway for carriages, both long since cracked from age and the elements. The dead remains of carefully placed hedgework could be seen surrounding the estate and its property line, marking the private residence with a perimeter of dead branches. Another thing that drew my immediate attention was a little cart parked in front of the main entrance—double confirmation that this was the place I was looking for.

I kept my eyes on the windows as I circled the residence, determined to locate the source of the flicker that had initially caused me to investigate. I didn’t have to search very hard, and as I was passing by the estate’s east side for the second time, I again saw the flicker of a light through the windows of a smaller second-story balcony.

“Gotcha,” I muttered triumphantly, and entered into a shallow dive.

I soared down towards the balcony, slowing my descent and alighting gently upon it, so as not to alert anypony within. Carefully, I leaned over to the large sliding glass door that led into the room beyond and peered inside.

Beyond the door was a small bedroom, furnished exactly as one would expect, only with more elaborate, expensive furniture to reflect the owner’s wealth. A large princess-sized bed took up the majority of the room, and the rest of it was taken up by nightstands, an armoire, a large floor-length mirror, and a dresser laden with empty jewelry cases and a multitude of tiny little bottles of perfume. The flickering had originated from a lantern placed on one of the nightstands, and the flame guttered again even as I watched.

I had my hoof on the door handle, and I was just about to slide it open when I heard hoofsteps approaching. A strangled cry of frustration escaped my throat, and I quickly launched myself into the air to hover silently over the balcony. As I watched from my vantage point, a pony slid the door open and made his way out onto the balcony, heading over to the railing and casually leaning a foreleg up against it. He wasn’t dressed like any raider I’d ever seen, but his leather barding didn’t exactly make him look like a beacon of justice, either.

I thought about killing him for a brief moment—just giving him a hard shove straight off the balcony—but decided against it. Stealth was the name of the game here—I wanted to find those foals and get them out as efficiently as possible, and in a way that would minimize injury to myself. No, I wasn’t going to take the risk of killing him and alerting his buddies. Instead, I drifted down silently and landed once again on the balcony, slipping quietly into the bedroom and leaving the pony none the wiser to my presence.

Plush carpet met my hooves as I plodded silently into the bedroom, and they sank a centimeter or two before coming to rest on the floor beneath. The pony who’d wandered out onto the balcony must have been stomping around like an elephant for me to have heard him coming on carpet this soft.

I started moving before the pony could come back inside, crossing the room in several bounding strides that took me to the hallway door silently, due in no small part to my natural lightness on my hooves. Resting a hoof on the door handle and checking over my shoulder to ensure the pony was still on the balcony, I opened the door slowly and slid out into the hallway, thankfully having the presence of mind to shut it carefully behind me.

I took a look around before I moved any further into the estate, wanting to make absolute sure that nopony had spotted me exiting the bedroom. Directly ahead of me the hallway split into three directions, and what appeared to be a living room was directly ahead. As I advanced slowly towards the middle, my view to the right opened up into a massive, spacious, spartanly-furnished room with a fireplace and a veranda that overlooked the estate grounds behind the building. As I crept closer and closer to the center of the hallway, a sudden loud snort caused me to jerk my head to the left.

Exercising as much caution as was possible, I flopped down onto my belly and slowly crawled forward in the direction from which I’d heard the snort. Bits and pieces of the room ahead came into view gradually, a spiraling stairwell first among them. When I finally reached the lip of the landing overlooking what I now recognized as the entrance hall, I slowly leaned my head out, glanced straight down at the floor… and spotted my target.

Beneath me, right at the base of the stairs was a little group of foals—three, all told, along with their earth pony escort, bound and gagged. Both colts were dead to the world, snoring obnoxiously while their little filly compatriot sat patiently, occasionally taking an interest in a nearby object and fixating intently upon it. They didn’t appear to be worried or panicked, and they definitely should have been in the presence of raiders. Could their utter lack of concern be attributed entirely to their naiveté, or was I missing a piece of the puzzle?

Regardless of whether or not I was missing something, I had a job to do.

Before I up and jumped down there to scoop up the foals and run, I took a moment to scan the rest of the foyer. The ScoutBuck was still refusing to provide me any feedback on potential hostile targets, so I had to rely on my own two eyes. It took a few full sweeps before I located a lone raider keeping watch out of the front door, just barely within my sightline. That blocked the main entrance as an avenue of escape, which left only the balcony from which I’d come—likewise a dead end due to the pony I’d snuck by—or the veranda directly behind me. Veranda it was, then. I was going to have to be very quick and very quiet to get these little foals out without drawing attention.

Without another moment’s hesitation, I hopped over the stairwell’s railing and unfurled my wings, using them to slow my descent and land quietly by the tied up earth pony. The chain of events that followed nearly gave me a heart attack. The earth pony jumped in surprise, causing the little filly to curiously investigate the commotion, and the second she spotted me, her eyes lit up.

“WOW, A PEG—” the little filly squealed excitedly, and I quickly slapped a hoof over her mouth before she could continue.

“Shh!” I hissed, shaking my head negative and holding up my other free hoof to visibly shush her. “You have to be a good girl, okay?” I whispered, checking to make sure the guard hadn’t heard her. “I’m going to get you and your friends out of here, but you need to be quiet. Can you do that for me, kiddo?”

“Mm-hmm,” the filly mumbled through my hoof, and I slowly removed it in case I needed to quiet her again.

“Okay pal, here’s the story,” I said to the foals’ escort as I started fumbling with his bindings. “Railright sent me to bust you guys out of here. Once you’re clear, he’ll finally give me back all of the stuff he’s holding as collateral, so rest assured that I’m pretty motivated to make sure you all get through this in one piece. What do I call you, by the way?”

“Chain Link,” the stallion said as I removed his gag and he rubbed at his sore forelegs where the ropes had cut into him. “What’s your plan, Featherduster?”

“Front door’s guarded, so I was planning on sneaking you guys out to the veranda,” I explained, pointing up and behind me. “I can fly all of you down to the ground one by one and then we can get the hell out of here.”

Chain Link thought it over for a minute. “Nah. I got a better idea. Follow my lead.”

Before I could protest, he’d scooped up both colts and thrown them onto his back, leaving the curious little filly to clamber excitedly up my leg while I wasn’t looking and perch herself upon my shoulders. Once Chain Link had seen that the filly was secure, he bolted straight towards the front door. I felt the bottom drop out of my stomach as his hooves clattered loudly on the old tile floor, drawing the attention of the raider by the front entrance.

“Hurry up, Mister! Let’s go!” the little filly encouraged me, and I took off running after Chain Link, biting my tongue to stifle a string of colorful expletives best not used around young ponies.

“I need backup!” the raider watching the front door bellowed as we charged towards him. “Don’t let them take the foals! We don’t want to lose them to those ponies again!”

That was an oddly coherent and well-spoken sentence for a raider. The motive checked out, though. Raiders didn’t like their merchandise running out from beneath their noses.

Chain Link completely ignored the raider moving to impede his progress, even as he blocked the earth pony’s path and stopped to sight down the barrel of his rifle. Instead, the reckless earth pony continued to charge forward like a bull, throwing out his shoulder and ramming through the raider, casting him aside like he’d weighed practically nothing. I couldn’t argue with those results, and the next thing I knew, we were streaking out through the front door and into the estate’s front yard.

”Come on!” Chain Link shouted, and bolted toward the cart that I’d spotted from the sky. “Hurry up and help me get the foals loaded into the cart, and decide whether you want to pull or shoot!”

“What the hell are you talking about?” I asked as I galloped over to the cart and settled the little filly into it along with the colts, now awake and very much confused.

“Do you want to pull the cart, or do you want to hop in back and defend us?” Chain Link explained. “They’re not gonna let us go without a fight, so one of us needs to stay in back with the foals and keep them off of us. The other one has to pull our asses the hell out of here. Make up your mind quick, because they won’t take long.”

“Do I look like I’m strong enough to pull a cart to you?” I snorted incredulously.

“No, you look like a beanpole.”

“Well, there’s your answer,” I said, and hopped up into the cart, squishing myself in beside the foals, now all gawking at my wings. “Hey! Hoovsies to yourselves!” I chastised as the filly began rubbing her face up against my feathers and sighing contentedly.

“Take this,” Chain Link said, reaching down to the floor of the cart and tossing me a long rifle that had been resting there before moving to hitch himself up to the cart. “It’s only got two shots, so make ‘em count.”

“Is this… is this a coach g—whoa!”

I ducked as a gunshot went whizzing by my head, and threw a hoof around the wall of the cart as it lurched suddenly into motion. I used my leverage to power through the minor G forces as we continued to accelerate, and propped the coach gun up against the wall of the cart to stabilize my aim. The 'rifle' was a side-by-side double barrel shotgun with triggers designed to be pulled with a hoof. The weight of the triggers had been adjusted accordingly, and required a good hard squeeze to actually fire the weapon. Lining up my first target right between the barrels, I held my breath and squeezed up on the leftmost trigger.

The coach gun roared and kicked back into my shoulder, but I was ready for it. I was used to the natural stabilization of my battle saddle, but I’d spent enough range time with scoped energy rifles to know how to brace for recoil, even if energy weapons had none. Given the nature of a scattergun, my aim didn’t have to be dead on, and I watched my target trip and fall as the hail of shot tore into his forelegs and chest.

My heart skipped a beat when the wounded pony fired off one last shot as he fell, but the bullet bit into the wood of the cart’s wall, and my attention shifted to the second of our pursuers. Once again, I braced the shotgun and took aim, but a bump jostled the cart just as I pulled the trigger, causing my shot to go wide. I cursed as the raider pursuing us escaped unscathed, and dropped the spent coach gun to the floor of the cart to reach down and tug out my energy pistol.

The final pursuing raider’s eyes widened in shock when I started snapping off shots at him, the sudden volley of pink laser bolts completely catching him off guard. I had a bit of difficulty landing my target with the cart’s constant jostling, but a lucky shot or two struck the pursuing pony in the chest, and I suddenly found myself one hostile target short. An eerie magical glow enveloped the pony as my final shot hit home, and he simply disintegrated on the spot, leaving behind nothing but a slightly phosphorescing pile of pink ash.

I heaved a large sigh of relief and flopped back against the cart’s opposite wall, chest still heaving as I came down from the adrenaline rush fueled by combat.

“Mister Pegasus?” the little filly inquired timidly. “Mister? Your leg is hurt, Mister Pegasus.”

“Eh?” I sat up and looked down at myself, and sure enough, my right foreleg was bleeding just below my shoulder. An exploratory glance revealed the bullet that had hit the cart’s wall to have been the culprit. “Huh, I didn’t even feel it. Thanks for letting me know,” I said, reaching down to playfully rustle the little filly’s mane. “I’ll be okay, though. It’s just a little graze, squirt.”

“How are we looking back there?” Chain Link called back from ahead of us. “We clear?”

“As clear as we’re going to get,” I replied. “Only two came after us, and they’re long gone now. Can you make it the rest of the way on your own? I know things didn’t go all that well for you the first time, but I really need to be getting back to Railright to pick up my stuff.”

“Old Appleloosa’s not far from here, I can manage,” the earth pony responded. “You can go ahead and take off. I really appreciate you bailing me out of that mess, though. We really couldn’t afford to lose these kids to those guys.”

“All right, well, good luck,” I said as I stood, wobbling slightly as the cart shifted beneath my hooves. “You little guys stay safe, okay?” I said to the foals surrounding me. “Try not to land yourselves in trouble! There won’t always be a hero to come rescue you, y’know?”

I couldn’t help but smile as the foals sent me off with well wishes and admiration, their cute little voices fading as I took to the skies once again and began my climb to altitude. This wasn't so bad. It was a lot like what I used to do, actually. Behind flying for the Wonderbolts, that was the whole reason I'd signed on with the Enclave military—to protect my friends and family, should we ever go to war again. I still didn't think much of the ponies down here, but maybe they weren't all savages. I'd just been blackmailed into liberating a group of foals from raiders, after all.

Maybe I could find a purpose down here... If the price was right.

You done good, Mach, I thought proudly to myself. So shines a good deed in a bleak and hopeless world. Looking back, I watched as the cart continued to roll towards a large settlement in the distance. “Enjoy your new life, you adorable little scamps,” I said as I continued to fly away and they grew smaller and smaller. “Not every day you get a second chance. Here’s hoping it goes better for you this time around.” It didn’t get much better than freedom. Things were definitely looking up for those foals.

Filled with a sense of satisfaction, I sped off towards New Appleloosa, eager to finally reclaim all of my stuff and move on to the next person who needed some work done.

“Ya done good, stranger,” Railright said as he handed over all of my possessions and I set to putting them all back where they belonged. “Ah didn’t think you’d be able t’ pull it off, but y’ made a fool out o’ me, Ah reckon.”

“It’s in the past,” I said dismissively as I adjusted my goggles to seat properly on my forehead. “You held up your end of the deal, so there’s no animosity between us. I do have one last favor to ask of you, though.”

“What c’n Ah do fer ya, feller?”

“I’m looking for work,” I said. “This was a good start, but I need to keep it up if I’m going to afford to keep myself fed and healthy. Is there anyone around here that might need the services of a former soldier? Anyone at all?”

Railright was silent a moment before perking up as a thought came to him. “Well now, Ah might have jus’ the thing fer ya. There’s a band o' mercenaries out here who operate out o’ a nearby rail junction—Junction R-7. Ah imagine they should be able to set you up with work real nice. Them solder o’ fortune types are always takin’ volunteers, ain’t they?”

“Rent-a-solders, huh?” I murmured thoughtfully. “Well it’s a start, I guess. At the very least, it’ll provide me a jumping-off point and it’s not like I don’t already know how to do everything a mercenary can do. What’s the worst that could happen?”

I grunted as I was driven roughly to the ground and my face was mashed into the dirt by a massive clawed appendage wrapped entirely around my head. A second claw had evidently been used to take hold of a weapon, as the next thing I knew a barrel was being pressed firmly to my skull.

“Gimme an excuse t’ pull the trigger, ya little pegasus fuck!” A female voice screeched from behind me. “Go ahead an’ make my day!”

“Get the fuck off of me, you mangy, flea-bitten, twisted freak of nature!” I growled, my words mumbled as my face was held tightly against the ground. “You griffon bitch! I bet you wouldn’t be such hot shit without all of your buddies to back you up!”

“I’m gonna ask ya one question before I splatter your brains all over the ground,” the griffoness hissed dangerously. “Who do you work for? Is it Deadeyes? Answer me!”

“Eat shit,” I snarled, and spat on the ground. “Your kind crippled my father. It’s your fault he turned into such a miserable asshole and ruined my life. Given the chance, I’d kill every last one of you, and if I’d known I was being set up to meet with a band of griffons, I would’ve kneecapped the asshole that pointed me this way.”

“I asked ya if you were workin’ fer Deadeyes!” the griffon screeched loudly, pressing her gun harder into my skull. “Answer me before I paint the dirt red!”

“By the Great Egg, what in the hell is goin’ on out here?” A gruff female voice exclaimed, her tone rife with experience and world weariness. I heard the familiar whoosh of a large set of wings moving through the air, and felt a gentle breeze from a downdraft as a large creature landed nearby with a crunch of dirt and grit. “Got a new toy, Reggie? What did this one do?”

“Flew into our airspace and opened fire on us when we moved t’ investigate,” the griffon pinning me—Reggie—snarled angrily. “Didn’t even have time t’ ask him what his business with us was before he opened up on us with an energy pistol. I think he’s workin’ fer Deadeyes. I was just tryin’ t’ get that information outta him, as a matter of fact.”

“Who the fuck is Deadeyes?” I scoffed irritably. “I’ve never even met anypony named Deadeyes! Fucking Railright sent me this way!”

I heard the clacking of beaks, and the griffoness hesitated, her grip on me slackening a smidge. “…Railright? That pony that runs the show over in New Appleloosa?”

“Yes!” I bellowed angrily. “I don’t know what your beef is with this Deadeyes guy, but I don’t work for anypony. I’m an Enclave fugitive! Sweet stars above, you buzzards are fucking dense!”

The griffons stirred restlessly at my slight, and I realized too late that I may have made a mistake in letting my prejudice determine my response. I couldn’t help it—they were the enemy. Ever since we’d attacked their homeland to replenish our steadily-dwindling resources, there had been bad blood between the Enclave and the Griffon Kingdom, and given the hot-headedness of our respective races, it had never quite cooled down.

“Let him up.”

“What!?” both Reggie and I blurted incredulously.

“But Mom—”

“Let him up, Reggie,” the second griffoness repeated. “I want to speak with him. Take his weapons and meet me in my office. Both of you.”

Reggie and I watched in stunned silence as her mother turned and began to walk deeper into the junction, past a massive energy cannon mounted to a train car that instantly drew my eye like a magnet. The seasoned old griffoness made her way towards a passenger car—the only other train car that had been coupled to the locomotive just ahead of it. Once she’d opened the door and slammed it shut behind her, I turned to the juvenile griffoness that had pinned me to the ground not a moment earlier.

“If you so much as touch my weapons, I’ll cut your fucking beak off,” I snarled. “Always wanted to peel a griffon’s beak off with my knife and keep it as a trophy.”

“I’d like to see you try it, you cocky little punk,” Reggie snarled, seizing my leg in one beefy claw and wrenching it behind my back, forcing me roughly back to the ground. I struggled against her hold as she undid the straps on my battle saddle, as well as my pistol holster and knife sheath, and she only let me up once she’d taken all of them into her possession. “Now get movin’ before I start breakin’ bones.”

I made a noncommittal grunt and followed after Reggie’s mother, examining the energy cannon as I passed it by. That was a lot of firepower. The thing would easily be powerful enough to completely vaporize anything dumb enough to get caught in the blast radius. Did these griffons even need that kind of firepower for defense? It seemed an awful lot like overkill. Then again, there really was no kill like overkill. Better safe than sorry.

Tearing my eyes away from the cannon, I focused forward as we neared the passenger car. Reggie had stuck to my flank like glue the entire way, making sure I was under her scrutinizing gaze at all times. It wasn’t like I couldn’t just shoot straight up if I’d really wanted to flee, but I went along with it anyway. I’d already done this dance with Railright, and I really didn’t want to lose my gear a second time.

I took a look around as I entered the passenger car, noting immediately that the furnishings were relatively unimpressive. The only decoration within the room was a large flag behind a desk flying the symbol of a griffon’s talon. I strode over to the desk and took up position directly in front of it, glancing over at the terminal sitting upon it as Reggie’s mother took note of my arrival. Reggie herself left us to stand guard by the door, presumably to make sure I didn’t attempt to flee.

“Okay, my little racist,” said Reggie’s mother, placing both claws on her desk and leaning over to tower above me. “You mind tellin’ me why you flew into my junction and opened fire on my talons? I seem to remember you sayin' somethin' about Railright.”

“I was looking for work,” I explained, forcing myself to be patient. “Railright said he could hook me up with a contact that would be willing to pay money for jobs that require my specific skillset. I’m a reconnaissance specialist and an automatic riflepony, so I didn’t think it would be too hard to land a steady job. Intel is priceless, and as long as there are two people left alive on the planet, somepony is going to want somepony dead. If I’d known that Railright was setting me up to meet griffons, though, I never would have come.”

“Oh, I’ve got work for ya, all right,” the old griffoness said, a cruel smile turning up a corner of her beak. “You’ve got wings and you don’t work for Topaz—that means you’re the only person I can use to get this job done. Let me make this crystal clear right now—you’re going to help me out, and you’re not going to give me a hard time about it. You said you were an Enclave fugitive? Well, I’ll tell them exactly where you are and that they can come and collect you if you decide you don’t want to cooperate. Alternatively, I don’t let you leave this train car alive.”

"I guess my hooves are fucking tied, aren't they," I growled, quivering with rage when I realized that once again, I’d been manipulated into helping someone against my will. “What’s the stars-damned job?"

The griffoness smiled again. “Tell me, Enclave, what do you know about Stables…?”