Quod verum est, in numeros. The truth lies in numbers. Unlike philosophy or divination, the study of statistics, sampled properly and analysed correctly, can allow us to predict the outcome of any scenario with an eerie measure of clarity. Take for example the following, a well known thought experiment proposed by amniomorphic spell pioneer Starswirl the Bearded.

Consider that pillar of Equestrian society, the concept of trustworthiness. As an initial premise, we may surmise that there are those amongst the general populace who are not worthy, in a general sense, of our trust (hence the existence of the concept as a recognisable state of being - it would not exist as such if it were an immutable constant). With that as a basis, we can then state that, of all the creatures ever to walk upon this fair land, only a finite, non-unity, non-zero proportion will ever be trustworthy to any real extent. Of that number, only a finite, non-unity, non-zero proportion will be proximate at an appropriate time to he or she who is in need of a trustworthy ally. Of that number, only a finite, non-unity, non-zero proportion of scenarios will exist in which the trustworthiness of the subject may be maintained or guaranteed throughout a given interaction. And of that number, only a finite, non-unity, non-zero proportion will remain trustworthy for a sufficient length of time in the face of worldly temptation and strife for the interaction to begin in the first place. Finally, one must factor in the probability of the analyst themselves being trustworthy, subject to the environmental variables described above (which, of course, may be represented by a finite, non-unity, non-zero fraction). By summarily multiplying these fractions by one another, the analyst is left with the mean probability of a random, sentient creature being trustworthy at some arbitrary time for some arbitrary purpose.

Disconcertingly enough, the result of this thought experiment, even with the most optimistic estimates, does not produce a non-negligible probability. It teaches us that, statistically speaking, you can't trust anypony...

- Statistical Analysis for Eggheads, 13th edition, Canterlot University Press

'I could've told you that...' mused Calibre, as he lazily hoofed through the ancient, blackened textbook.

A light breeze caught the edge of the tome's decrepit pages, ruffling them gently as the earth pony's eyes continued to scan the book's contents. It certainly wasn't the best purchase he had ever made, that was for sure. If and when that blasted trader made it back to Trotfell, the first thing Calibre was going to do was get his caps back.

In the distance, a shot suddenly rang out across the Wasteland. Calibre's ears perked up immediately and his head snapped to the direction of the sound, his eyes keenly scanning the horizon for trouble. His perch atop Trotfell's tallest guard tower afforded him an excellent view of the plane around the town, and he was quickly able to discern the tell-tale crimson flash of laser weapons in the distance. He rose from his position on the floor of the tower and grabbed his rifle, flipping the safety catch to the 'OFF' position before settling down into his markspony's stance.

Through the scope of the sniper rifle, Calibre was able to make out two pegasus ponies with a small sky wagon being set upon by a much larger force of raiders. They were still quite far off, so he couldn't see their faces, but he was able to surmise that they weren't wearing body armour, and were instead outfitted with smart (and almost entirely untarnished) Enclave flight suits - a sure sign of the do-gooders of the new 'Volunteer Corps.' he had been hearing so much about lately.

The group had been turning up in conversations all over Equestria, seemingly the Grand Pegasi Enclave's way of 'reconnecting' with the poor, downtrodden ponies of the surface world. Calibre was dubious of these apparent intentions, so much so that he would often advise his acquaintances (for he had no friends to speak of) to avoid contact with them outright, regardless of whatever 'help' they seemed to be offering.

He continued to regard the scene playing out before his scope. The pegasi were holding their own against the raiders, deftly dodging their poorly coordinated attempts at bringing the pair down. More red flashes merged with the pale glow of the late afternoon sky, and no less than three of the raiders dropped to the ground clutching smoking wounds on their hides. Calibre felt one of his eyebrows rise slightly as his opinion of the pegasi as combatants rose further and further. These two were fighting like no ponies he had ever seen! It was as if they had some sort of cause to fight for; as if they had to win or all would be lost forever. Why they didn't just ditch the wagon and fly away, he had no idea. Calibre silently thought about what could possibly be so important, and was running through possibilities in his head when a stern, authoritative voice grabbed his attention from behind.

"Calibre!" shouted Sage, the mayor of Trotfell, as he galloped out onto the landing of the tower. "What's going on!? Are we under attack!?"

"Not quite, sir," Calibre responded languidly, running his tongue around his mouth in an expression of disinterest. "Looks like that there 'Volunteer' lot have bit off more than they can chew. I have to say though, they're doing pretty well for a bunch of flappers."

"The Volunteer Corps?" said Sage, his eyes widening in surprise. "They've never come to this region before! This could be an attempt to open trade or diplomatic relations with the North. We should help them!"

At that, Sage rounded on his elderly - although still entirely functional - hooves and started quickly towards the staircase back to ground level.

"I'll round up the duty guards! Cover them, Calibre!" Sage shouted over his shoulder as he disappeared down the stairs.

'What!?' Calibre gawked internally. 'Cover them!? We haven't a clue who they are or what they want! We can't just treat them as if—'

His monologue was interrupted mid-sentence by a sudden piercing scream coming from the direction of the conflict. As Calibre pressed his eye up to his scope again he saw a bulky, pastel-coloured streak falling towards the ground, quickly followed by a far more coordinated swathe of lime green. One of the pegasi had been hit, causing both them and the sky wagon they were hauling to hurtle towards the Earth. Their companion, still in control of his or her flight, was risking a head-on collision with the ground in order to arrest the other's fall (or to save the wagon - at this point Calibre wasn't sure which would be worth more to them).

A small, uncomfortable pang of sadness worked its way onto Calibre's face as he unconsciously lined up one of the remaining raiders in the sight of his rifle. He was experiencing a sensation not entirely unlike regret at not acting sooner; an uncharacteristic emotion which was entirely failing to sit right with him. And, if that wasn't worrying enough, the subsequent explosion of the raider's head did absolutely nothing to alter his feelings.

Three subsequent - and equally lethal - gunshots rang out across the blighted tundra, cleaving flesh from bone and separating the raiders from their mortal existence as Calibre put his skills as an expert markspony to good use. An almighty crash resounded a moment later, just as he was about to dispatch the penultimate assailant, and he quickly turned his scope toward it. To his dismay (and surprise), he realised that he was looking at the spattered remains of the wagon pilot and their companion, both of whom had apparently been killed while saving the enchanted container from smashing against the ground. Gritting his teeth in a turgid combination of bewilderment and rage, Calibre fired twice more, neatly puncturing the final two raider's heads.

Their corpses flopped to the ground just as Sage's contingent of guards arrived at the scene. Calibre could make out Caring Heart, Trotfell's youngest doctor, and two nurses attending to the crashed pegasi while the guards poked and prodded at the raider's bodies, examining his hoofwork, and ensuring that they had nothing else planned for the day.

'Why did they die for that wagon!?' Calbre asked himself as he continued to peer through the telescopic sight affixed to his rifle. 'They could have just ditched it and escaped! What the hell would be so import—'

Before the thought could finish crossing his mind, Calibre noticed a sudden change in the assembled group of ponies surrounding the sky wagon. All at once, they whipped their heads toward the downed vehicle, and Sage made a beeline for the cracked hatch on its side, pulling it open savagely as he reached it. Calibre peered intently into his lens, willing the scope's magnification factor to increase as Sage buried his head in the wagon's interior. A moment later, he emerged with a light blue bundle of fabric held securely in his teeth, and immediately motioned for Caring Heart to attend him. Those present proceeded to cluster around the strange package, their heads bowed in expressions of intense interest as Calibre once again began to clench his jaw in frustration at having his view obscured.

After what seemed like an eternity of waiting, the cluster of ponies finally dispersed, allowing Caring Heart and Sage to begin galloping like equines possessed back towards the Trotfell gates. Calibre refocussed his scope, following the pair with the smooth, practised motions of a seasoned sniper. They drew closer with every passing second, and it wasn't long before Calibre could make out what it was that Trotfell's mayor and doctor were carrying.

Calibre's eyes widened in shock and his heart dropped into his gut as the image of the bundle was finally resolved. There, in Caring Heart's motherly embrace, was a scared and newly orphaned pegasus foal.

Calibre let out a gentle breath as he squeezed the rifle trigger set between his jaws. A thunderous shudder resonated throughout his body as a single high velocity round left the weapon's barrel, but he was too used to the sensation to be phased by it. A full six hundred yards away, a single bloatsprite suddenly exploded into a puss-green cloud of goop, and Calibre gently relaxed the strong, resilient muscles of his shoulders as he rose from his stance.

"Whoa!" cooed the bright blue pegasus filly beside him, as she pulled a pair of well-used binoculars away from her face. "That was amazing! Where'd you learn to shoot like that!?"

"Practice," Calibre shrugged, as he flipped the safety catch back into the 'ON' position. "By the time I'm done with you kid, I expect you to be able manage that too."

"By the time you're done with me?" the little filly repeated, cocking her head to one side. "You mean you're gonna teach me how to shoot!? But I don't even have a real gun! All I've got is one of those rubbish old BB rifles."

"Who's been teaching you English?" Calibre asked, as he busied himself with an old footlocker secured to the floor of the guard tower's upper platform. "'Cos they're not doing a very good job - you're getting your tenses mixed up."

"Huh?" replied the filly, now thoroughly confused. "What's a 'tense'?"

"You said you don't have a real gun," Calibre responded, grasping a crudely wrapped object with his forelegs. "What you should have said was that you didn't have a real gun."

The filly's eyes widened to a pair of adorable, glittering orbs, full of anticipation and wonderment as Calibre's intent became apparent.

"You mean...!?" she gasped, her words brimming with excitement.

"Yep," replied Calibre, as he hoofed the parcel over to the tiny mare. "Happy birthday, Moon."

"Oh my gosh!" cried Moon Shadow, as she tore at the salvaged, two-hundred year old wrapping paper surrounding Calibre's present. "Thank you, thank you, thank you!"

A matter of seconds later, Moon was hungrily taking in every single little feature of her 'new' .22 calibre rifle, from the weld around the ironsight to the action of the firing bolt. When he was sure she wouldn't notice, Calibre allowed himself the slightest of smiles at the filly's delight, and was almost able to eclipse the deep guilt that he still held in his heart.

The last five years had been a challenge for Calibre. The choice he had made on the day of Moon's orphaning had haunted him ever since, and he was reminded every single day that, had he shown some concern for the Volunteer Corps. ponies in distress and acted sooner, Moon Shadow might still have her parents, and wouldn't be confined to the surface world.

As it was though, the unfortunate little pegasus had been denied her mother and father, and the Corps. had never set hoof nor wing in Trottingham since.

Calibre shivered as he regarded the pastel blue filly in front of him. Despite the pure, tangible joy that her young heart was revelling in, he was still inexorably reminded of the horrific three hour period that followed the incident all those years ago. He had laid there, frozen atop the guard tower, tears streaming down his face at the tragedy he had just had a hoof in. A tumultuous, angry sort of sadness gripped him until Sage, having noticed Calibre's absence from the town below, had ventured up the guard tower to find him.

"Well," Calibre said briskly, as he tried in vain to snap himself out of his mood "shall we get in some target practice then?"

"Aw, yeah!" Moon cried, as she flopped onto the floor, readying her new weapon with all the skill of a seasoned BB gun specialist and all the grace of a dead swan.

Calibre smiled once again at her boundless enthusiasm as he settled himself beside her, putting his own gun to one side and picking up the binoculars. He began to scan the horizon, acting as the young filly's spotter, and quickly zeroed in on the targets he wanted her to focus on.

"Oh, my!" he said loudly after a moment of silence. "Looks like there're some raiders on the prowl! Check your one o'clock, Moon! Quickly! Before they get away!"

"Raiders!?" the happy little markspony squealed, joining in the game. "Where!? They won't get past me!"

"Your one o'clock," repeated Calibre. "Remember? We talked about giving combat directions using a clock face?"

"Uh..." Moon droned uncertainly. "Was that the one where it's like time, but it's really not time? Like where to look? 'Cos I never really got—"

"That way," Calibre grumbled, as he nudged the barrel of her rifle toward the correct bearing.

"Oh," the filly replied, her cheeks flushing with bubblegum-hued embarrassment. "Yeah. Right. I-I knew that..."

Moon adjusted her tiny, skinny shoulders, settling into the position she had observed the town's snipers assume so many times before. Her eyes narrowed to slits and her tongue began to peek out onto her top lip as she focussed her mind on steadying the rifle.

"H-hey!" she suddenly exclaimed, as her eyes followed Calibre's directions. "There really is something out there!"

"Is there now?" the older buck responded, chuckling to himself. "Well, then... you'd better shoot it before it gets too close to the town, hadn't you?"

"Yessir!" Moon replied, as she slammed a magazine into her rifle, locking the firing bolt in place with a flourish and taking the trigger enthusiastically into her mouth. No more than two seconds elapsed before gunshots began to noisily pierce the otherwise quiet Wasteland afternoon. Bullets ricocheted off of buckets and embedded themselves in scavenged timbers as Moon defended Trotfell against the ravenous oncoming hoard of fenceposts that Calibre had assembled for her.

"Yeah, that's it!" he shouted proudly, as Moon scored body hit after body hit, mortally wounding what could have potentially been a dozen murderous raiders. "Good girl, Moon. Remember though, you should always try for a headshot. In a combat situation, dispatching an opponent quickly is often the key to vic—"

"What's 'dispatching' mean?" the little pegasus asked without turning her head, cleanly cleaving Calibre's rhetoric in two as she continued to expend ammunition.

"Fancy word for killing," Calibre responded (after sighing heavily and rolling his eyes in frustration). "You can use it for talking about mail as well. You know, sending things places? But, mostly it's a fancy word for poppin' somepony."

"Okay," Moon replied, quickly busying herself once more with her imaginary guard duties.

Calibre caught himself staring at the little mare as she continued to attack the targets he had set up for her. She was falling into a competent rhythm, firing more accurately and reloading quicker with every repetition. The old markspony couldn't help but flush with pride as his diminutive protégé improved before his very eyes.

"One for you!" Moon said to herself triumphantly, as a bucket-head was launched into the air. A cool breeze meandered gently across the guard platform as the sniper's student began to line up her next shot.

Calibre sat back on his haunches, electing to not observe his student directly, his confidence in her abilities matched only by his pride in her development. He looked out instead over the wall of the guard tower, watching as Moon expertly punctured the myriad of objects just beyond Trotfell's East gate. Since first assembling the small target range two years previously, Calibre had expanded and improved it at every opportunity, incorporating refuse and salvaged raider barding to make the targets more realistic for his promising young apprentice.

In the comparatively short time between that moment and his first meeting her, Calibre had developed a relationship with Moon Shadow that was deeper and happier than any he had ever had before. He spent the majority of his spare time doting on her as if she were his own child, imparting worldly wisdom here and heartfelt gifts there. The firing range was the first of his presents of course (and was now used by practically everypony for target practice), but there had been others along the way. They included combat barding that Calibre had personally hoof stitched (although he'd rather shoot you than admit to picking up the tools of seamstress) and a firing mechanism for her rifle so well preserved that it would have fetched more than his annual guard's salary if openly traded.

"One for you!" Moon repeated, accomplishing another feat of ballistic accuracy only seconds later.

"How's your father?" Calibre asked quietly, as Moon continued her practice. "I haven't seen him in a few days."

"Oh, he's okay," Moon replied, without so much as a twitch of her rifle. "He's trying to deal with all the increased raider activity in the area, so I haven't seen much of him recently."

"Yeah..." mused Calibre. "They're getting bolder every day. How many hits are you at now, Moon?"

"Thirty-seven," the filly replied.

"And misses?" asked Calibre.

"Nadda," Moon smirked.

"Good girl," Calibre replied, smiling as he checked the sun's progress through the cloud layer. "I think we can call that a successful day's practice. How about you take one more to empty the chamber and we can go get some grub?"

Moon Shadow tutted in annoyance as her session was called to a close, but knew all too well what would be in store for her if she made a fuss. Calibre may have been a great teacher, and her father a kind and caring leader, but by Celestia were they scary when you crossed them!

She released the magazine from her gun and, as was customary during her training sessions, lined up one last shot in order to expend the final round in the rifle's firing chamber. Moon spotted the furthest target she could make out on the range: a brand new rust-red raider mannequin that was swaying wildly in the wind. She wondered for a moment why she hadn't noticed it before, but forgot the thought as soon as she brought the scope up to her eye.

"And one for—" she began, stopping mid sentence as her disproportionately large eyes widened to impossible saucers. "C-Calibre? Why's that one moving like that?"

"Hmm?" Calibre responded, as he pulled his own eyes away from Moon and returned them to the binoculars. "What do you mean moving? I don't see any— Wh-what the hell!?"

The pair turned to gawk briefly at one another, the difference in their ages forgotten and any semblance of formality dismissed as the scene before them played itself out.

A hundred feet below the guard tower platform, a single equine figure was falling over his own hooves, half dazed as he tried in vain to stay upright. It looked as if he - whoever 'he' was - had travelled the length of the world, and had only just then decided to take a rest, allowing his fatigue to totally overtake him as he slumped and wobbled repeatedly into Calibre's improvised target range.

"I-it's a colt!" Calibre said to nopony in particular as he looked through the binoculars at it. "He's a big lad, but he's definitely a young 'un. Looks like he's carrying a pump-action, and nothing else besides."

"Wh-what's wrong with his hide?" Moon asked, her voice wavering as she held onto her new rifle for dear life. "I-it looks like he's... He's..."

"Covered in blood..." Calibre whispered as he slowly dropped the binoculars to the floor of the platform. "He's soaked head to hoof in it..."

Calibre had never gotten on well with foals. Moon was an exception of course, but even between the two fast friends - whom the other guards had taken to calling 'the sniper and the sci-fi buff' - there had still been profound moments of tension. Sometimes Calibre would say something that wasn't meant for a child's ear, and sometimes Moon would overstep her bounds as the markspony's apprentice. Regardless of what brought them about though, there were always moments where it would become clear to everypony in earshot, that Calibre still had a long way to go when it came to kids.

So, dear reader, you can imagine his discomfort and distress at seeing one so young, smeared with the arterial spray of at least a half a dozen other ponies, and falling over himself with fatigue, naught but two hundred yards from what, as far as he was concerned, was the safest place in the world.

A jarring mechanical clunk popped Calibre's bubble of introspection as Moon slammed a fresh magazine into her gun. He watched silently, his brow furrowed with discontent as the now practised apprentice silently brought the rifle to her shoulder and took in a breath. Calibre knew all too well that that deliberate, stable inhalation was the death knell for the pony down below. The next time Moon's lungs moved, she would exhale, and in so doing would squeeze the trigger of her rifle with her lower jaw, firing with absolute precision a sharpened, aerodynamically styled shard of hot metal straight into the colt's skull.

Calibre turned his head, his perception of the world around him having slowed to a visceral crawl, and looked at the colt below.

Something was wrong with this. He knew it. Deep in his gut, he felt the rumblings of another tragedy taking hold.

Calibre had taught Moon everything he knew about guarding a settlement in the Equestrian Wasteland, and it was finally beginning to show. His failure to defend her parents had led to him adopting the age-old mantra 'shoot first, ask questions later' (although, given the way he had taught Moon, 'shoot first, shoot second, and only then think about asking questions' might have been a more appropriate summary of his leanings).

In one single, dark moment of enlightenment, Calibre felt his heart shudder as a humongous weight of realisation settled upon his shoulders. In that morbid, shining instant, all of his questions were answered, and all of his fears were confirmed.

He realised with horror that it was all his fault.

Calibre had worked hard to right his mistake of yesteryear, namely his failing to fire his weapon when it was needed the most, and had set about making sure that it would never be repeated, going so far as to take Moon on as his apprentice. He was resolute that she would never know the agony he had known those seven years earlier.

But alas, in his zealous pursuit of righting his own wrongs he had overcompensated, priming Moon to mar her young life with a whole new disaster. He had taught her to shoot, shoot and shoot again until all was silent and dead, totally disregarding the lesson that he should have learned on that fateful day; the lesson he had only just understood a whole seven years later!

It was all about trust. That implied, unspoken, built-in trust that a broken society like Equestria needed so desperately.

Why were the Volunteer Corps. ponies so close to Trotfell when they were attacked? Answer: Because they had flown towards Trotfell so that the settlement's guards could cover them! They had trusted that the sniper on duty - Calibre - would help them in their time of need!

And he had failed, completely and utterly, to do so.

But what about this colt? This crazy, shambling, blood soaked colt? This poor kid with his raider's shotgun shell cutie mark on his flank, the end of a jet high ringing around inside his head and the entrails of his most recent victims caked all over his hide. Why was he there? Why had he wandered so close to a settlement like Trotfell?

Was it really jet? Was he just another doped up raider who'd scored a hit after a massacre and followed the pink dragon to his doom?

Or was there something more? Could it have been that he had seen Trotfell in the distance and trusted that in his wounded, desperate state its residents would aid him? Could it be that there was another side to his story and that, by some miracle, he was a survivor of some sort of massacre?

It didn't matter either way, really. Because Calibre couldn't take that chance.

The world sped up again as Moon's lungs began to contract, resulting in the tightening of her jaw. With a motion worthy of an old Hong-Pong style martial arts play, Calibre swept his foreleg out towards Moon, deftly smacking the barrel of her rifle just as she pulled the trigger. The round ricocheted once off of the guard tower's ceiling, and twice more off of the walls, before it finally came to rest.

Moon turned to her mentor, her eyes morphing into fiery, accusatory pools as she roared at him.

"What are doing!?" she thundered without respect. "I was about to bag my first raider! Now he might— C-Calibre...? Calibre!? What's wrong!?"

Calibre had been staring his diminutive student down evenly for several seconds, not quite ready to defend his actions, when he suddenly noticed how unbelievably tired he was. He felt as if he had just run a hundred miles - his breathing was laboured and his head was beginning to pound, as if somepony were tightly pressing against his temples with their hooves. He stumbled backwards, falling onto the guard tower floor as Moon galloped to his side. She was crying, Calibre noticed, and when she spoke her voice was muffled somehow, as if his ears weren't working properly.

'What's happening...?' Calibre wondered to himself as his vision began to blur. 'Why am I...? Oh... Is that why...?'

As he focussed on Moon's tear-streamed face, Calibre became aware of the myriad of colours playing and dancing in his field of vision. Of course there were the dark, greyish tones of the guard tower and the filthy glow of the sky. And, of course, there were the pleasing, baby-blue tones he associated so warmly with Moon Shadow, and the wondrous, pale silver that made up her eyes. But all of those stimuli fell to the wayside of Calibre's considerations when he noticed the newest colour to be thrust upon his eyes' palette.

Red. He was covered in red. Deep, dark, foreboding red, black like death and yet warm with life. He sleepily swept his hoof over his chest as Moon darted to the speech tube attached to the platform's lip. Calibre heard what sounded like loud, shouted syllables being barked into the tarnished brass cone on the end of the pipe as he drew his foreleg back and forth across his hide. The texture was entirely new and altogether wrong - all wet and sticky. Maybe it was treacle? Or maybe it had something to do with the hole. The new one. In his back. The hole that he didn't remember being there before.

Maybe the two pegasi would know. Maybe they'd recognise him from before and help him to find out where all the red was coming from? Calibre was glad when they remembered him, but he found it hard to ask them his question, or indeed to form any coherent thoughts at all.

Moon had vanished now. And so had the guard tower. Even the red worries were drifting away. All that remained were the two smiling, gratitude-laden faces of the pegasi, and a hushed whiteness all around.

Calibre felt his face stretch into a smile as he sighed for the last time. Somehow, he knew that - in the end, at least - he had done well.

Moon Shadow sat atop the guard tower alone, her rifle in pieces on the floor as she cradled a far older weapon in her hooves. She was still crying heavily, shuddering slightly with every emotionally agonising breath as a shadowy figure silently ascended the guard tower.

"I thought I'd find you here," said Sage, as gently as he could manage.

Moon slowly looked up towards her adoptive father, allowing the waning moonlight to catch the wet, salty trails that ran underneath her eyes. Her lower lip trembled as the elder buck's soft, empathy laden eyes took her and her sorrow in.

"K-keep away!" Moon said, her voice quivering, as her father moved to take a step forward. "I'll only hurt you if you come too close!"

"I don't think you will," Sage relpied simply, as he sat down on the platform floor. "You're not the type, Mo."

"B-but I am!" Moon shouted, fresh tears flowing from her eyes. "I killed Calibre! I did that! And now I'm never going to see him ag—!"

"That's enough," Sage said quietly, his tone conveying all of the required authority. Moon closed her mouth with a wince, and hugged Calibre's rifle tightly as Sage moved closer to her despite her warning.

"I don't think you're a killer, Mo," Sage said softly. "And Calibre's gone because he didn't want anypony to die unnecessarily today."

"Wh-what do you m-mean...?" Moon asked, her voice wavering with every syllable.

"I'm talking about the colt you were about to shoot," Sage said. "He wasn't a raider. In fact I think he had just survived a run in with them."

"You mean you brought him inside!?" Moon screamed, as she rose to her hooves, momentarily towering over her father. "He could have been anything! A raider! A slaver! A cannibal! And you just let him in!? What were you thinking!? What would Calibre have died for if he had been dangerous!?"

Sage looked up at his daughter, a harsh expression of disappointment upon his face.

"Are you finished?" he asked quietly, causing Moon to shrink back to her regular size.

"I-if he hadn't..." she began, her voice having been reduced to a whisper. "If he hadn't appeared... C-Calibre might still be a-alive..."

"Yes, that's true," Sage replied. "But he did, and if Calibre hadn't acted, that colt would now be dead, and you would have an innocent's blood on your hooves for the rest of your life."

Moon hid her face in her hooves, her shoulders shuddering with new sobs as she retreated to the corner of the platform.

"What happened today was important," Sage continued, as he moved to sit beside Moon, "Did Calibre ever tell you why he was so fond of you?"

"N-no..." Moon said, wiping tears from her eyes with her foreleg.

"He was the sniper on duty when your birth parents were killed," Sage said. "He failed to save them, and took it upon himself to put it right by helping to raise you."

"R-really...?" Moon asked helplessly, as fresh tears welled up under her eyes. "Th-that just makes me miss him more!"

"I know, Mo..." Sage cooed as he took the little filly into his embrace. "It's okay, love. It's okay. I'm not saying all this to upset you. I'm saying it because you need to understand how wonderful today truly was."

"Wh-what!?" Moon screeched angrily, as her outraged little forelegs pushed her father away. "Wondeful!? H-how could you say something like that!?"

"Because it's true," Sage replied, a measure of genuine, teary passion working its way into his voice. "Calibre taught you to fight; to eliminate every and any threat as soon as it reared its head. But the one thing he never thought to teach you was when not to fight. Don't you see, Mo? He gave his life so you could be a better pony, so you could learn the lesson that he spent years learning!"

Moon didn't move or make a sound for several minutes, her eyes fixed to the floor as she considered her father's wisdom. After a long silence Sage rose to his hooves with a sigh, and began to trot slowly towards the tower's staircase.

"Make of Calibre's actions what you will," he said, just before he began to descend the stairs. "But I still think what he did was pretty wonderful."

With that, the silver-maned buck climbed down off of the platform, leaving only Moon atop the tower.

She blinked once, as she continued to process everything she had just learned, and slowly began to raise her head. Her eyes landed on the scattered components of her destroyed .22 rifle, spread out across the platform.

She blinked once more, and silently began to gather the pieces together, screwing, clicking and latching them all back into position. A few minutes passed, and soon Moon was once again holding the rifle that Calibre had so proudly given her. With an entirely neutral expression on her face, she slung the weapon over her neck and onto her back, and began to make her way down to the town below.

By the time she made it to the ground, Moon had made a decision. She decided that she would never again ascend the guard tower. Nor would she ever take on guard duty. If there was ever a threat to her town, or her father, or anypony she loved, she would deal with it. But not with her rifle trigger between her teeth.

She looked back up at Trotfell's tallest tower, and sighed as the moonlight caught the barrel of Calibre's rifle, propped up against the platform wall for all to see. With an enlivening breath, Moon nodded to herself, and sent a short, yet entirely heartfelt prayer to the Goddesses on Calibre's behalf.

At that, she turned her back on the tower, and made her way toward Trotfell's hospital, intent on meeting this strange, shotgun-wielding colt from the North. Her resolve hardened with every hoofstep, and the little filly quickly broke into a confident and rejuvenating gallop.

At the ripe old age of eight, Moon Shadow vowed to never again let the fear of others drive her to violence. She would trust them, and she would love them, and she would make sure that they could never harm her.

Because at that point they would no longer be her enemies. They would be her friends.

Author's Notes:

Thanks to G-Man64, firstly for the great idea, but mostly for thinking to ask me for my input. I’m honored

Since I ended up with the letter T, I went for ‘trust’ as a core theme, with ‘time’ as a heavy afterthought (hence the time skipping - a la the intro to Fallout 3). I also took the opportunity to provide a backstory for a few of my characters from my main FoE fic, Just Like Clockwork.

Hope you all enjoy, and thanks for reading!

ST