Balls. That’s what it was. Balls. Stupid. Pure, utter garbage.

Lady Lake was dealing, so I know he didn’t cheat. I’d drawn the four-of-a-kind this time. Me. Not him. But noooo… he had to draw a straight flush. I’d gone all-in, too.

At least he was humble about it. And at least I hadn’t gone out first… I’d taken Tumbleweed out of the game a few rounds before that. It was a good first showing.

The game continued for another half hour or so after I went broke. Hornbill won… I wasn’t exactly surprised. What I was surprised about, though, is how he didn’t actually take the caps. He gathered them up, sure, but then separated them into smaller piles again before getting up and hiding them in random little places, like under loose floorboards or little nooks and crannies in the cracked walls.

The rest of us stayed there as he did that, simply sitting in silent defeat for him to come back. A few minutes later, he did.

“She’s a real heavy sleeper, huh?” he said as he walked back in the room and towards the group.

I sniffed a little, looked down at Firestorm, then glanced back up at him. She was still sound asleep. “I think she spent most’a last night cryin’... not sleepin’. She’s got a lot t’ catch up on.”

Hornbill grimaced and gave a little nod. “Right… Well…” He looked out the window for a moment. “It’s time for Constable to be on duty. I’ll stick my head out the door and tell him we need the doctor. I’ll be back, maybe ten minutes.”

I returned his nod then he turned around and walked downstairs.

Lady Lake started idly shuffling the cards when he left. “So kid, how’d you end up here, anyway?”

My brow furrowed a little. I guess it wouldn’t actually hurt to tell, would it? What were they going to do? No information I could give them that Moonshine didn’t already have…

I sniffled softly and turned to look at Lady Lake. “I got tricked… Moonshine came through our town actin’ like a merchant. Left th’ next mornin’... but then came back, askin’ fer help gettin’ his cart unstuck… I really…” I paused and sighed, “I really shoulda known better… It hadn’t even rained lately, an’ he said it was stuck in mud… impossible. But he said our town’s… elder had sent him so… I just went.”

Lake smacked her lips softly and shook her head. “Rotten bastard…” She motioned towards Firestorm. “How’d she get wrapped up too?”

I bit my lip and looked down at Stormy. “She’s been… nearly tied t’ me fer th’ last two weeks. I sorta… helped free her from slavers. Some… slavers from this place, actually.”

“What? Ooooh, ho ho ho… really? That was you? The big thunderstorm that sent them all the way back here?! Kid, they were pissing themselves trying to explain what happened to their boss and not get in trouble for losing property. It was great!”

I blinked in surprise, then looked up at her as she spoke. I tried, but I really couldn’t contain a smile and a laugh at hearing how well the fear plan had worked. “Um, yeah, that was me. Well, me an’ my friend.”

Lady Lake had a wide smile. “Wow…” She gave her head another slow shake then clicked her tongue. “Shame you ended up here. Me and Bill, we’ve been slaves for… a real long time now. No way to tell exactly how long, really. This group bought up awhile back, brought us here before heading up to return to Rainbow Falls.”

I chewed on my lip a little, debating asking the first question that popped into my head. Quite the conundrum… Ultimately I decided to go ahead and ask, because if I didn’t, it was just going to bother me. “Y’all seem kinda… happy… t’ be slaves.”

Lady Lake stopped her shuffling and raised an eyebrow. “No, not quite, kid. We aren’t happy to be slaves… We’re just not miserable sacks just because we are slaves. Sure. After it all started, there were some months… some really, really bad months.” She got quiet and took a deep breath before continuing. “Then we realized that… if… we didn’t try, what was the purpose of still being alive?

“So we came up with this plan.” She lifted the cards up in her magic slightly. “We’ve actually managed to find at least a guard or two at each place we’ve been that gets hooked into it. It’s made life… bearable. But there’s no point in being sad. If you’re sad, you won’t see the way out. And we’ll get out. Eventually.”

My feathers ruffled a little against my sides. Right… not happy to be slaves. Just… not letting it defeat them. It made sense… Actually, it was kinda what I’d told to Firestorm in the cart. Wait, no, I didn’t tell her. My mouth was taped shut.

I blinked and looked back down at the sleeping filly. “Do ya actually believe you’ll get out?”

Lady Lake snorted very softly. “Kid, I know it. We’ll either escape, or buy our freedom, or something else. Staying here until we die isn’t an option.”

I closed my eyes for a few minutes. No… staying here wasn’t an option. The last thing I wanted my life to be was… breeding at Moonshine’s beck and call. I was going to keep that part under wraps, though. As awful as it was… sex was probably not quite as bad as some of the things Lake had experienced… or maybe Tumbleweed, or anyone else here.

Actually I did have one question, though. My eyes opened and I looked back at the unicorn mare. “Have you ever heard of anypony named Absinthe?”

Lady Lake blinked and tilted her head. “Heard of? Yeah. Seen? No. I’m not even sure she actually exists. The boss here, the big purple one with the black mane, he’s obsessed with her. Asks all the slaves that come here about her. Asks the slavers every time they come back in from being out. Haven’t seen a pony yet that’s actually seen her or even recognized the name.”

I chewed on my lip as she spoke, slowly nodding when she finished. “Do ya know why he’s obsessed?”

Lake shook her head. “He says she’s his daughter.” She snorted and smiled faintly. “Wouldn’t it be a hoot though? Like, maybe some other band of slavers came through and snatched his daughter up. That’d be real karma right there.”

I managed a fake half smile. “Heh, yeah… that’d be… a thing.” Yeah… let’s… not let anyone know she’s my sister, yeah? Yeah. “So um-”

“Here we are!”

My head snapped around back to the doorway when I heard Hornbill call out. He stepped back into the room, another pony following him. A stallion, though the stallion was a bit shorter and skinnier than Hornbill was. Which was weird… How was the slaver the skinnier one?

“Who is the patient?” The doctor’s voice was softer, too.

I tried to raise my wing, but after a couple of tries grimaced then said, “I am.”

“Ah!” The doctor stepped in further, then motioned everyone else out. “Please! Please! Everyone else out.”

I felt a rustling against my left side and bit my lip. Good going, loud doctor. You just woke up Firestorm. Idiot.

Tumbleweed and Lady Lake got up to their hooves quickly and stepped out towards the door. Hornbill nodded to the doctor then looked to me. “We’ll be right out in the hallway, Buck.” The three of them then turned and walked out the door and into the hallway as requested.

The doctor nodded to them, then came around the front of me, tsk’ing when he saw Firestorm just starting to lift her head up off the floor. “Everyone, I said everyone out.”

I smacked my lips loudly. “She stays.”

His eyes widened a little bit and he motioned between us with a hoof. “Does she need help too?”

I snorted. “Doesn’t matter.”

The doctor seemed to contemplate that for a few seconds before nodding and setting down his doctor bag, dropping it off of his back. I looked over the bag then at his body, my brow furrowing at what I saw. He was wearing a set of scrubs, but it didn’t cover his entire body. His lower legs, head, and neck were all exposed, and they were all very heavily scarred. Little, thin lines criss-crossing each other.

“Oh dear… what exactly happened here?” He lowered his head down and very gently put a hoof up to the side of my face, examining the bruises that had grown over the day.

“I got kicked.”

“By who, may I ask?”

“Moonshine.”

The doctor let out a sigh. “He’s always been temperamental, but usually he’s not so… rough.”

My eyes narrowed. “Yer kiddin’... right?” I felt Firestorm start to shift against my left side again, this time scooting backwards along my body. She’d probably just actually woken up and seen the strange pony in front of her. I took a deep breath and moved my tail around, curling it up a bit so that she’d hopefully back right into it and stop.

The doctor shook his head. “No, no I’m quite serious.” He turned to reach into his doctor bag.

“Well he’s pretty rough now…”

After a few moments he pulled out a small container and opened it. “Stay still.” He dipped a hoof into the salve inside, then lifted up and gently spread it across my cheek and around my eye. To his credit, it didn’t hurt, actually it felt kinda cool and relieving. “I might have a talk with him, see what got him upset… Kicking children is hardly the right way to go about things.”

I blinked. “Taking slaves is hardly th’ way t’ go ‘bout things.”

The doctor finished applying the stuff, then put the container back. “Not much argument there.”

My brow furrowed. “Wouldn’t you be th’ one t’ argue for it?”

The doctor shrugged as he zipped up his back, then hefted it up onto his back. “I’m here because I had nowhere else to go, and I thought maybe I could make a few slaves’ lives easier.” He gave a dry chuckle. “At least that’s what I tell myself. Stay well, hopefully I won’t have to see you again.”

The doctor turned and trotted right off for the door and left before I could even think of any type of response to give. Which, in my mind, simply left…

What… the heck… was that?

There was something about Stormy’s mane. Messing with it just really quieted her down. The grown-ups had checked in on us again, then left us alone to talk amongst themselves. Soon after, Firestorm started to get agitated again. I started with petting her back, and it worked a little, but I got the idea to borrow one of the grown-ups’ brushes. I brought it back, started using it on her mane, and she calmed right back down.

That is, at least, until the entire place was shaken with a loud shout. “LINE UP!”

Both me and Firestorm were caught by surprise. There was a rustling of bodies getting up on the second floor, and I could hear ponies heading down the second floor hallway.

Hornbill stopped in front of our door, stuck his head in, and waved for us to follow. “C’mon, guys. Line up, we do this once or twice a day. You don’t want to be the last one there. C’mon.”

I looked between him and Firestorm, then quickly got up. The filly wasn’t long behind me as I headed for the door. Hornbill waited for us, helped us both out the door, then let us walk ahead of him for the stairs, down them, then outside.

This place was the busiest I’d seen it yet when I stepped outside. All the slaves were there, in front of the building, lined up shoulder to shoulder. As well, all the slavers were there, too. At least I was pretty sure it was all of them. Constable, the doctor, and Moonshine were all there, at least. I looked around quickly, trying to count as many as I could. It looked like eight slavers and seven slaves, counting me and Stormy.

CRACK!

I gasped and jerked to the side, away from a whip that had just snapped right beside my face.

“Keep yer eyes t’ yerself, turkey!” That wasn’t Moonshine. That was one of the other slavers… My reaction was to look over to where he was. Bad idea. The next thing I felt was the whip cracking against my right shoulder. “Did I stutter?!”

I was biting my lip as hard as I could. It was either to keep myself from crying over how bad that hurt, or to keep myself from saying something stupid. I really didn’t know. I did know two things, though. One was that I had heard Firestorm whimper in my stead, and the other was that I saw Moonshine walking in front of me over towards that other guy with the whip.

“Hey, Blitz,” I heard him say.

“Yeah boss?”

“That one, discipline, leave it to me. Or come get me if I’m not there. Leave your whip off of him. Got it?”

“Uh… sure, boss.”

“Atta boy.” Moonshine then turned around, and the next thing I saw was him stepping back in front of me, bending down a little so his head was down near level with mine. “Sorry ‘bout that. Won’t happen again.” Now I was just trying hard to not spit in his face.

He gave me a smile, then tilted his head ever so slightly. “Ya got yer mother’s eyes.” His expression went from apologetic to a scowl. “Better than ya deserve, ya little murderer.” He snorted, the air hitting my face from his nostrils, then turned and walked away towards the middle of the line up.

All thoughts of spit were dropped and replaced by confusion, my eyes following him as he walked away. What had I ever done to him? More importantly, how did he even know what my mother’s eyes looked like? I didn’t even know what my mother’s eyes looked like!

Moonshine spoke up again as he turned to face the slaves. “There’s been a change of plans. We’re gonna be here fer another couple’a weeks. That means y’all won’t get t’ sit ‘round bein’ lazy all day long! Yer gonna haveta get back t’ work.” There was a long pause in which he looked over each slave in turn. I had expected a collective groan or something, but no. There was pure silence.

“Glad ya approve!” Moonshine let out a chuckle. “You three,” he pointed to the three slaves farthest to the left… a group that included ‘Dumbbell’, “get back t’ workin’ on th’ armor. You three,” he pointed to Tumbleweed, Lady Lake, and Hornbill, “Yer gonna be headin’ out with a guard lookin’ fer food.” He then turned and pointed at me and Firestorm. “Y’all two… I still need t’ figure out which mare’ll be first, make a good match… There’s a pretty orange mare I been thinkin’ ‘bout, but I’d haveta buy her first… In th’ meantime… I gotta introduce y’all t’ some’a our other guests. I think y’all might know each other. Gotta settle that fact.”

I gulped when he pointed to us. Right. Powder and Scout… this wasn’t going to be a fun reunion.

Moonshine flashed a sneer in my direction after I gulped, then looked back at the other slaves and stomped his hoof on the ground. “What’re y’all waitin’ fer?! Yer gonna be workin’ through th’ night, let’s go!”

After he shouted, the other slaves all hesitated, but then broke up heading separate directions. The three adults I didn’t know all headed towards another nearby building, while Tumbleweed, Hornbill, and Lady Lake all walked over towards a couple of the slavers who were standing off to the side.

After they dispersed, Moonshine walked back over to me and Firestorm. “Let’s get going, shall we?” He turned again and started to walk away. I really, really didn’t want to follow… but I didn’t exactly have a choice in the matter.

I walked after Moonshine with Firestorm following right on my hind hooves. Where we ended up walking across a few streets to another old house, except it was a lot smaller of a house than the one the other slaves were in. Moonshine walked right up to the door, pulled out a key, and unlocked it. When he opened the door, it revealed an inside that was pretty much just like the other house, except one story instead of two.

“Y’all can come on out. Yer time’s up.” Moonshine waited after he called out, looking to me as he did. “These two proved t’ be… even more rowdy than you, actually. Had t’ throw ‘em in their own place.”

I looked from the door over to him. “How rowdy?”

Moonshine shrugged. “Well they wouldn’t stop fightin’. Themselves, others, they weren’t takin’ orders seriously. Hopefully they will after this, though, so we don’t gotta do it again.”

I gave my head a slow shake. I didn’t understand this guy at all… He put Powder and Scout in their own house when they got rowdy. When I tried to fight, he just kicked me, then he just sat back and smiled when I didn’t just let him walk over me in the question thing we did. How do those things go together and make sense?

After a minute or so, Moonshine snorted and walked into the house. “Y’all better be gettin’ out here right now!”

I glanced behind me at Firestorm then looked back ahead and followed Moonshine into the house. The filly once more followed behind me

After we walked into the house, we immediately saw Scout sitting quietly off in one of the bigger empty rooms near the front. He was a blue unicorn colt. Not quite as bright a blue as Powder. And he was awake… looking right at us. But silent.

Moonshine stopped and then walked towards Scout. “Where’s th’ other one?”

Scout shrunk back a little as Moonshine walked towards him, but didn’t say anything. He was scared. Very scared.

Moonshine took a long breath and a couple more steps towards Scout, towering over him. “Where… did… the… other… colt… go?”

The colt gulped under Moonshine’s glare and started to shake a little bit. Moonshine gave a low growl and turned his head to the side, opening up a saddlebag. “Ya got ‘til th’ count’a five t’ answer that question.” He stuck his head into the bag, then pulled out a whip. He turned his head back to face Scout and started counting through the whip in his mouth.

“One.”

Why wasn’t Scout talking? Just tell him where Powder was, he wouldn’t get in trouble. Except… Powder was probably trying to like… escape or something. If he was trying to escape… was Scout really going to take the beating to let him get away?

“Two.”

Scout started to scoot backwards ever so slowly. C’mon, Scout. Just talk! Don’t sacrifice yourself for that little lying punk. … Wait…

“Three.”

What the hell is wrong with me? Am I really saying to just give in to the guy with the whip? No… you can’t… you can’t just let him win. What had Hornbill said? We’re not powerless… they don’t have complete control. Unless you give it to them. There’s room for negotiation.

“Four.”

Scout had made some mistakes… but he didn’t deserve this. After a couple more seconds, Moonshine started to shift his head to move the whip… and I made my decision. I darted forward as quick as I could, lunging for the whip. I caught it halfway down in the middle of Moonshine’s backswing and yanked hard, ripping it right out of his mouth.

The big stallion grunted, then snorted and turned, lashing out with a forehoof to kick at me. I was able to use my momentum of lunging to roll out of the way in time, and somehow, I have no clue how, ended up back on my hooves.

“Leave him alone, Moonshine!”

He let out a low growl. “You’ve made a big mistake…”

I snorted back at him. “No!” He took a step towards me and I took a step backwards at the same time. “You touch him, ya lose yer pegasus breedin’.”

That got Moonshine to stop. He narrowed his eyes at me. “How’s that?”

I chewed on my tongue for a moment before answering, “Any way necessary. Die. Escape. Crush my balls. I dunno. How don’t matter. Don’t touch him. Ya wanna know where Powder went? Lemme talk t’ him.”

Moonshine glared at me for several long seconds before letting out a long breath. “Very well. Ask ‘im.”

“Wait outside.”

He seemed to be debating his answer, but after a bit simply bent down to pick up his whip. He gave it a solid crack after picking it up, then put it back in his saddlebags. “If ya don’ come up with a good answer… yer gonna regret this fer a long time.” With that, he turned and stepped back out of the house. I let out a breath I didn’t know I’d been holding.

The moment he left, Firestorm ran as fast as she could over towards me and Scout. “You’re insane, Tri!”

I looked down at her and gave her half a smile. “Yeah.” I took another breath to steady myself, then looked over at Scout and stepped closer to him. The colt seemed to be terribly confused. “Hey Scout… how’s it goin’?”

He looked just as nervous as he did before, now scooting away from me.

I sighed and stopped where I was. “Look… Yer an idiot… but yer still a Crusader. Now where is Powder?”

Scout gulped and shook his head. “I can’t tell them, Buck. I can’t. You can’t either.”

“I ain’t gonna tell him anything bad. But ya gotta tell me th’ truth. Th’ only way this works is if ya tell me th’ truth.”

Scout fidgeted, rubbing one forehoof against his other foreleg. He glanced repeatedly between me and the front door, but finally settled on me. “Powder found a loose board in the wall. Managed to fit through… He… he promised he was gonna get help. That he’d be back.”

I nodded slowly. “An’ how long ago was this, Scout?”

“It… it… it was last night.”

“Last night… so he hasn’t gone too awful far yet. Not on his own… What was his plan t’ tell th’ slavers, huh?”

Scout shook his head. “We didn’t go over that…”

I let out a sigh. “Right, okay. Look, Scout, we’re gonna get outta here, okay? We just gotta stick together… Can you do that?” Scout gave me a little nod, which I returned with a faint smile. “Good. Now…” I turned a little, “Scout, meet Firestorm. Firestorm, meet Scout. Y’all chat for a minute, I have t’ go deal with what’s-his-face.”

I didn’t wait for them to respond, instead simply walking for the front door. What was I going to say? Obviously I couldn’t say Powder was still here. He’d do a search, not find him, and know we were lying. By now he’s gotta be expecting an escape already. But would they go look for him? One colt, and they already had sent a few away? I couldn’t take that risk of him getting caught again, either.

I took a deep breath then stepped out through the front door, back outside. Moonshine was pacing back and forth just beyond the door and immediately stopped and spun around to face me when I appeared. “So where’s th’ runt?”

“Th’ runt has a name, ya know.”

Moonshine almost smirked before snorting. “Don’t start testin’ me, son.”

I licked my lips slowly. “His name’s Powder. As in Black Powder, fer his cutie mark, or Powder Blue, fer his coat color… as fer where he is… He managed t’ get out. He’s headin’ out towards th’ coast. He knows how t’ get home from out there.” The coast was east, Asylum was a lot more south than just east… it should work. And be believable. Hopefully.

Moonshine simply grunted. “Great. Gotta go catch him.”

He started to turn around, but I spoke up, “Really? Yer gonna go send a buncha ponies after a kid?”

Moonshine looked back at me and snorted. “Runt could tell somepony where we are, get a whole heap’a trouble on our heads. Yeah, gonna go catch ‘im.” He flicked his tail and trotted off, back towards the big library building he’d brought me into right after arriving in town.

At first I was a little shocked that he’d simply left me there. Alone. Why wouldn’t I escape too? A couple of routes crossed my mind before I spotted two of the slavers. They were posted outside the main slave building, but they were watching me. That’s why I wouldn’t escape… right.

I turned around and walked back into the building, only to be met by the awkward silence between Scout and Firestorm. “So they’re gonna go look fer Powder…”

“What?! No! They can’t!” Scout got up and started to run, but apparently forgot about the chains on his hindlegs, and ended up flailing and falling again.

I stepped forward, put my muzzle under Scout’s barrel, and helped him back up to his hooves, but then put my foreleg in front of him to keep him from going anywhere too quickly. “Calm down, Scout. I told ‘em th’ wrong direction. They’re gonna go look, but they won’t find him. If anything, it’ll just mean there’s less here so we have more chances t’ do somethin’ if we find a way t’ get outta here. Okay?”

Scout whimpered softly, then dropped his head down before nodding. “Okay…” He sniffled, then stepped back and looked up at me. “I’m really sorry, Buck…”

I bit my lip then let out a sigh. “What for?”

Scout looked back down at his hooves. “Stealing food. Powder said it-”

“No, I don’t wanna hear what Powder said, I wanna know what you thought.”

He paused for a few moments then said, “I just thought he was right… ‘cause he was always right.”

“Not always, ‘parently.”

Scout shook his head a little. “Guess not.”

I let out a long sigh. Right there… right there was what deep down I didn’t want to hear. Because deep down, I wanted to pummel him, both of them, really, for being so stupid and for all the trouble they caused. But no… I knew what I had to do, and it most certainly wasn’t that. What I had to do was almost the exact opposite of that.

I leaned down and nudged at the side of Scout’s neck with my muzzle. “How bad does Powder still hate me?”

“Um… a lot.”

I gave a little nod and lifted my head back up. “Alright… I’ll tell ya somethin’ my sister told me. Sayin’ yer sorry don’t really… fix nothin’. On it’s own. It’s a good start, though… means ya know you were wrong. Means ya won’t do somethin’ that massively idiotic again… right?”

Scout finally looked back up at me and nodded. “N-no. I won’t.”

I gave a nod in return. “Right. Ya won’t. Now I dunno ‘bout forgivin’ ya ‘er anything… but I’ll tell you what. We can’t have ya wonderin’ ‘round on yer own, an’ we sure can’t have ya followin’ Powder ‘round. So when we get outta here, how ‘bout I bring ya back home?”

Scout started to look a little excited, but then didn’t seem quite so sure. “But everybody’s gonna hate me.”

“No… no, not everyone’s gonna hate ya. Are th’ adults gonna keep an eye on ya? Yeah… of course. Th’ other kids… prob’ly ain’t even gonna remember what happened. You jus’ start runnin’ ‘round again an’ don’t mention it… it’ll be fine. Trust me.”

He still seemed uncertain, but then gave a small nod.

I returned it with a smile, then looked between him and Firestorm. “C’mon… let’s go back t’ th’ other building, figure out what we’re gonna do now.”

I motioned for them to follow me, then turned and headed back out.

By the time I woke up the next morning, my wings had never in my life ached as much as they did right then. I had flown for miles and miles before at one time. All day long with very little rest. And they hurt after that. So sore. But not like this.

The first day, yesterday, it had been okay. I’d kept trying to spread them out instinctively, but the restraints kept them close. But it was fine. It felt weird, sure, but it was fine. Today, though… almost, what, thirty or more hours straight of not being able to move them even a little bit. The muscles were screaming at me.

The worst part was for a few minutes I was actually tempted to go and say that they could clip my wings so long as they took the strap off. But that wouldn’t work. If there was an escape, there’d be no way I could fly. And with my luck? That purple jerk would probably take the strap off, clip the wings, then put the strap back on for a giggle and watch me squirm.

Really just the thought made me wanna kick his teeth in.

I tried to be quiet and not groan too much at the aching, but as it turned out, I was the last one up. Scout and Firestorm were across the room, sitting next to each other and speaking softly. I could hear… some… ruckus going on a couple of rooms down. Wasn’t sure what that was… and I quickly came to the conclusion that the less I thought about it, the better.

The next sensation to hit me was my stomach. It wasn’t as bad at first, but as I came around and started to get my bearings, it began to overtake my wings for the worst ache in my body. I hadn’t eaten since… since I was at home, before reading out of the magic book to Firestorm. She… hadn’t either. … How was she even still functioning? We’d had a little water out of Hornbill and Lady Lake’s stash, but no food.

I licked my lips and got up to my hooves.

The noise immediately attracted the attention of Firestorm. She cut off her conversation and looked over at me. “Hey, Tri.”

“Hey.” I smirked at her, then nodded at Scout. He gave a little nod in return. “How y’all doi-”

“LINE UP!”

Our heads all turned in unison in the direction of the yell.

“C’mon… this early in th’ mornin’?”

Scout and Firestorm, however, didn’t have the same complaint. At least not verbally. They both immediately got up and moved past me for the door.

“Well ain’t y’all a pair’a go-getters…” I huffed then turned and followed after them. As much as I didn’t want to, I didn’t want to fall short of Hornbill’s advice to not be the last one to line up even more.

I was actually the fifth, behind the two younger ones. Right in the middle of the pack. As the others filed in on both sides of me, I took the opportunity to get a quick glance around the area. Six slavers this time. Of which, Constable, the doctor, and Moonshine were all still there, the only three I knew. So that meant they sent two out to go find Powder, which hopefully wasn’t going to work.

And with the addition of Scout, that made nine total slaves. Nine to six… well… take out Scout, Firestorm, and ‘Dumbbell’, and that made six to six… Technically an even fight, but they had guns and we had… chained legs. Yeah… that wasn’t gonna be happening.

Moonshine moved front and center as the last ones filed into line. He lifted a hoof up and did a head count of all who were there before clearing his throat loudly. “Y’all made it. An’ fairly quickly. Good, won’t haveta punish nopony today. Life’s always nicer when there ain’t nopony gettin’ punished, don’tcha agree? Now, orders? Armor repair same as yesterday. Th’ rest’a ya? Yer workin’ on cleanin’ out an’ fixin’ up another set’a barracks. We got company comin’ from Rainbow Falls, gotta make sure we got room fer ‘em.”

Moonshine stood still for a moment, just looking up and down our line of ponies. “Well…?”

Immediately the slaves scattered, the same three going to the armory building again, while Tumbleweed, Hornbill, and Lady Lake all went towards one of the other slavers. I took a step forward and flicked my tail against both Scout and Firestorm to get them to follow me, then quickly headed after the three adults to the slaver.

“We’re setting up that one,” the slaver pointed to another two-story house that was… only partially ruined. “It’s needs cleaned. Dusted. Get it clear of debris. There needs to be at least six beds set up inside. Stock it with some of the food we caught yesterday. Inside there’s already your own food. We’re going to do an inventory at the end of the day once it’s all done, there better not be any additional food missing.”

Hornbill nodded. “Yes, sir.” Immediately after speaking, he broke off and went towards the house. Without a word, the other five of us followed suit and chased his tail until we got inside.

Also without a word, we all went straight for the food that was laying on the ground. It was ant meat, but I really, really didn’t care in the slightest. I laid down and simply devoured the portion that was there, just like everyone else did.

Lady Lake was the first to say anything. “We have got to try and make sure Constable is the one doing the inventory tonight…”

Hornbill took the last bite of his ant meat and moaned softly. “I’ll see what I can do, dear.”

I glanced between them, having finished my meal quicker than either of them did. “What… do ya go that long without food normally?”

Lady Lake simply nodded. “Water about once a day, food once every two or three days. We try to stuff ourselves as much as we can on what we catch when we go hunting for food, like yesterday. But yesterday we really weren’t able to hide it that well.”

My face screwed up and I just shook my head. Firestorm spoke up before I could, though. “How do they expect you to live?

Lady Lake snorted softly and looked to Stormy. “Sweetie, I don’t think they do.”

Firestorm’s ears dropped and she looked back down at her hooves, then started to slowly lick off any of the residue that had gotten onto them from when she was holding the meat as she ate it.

Hornbill grunted and got up to his hooves, clicking his tongue softly. “Try not to think about that though, eh? Let’s get to work. The quicker we get this done, the quicker we can rest again.”

I wanted to argue about why not simply rest now and then work into the night until we were exhausted, so then we could just pass out asleep… but arguing with Hornbill wasn’t high on my list of things to do, honestly.

I, and all the others, got up after him. Our first priority was taking a quick tour around the house to see what all needed to be done. The first thing that popped out was that there were only two mattresses in the place. We’d have to move at least four more in. Fun. Second, there were sections of the wall that clearly needed replaced, and half of the floors needed debris from… who knows when taken out of it. Broken chairs, pieces of wood, there was even a brick laying in one of the bedrooms. Where had a brick even come from?

So, we got to work. Each of us had our own room taken up as our duty. We started with removing the crap from the floors or other surfaces, then had to go about dusting it. Which… it wasn’t like we were given any fancy dusters. Had to use our tails. I was a bit tall for my age, so it was fine for me. Scout and Stormy, though… I had to go through their rooms as well and help them with the dusting parts. They simply couldn’t reach high enough.

Those parts weren’t exactly… hard, though. Time consuming, sure, but not difficult. It was after noon by the time we were done with that. The hard part came next. Mattresses. We had to go out to other buildings in the town, find mattresses that were somehow still in good shape, and drag them all the way back to the building we were working on. Mattresses are heavy. And awkward. And we couldn’t carry them on our backs the easy way because they had to fit through doors and hallways, so they couldn’t just be horizontal.

The first one, alone, took half an hour to do. And that was from a building right next door. But, it gave us experience. The second one would go easier, right? We knew what we were doing.

Right… well, no, wrong. It did go easier, but as we were about to enter the barracks building with the mattress, something caught my eye off in the distance. Up in the sky. I stopped paying attention to what I was doing, trying to spot the thing again, but I’d lost it. Lost everything, actually. I didn’t see what had caught my eye, and I’d stopped paying attention long enough that I let the mattress slip off of my back and crash to the ground.

Hornbill was at the other end of the mattress. “Buck! Please… pay attention.”

My ears pinned back and I quickly turned around. “Sorry! Sorry. Sorry.”

With the help of the other adults, we got the mattress vertical again, up onto my back again, and got it into the building. Another half hour endeavor, which would’ve only been fifteen minutes if I hadn’t seen some phantom in the sky.

The last two mattresses took a total of two hours to find and bring back, mostly because they were both from the exact opposite side of town. Plus it didn’t help that I kept feeling like I was seeing something in the sky off in the distance. By the end of it, it was evening, and we were all exhausted… and I was starving again.

We weren’t all quite done yet. After setting down the last mattress and taking a five minute break, Hornbill walked over to me. “Hey, Buck. Take the foals, go back to your room. We’re going to try and nab some food. If this doesn’t work, you guys need to be completely separate from it. That way they’ll just blame us. Got it?”

I was caught a little by surprise of the suddenness of that statement, but slowly nodded. “Are ya sure? I could… try t’ help somehow.”

He shook his head. “No. Now go on, leave this to us. And leave the flogging to us to if we get caught.”

I gave another slow nod, but then the sense of urgency hit me and I jumped up to my hooves. It was getting a bit easier to move around with the chains on my hindlegs. Still not very maneuverable, but less difficult.

I went over to Scout and Firestorm. “Guys, let’s uh… head back. Real quick like. Grown-ups can handle it from here, we get t’ rest. Sounds good, yeah?”

Scout let out a little groan of relief and sped past me for the door. Firestorm, however, just yawned. “We get to stop now?”

I smiled and nodded. “Yeah, let’s just hurry off… so we can rest. Hurry up and rest.”

Firestorm nodded then followed after Scout, admittedly much slower than the colt. I turned and walked out after her, following both of them back over to our building.

Evening seemed to be going by pretty fast, with night not far behind it. With any luck, maybe they’d make it back with some food before we all went to sleep. It was torture trying to go to bed on an empty stomach.

Roughly thirty minutes later, Hornbill and the others came rushing upstairs. Two of them were carrying small sacks. They ran straight for their room and dropped them off before coming back towards what had become the foal room.

“We did it! C’mon!”

“Really?” I started to smile and got up to my hooves. I ran out into the hallway and followed him into his and Lake’s room, where Lady Lake was opening up the sacks. Inside were small portions of food, but food nonetheless. Most of it was hunted meat, but there were a couple samples of cram thrown in as well.

“Remember, we can’t eat it all tonight. We have to save some of-”

“LINE UP!”

Hornbill’s mouth froze open and a look of fear came over him. He pulled his head back out of our room and looked down the hallway to the staircase. “No, they didn’t see it… They didn’t.”

Lady Lake darted past him in the hallway, “Doesn’t matter if they did, let’s get out there!”

I gave a groan at the interruption, if they didn’t see it, they pick the worst times for these things. If they did see it… well… we were screwed.. I stepped over to the other room again and gave both Scout and Firestorm a little shake to get them out of their drowsiness, then quickly headed after the adults to the stupid line up.

We hustled outside and filed into line, like we had both previous times. The six of us who had worked on the barracks were there first. The other three were apparently still working, because they came over from the other building with the guard who had been watching them.

Moonshine was once again front and center, wearing a rather unpleasant look on his face. He remained quiet until everyone had made it to their proper places. “Which one’a y’all can tell me why yer out here right now?” The whole group was deathly silent as he scanned his eyes across us. “Not talkative, huh? Well then… Constable. Gimme yer gun.”

Constable looked confused at the request, but shook himself out of it. He drew his pistol out of its holster then offered it over to Moonshine.

Moonshine took the pistol and placed it on his upraised hoof. “We have a problem. A discipline problem. ‘Bout five minutes ago, I got lied to. Now… who wants t’ guess who did th’ lyin’?”

We all stayed perfectly still, not saying a word.

“Well. Lemme educate y’all then. Constable.” He looked over at the fat pony.

Constable had to do a double-take before he fully realized he was being spoken to. “Yeah, boss?”

“Constable, these ponies standin’ in a line in front’a ya. What’re their names?”

His brow furrowed at Moonshine before he looked at the slave line up. “Um… Hornbill, Lady Lake, Tumbleweed… um… I don’t know those two foals. But the third one is Scout. And Coconut, Rocky, and Lemon Cakes.” He paused for a moment then looked back at Moonshine. “Why, boss?”

Moonshine gave a derisive scoff. “Who else here knew all the names of these filthy maggots?!” He turns around to look at the other slavers, but none of them moved a muscle. After a few moments, Moonshine looked back at Constable. “But you did. You like ‘em, don’tcha?”

Constable stammered a bit before shaking his head, “I don’t… I don’t… What?”

“That’s why yer lettin’ ‘em steal food, ain’t it?!”

Constable took a step away from Moonshine. “I saw nothing. I heard nothing. I know nothing!”

“That’s th’ problem, ya idiot!” Almost as if adding extra emphasis, Moonshine picked up the pistol off of his hoof and shot Constable right in the shoulder. There was a collective gasp from both the slaves and the slavers followed by a cry of pain from Constable.

“If ya like ‘em so much, well guess what. Yer one of ‘em now. Have fun!”

“Wh-what?”

Moonshine dropped the gun entirely, stepped over behind Constable, and gave him a shove towards the slaves. “I know ya ain’t deaf too now! Get in line!”

Constable tried to keep his balance, but cried out again as he stumbled and fell in front of us after being pushed forward.

Moonshine pointed off to the side. “You! Get another set of chains.”

“F-for him, boss?”

“Who else? Goddesses, idiots everywhere.”

The other slaver started to run off to fetch the chains, but he stopped dead in his tracks when he heard something. Something all of us heard.

Our heads all lifted up in search of the source when we heard a blood-curdling screech that lasted five or six seconds. There was a short pause, followed by another one, louder. It was… a bird scream. Wait… not bird. Griffin!

I was just about to speak when more gunfire erupted. But it wasn’t from the slavers. It was at the slavers. The first pony to drop was the slaver who had gone to get the chains. Two blasts from a gun and he hit the dirt, hard.

Then utter chaos broke out and my heart started pounding. The slaves scattered, all in different directions, bumping into one another. Crap! I quickly moved to the side to stand over Firestorm and Scout, just to make sure they didn’t get trampled by the panicked adults. Some were running for the slave building, some were running towards the fallen slaver, and two were just running… away.

There was yelling followed by more gunfire. The slavers had drawn their weapons to return fire, and the air just became a constant ringing of gunblasts and bullets, which I could only hear between the beating of my heart I could hear in my ears.

And another hawk scream. Out of the corner of my eye I saw an orange blur dive down out of the sky, swoop past a slaver, and disappear going straight up again. The slaver at first looked like he was fine. but after a second I saw the blood coming out of his throat right before he fell to the ground as well.

I hunkered down over Scout and Stormy, trying to be as close to the ground as possible. Constable was still laying in front of me, nursing his shoulder. I took a quick look around. Three slavers left standing. Except. Only two had guns. The doctor had ran and used the nearest building as cover, but didn’t even have a gun out.

As quickly as the air had erupted, it got suddenly quiet again. Except for the ringing in my ears. Both of the slavers, Moonshine and the other one, had stopped firing to reload. The attackers had stopped too, but they finally came into view, I saw they weren’t reloading.

Off to the side I saw a purple pony rushing around the side of the slave building and towards the slavers. Lily! She lunged for the nearest slaver, right as he was putting the magazine back into his pistol, and knocked him to the ground. I stood up and gave a cheer on reflex as she brought her hooves down on the slaver’s head and take him out of the fight quickly.

That left Moonshine. I looked over at him, ready to rush him myself to keep him from shooting Lily, but he didn’t even have the gun in his grip anymore.

He was just standing there, dumbfounded. Staring at Lily. “Absinthe? Abby? You’re alive? Sweetie! You’re alive!” And just like that he was smiling. His crew had just been wiped out and he was… smiling…

Lily spun around to face him, ready to pounce, but she relaxed ever so slightly when she saw his lack of gun and the look on his face. Instead, she started to slowly walk towards him, almost stalking him. “I’m alive, Dad.”

Wait… what? Dad?! WHAT?! You mean he wasn’t lying about that part? Wait… did that mean… no…

“Yes!” Moonshine let out a happy laugh and… was… he was crying? He was crying! “I knew it! I knew I’d find you one day!”

He started to trot towards Lily, slowing when he got closer and lifting up a foreleg like he was going to give her a hug, but she wasn’t having any of that. She made a quick move under his foreleg, stepped to his side, then pushed him over and pinned him against the ground.

Moonshine let out a grunt when he dropped. “Abby? What’s wrong?”

Lily just stared down at him, but shouted out, “Kari! Get the kids out!”

Seconds later the griffin dropped out of the sky right next to me. “Kari!”

He chirped then gave me a cocky smile. “My turn to rescue you, huh?”

I rolled my eyes. “Does that make us even?”

Kari snorted. “We’ll see about that. Lemme finish my job first.” With that, he ducked down closer to the ground and addressed the two foals that were now right next to me. “Hey, Firestorm. Hey… uh… buddy. You know Inkblot? Lemme take you to her, we can get those chains off real quick, sound good?”

It wasn’t the reaction I was expecting, but Firestorm practically leapt forward and gave Kari a hug. Kari caught her and held her tight, then motioned for Scout to come along as well. After a nod from me, Scout went to Kari, then Kari took to the air taking them both away from the little battlefield.

Lily watched him fly off, still pinning Moonshine to the ground, then looked over at me. “You okay?”

I took a deep breath before saying, “I think I am now.”

My sister gave a short laugh then nodded. “Good, now come here.” I turned and walked over towards them, looking between them as I got closer. Lily was keeping her eyes on me, but Moonshine seemed to not be able to pull his eyes away from Lily. “Did he hurt you?”

I blinked and looked at Lily. The question seemed… dumb. “He kidnapped me…”

“Yes, Buck, but did he hurt you? Like, physically.”

“Well… yeah, my face an-”

“Really?” She looked back at Moonshine, shouting into his face now, “REALLY?! Fifteen years and you still haven’t moved on? I was this close… this close to giving you a chance, too.”

Moonshine pushed his head back from Lily into the dirt. “But-but she was so special, and, and her killer… Her killer had to be pu-”

Lily interrupted him with a hoof to the muzzle. “That’s enough out of you.” All I could do was stand there, speechless once more. “Look away, Buck.”

She pulled her head back and removed her pistol from her holster. She’d said to look away, but the command didn’t really register. Without waiting, she fired three rapid shots into Moonshine’s head, the stallion immediately going limp. I continued to just stand there in shock. I’ve never exactly seen somebody’s brains blown out before… and I never thought I’d see my sister put a bullet through the head of her father… which… made him my father, too?

Lily holstered her pistol then did a double-take after glancing at me. “I told you to look away, you idiot…” She got off of Moonshine’s body, stepped over, and wrapped me in a hug, forcefully moving my head away from that direction and blocking my vision of the body.

We just sat like that, her hugging me tightly, for about a minute. Right up until Hornbill’s voice was heard from the side. “So, you know each other?”

I blinked my eyes back open then sucked in a deep breath. Right. Slaves. I gave my head a shake, then fought Lily a bit to pull away from her. She didn’t want to let go at first, but after a couple seconds she let me out of her grasp. “Yeah, uh, Hornbill, this is Lily. Lily, Hornbill. Also uh…” I nodded in their direction, as all three of them had been the ones to swarm the first downed slaver, “Lady Lake and Tumbleweed. They’re nice…”

The three of them nodded as they were introduced, then Lily greeted them as well. “Hello. Um, well. We can get you out of the chains, at least. So there is that. We should probably start there.”

Hornbill simply smiled, the biggest smile I’d seen out of him yet. “That’s very kind of you, ma’am, more than we could really hope for.”

Lily gave a small smile in return, then looked back at me. “And we need to do a lot of talking… but that can be done later. Here, I can carry you over there.”

She started to lay down, but I shook my head. “I can walk.”

She blinked and lifted back up again. “You sure?”

I nodded. “Yeah, I’m sure.”

“Alright…” Lily leaned over and nuzzled my cheek softly before getting fully back up to her hooves and began to lead us through the town. We didn’t get very far, though, before a potential problem started to rise. Literally.

Constable was slowly working his way back up to his hooves, and finally made it right as we were about to pass by him again. He looked a little… embarrassed, maybe?

Hornbill was the one to stop and address him, though. “Do you know what just happened?”

Constable licked his lips and looked around the area. Four dead slavers, a fifth hiding off somewhere, four escaping slaves and one of their rescuers. “I… see nothing.”

Hornbill chuckled and snorted. “Do you want a chance to do something different?”

The big fat pony looked around again before looking back at Hornbill. “I don’t know…”

Hornbill nodded slowly. “We’ve got a deck of cards, that means we can make caps. My first thought? There’s a place in Manehatten I know. It’s called Friendship City. We could use a nice guy with us, though, one that can put up a nice bodyguard front. Benefits? We won’t shoot you if you happen to mess up.”

Constable grimaced at that.

Hornbill took a step forward and patted Constable’s good shoulder. “Give it some thought. We won’t leave until morning, you’ve got time.”

I had slowed down to listen to their conversation, but once it ended, I sped back up to keep pace with Lily. I couldn’t wait to be able to spread my wings again.

By the time we’d walked the mile or so out of the town, Scout and Firestorm were both free of their chains, and taking advantage of it by running around in circles playing tag with each other.

“Bucky!”

Inkblot finally saw me as we got closer. She hopped up to her hooves and galloped to me, just barely stopping before plowing me over, and reared up to give me a tight hug.

I smiled when I saw her hop up and run over, then closed my eyes and lowered my head down, wrapping it around the back of her neck.

“Firestorm told me what happened. Don’t you ever do something that stupid again.”

I laughed softly. “I won’t do somethin’ that stupid again…”

“Promise me.”

I let out a soft sigh. “I promise, Inky.”

“Good.” She gave my neck a tighter squeeze, then licked my cheek as she pulled away again. “Let’s get you unchained.” She turned and ran back to her supplies and I followed close after her.

Ultimately Lily had insisted that we actually head right out for home again rather than camping out for a night so close to the slaver outpost. Even if most of the slavers were dead and there wouldn’t be reinforcements there for weeks. I was okay with this, and it gave me a chance to actually spread my wings and fly. The younger foals… well, they were okay with it after they fell asleep and got carried by Lily and Kari.

The sun was rising by the time we actually made it back to Asylum. I was dead tired. I still wanted my answers from Lily, but I soon found out that this was the second night in a row she had stayed up without any sleep, and any sort of conversation was not really gonna happen.

So, instead, we decided to sleep and talk later.

When I opened my eyes for the first time after going to sleep, it looked like it was still morning outside. That… couldn’t be possible though. No way I slept for twenty-four hours. Evening… must be evening… I got caught up in a yawn, then started to stretch out my body. Had to do it carefully, though. Lily was still curled up around me. Like she wanted to make sure I didn’t disappear in the middle of the night. Er… day. Whatever.

My attempt at stretching my legs was causing her to stir, though. First she tightened around me some, but then started to spread out and stretch just like I had been doing. I took the opportunity to finish my stretches, then shifted my head up and laid it on Lily’s shoulder to wait for her to finish her stretching.

When she did, I rubbed my chin against her coat for a moment before whispering, “You awake?”

There was a short pause before Lily groaned softly. “Unfortunately.”

I gave her shoulder another small shake with my muzzle. “Weeeeelllll… you promised…”

“I promised to strangle my little brother because he didn’t let me sleep?”

“No… no it definitely wasn’t that.”

Lily let out a long sigh. “Can’t it wait a few more hours?”

I bit my lip and my ears drooped back. Yeah… yeah it probably could. “Sorry…” I pulled my head back then laid it down on the ground.

Everything was quiet for a couple of minutes, but then Lily shifted her body and bumped mine. “Go get High Times. Bring him here. Then we’ll talk about it.”

I lifted my head up again and blinked. “Really?”

“Yes, really, now go, you little punk.”

“Okay!” I carefully got up to my hooves, trying to not step on Lily, then hopped over her and ducked out of her tent.

I first went to the Adult’s building, but he wasn’t there. He wasn’t in the hospital, or the General Store, or anywhere else either… Eventually I came all the way back around to look for him at his tent. And he was there. I made a big, giant circle for nothing. Awesome! Yeah. Whatever, got to fly.

I approached the front of his tent and considered how I should make my presence known… but decided to just clear my throat loudly. “Uh, knock knock.”

High Times looked up from whatever he was doing with a set of saddlebags and his face lit up. “Buck! Good to see you! I saw you guys come back in this morning, but I didn’t want to bother you.” He got up to his hooves and stepped outside his tent. “How are you doing? How’s Firestorm?”

I took a step back to let him out of his tent. “I’m okay. Firestorm’s… well she cried a lot. But I think she’s good now again. Plus… maybe she might be obsessin’ over Kari too now since he sorta rescued her this time. Ain’t sure how he’s gonna handle that one… but uh… yeah.”

High chuckled. “I’m sure he’ll manage. I’ve heard he’s a bit… gruffer, at least sometimes, might help him soften up a bit.”

“Heh, yeah… Um…” I paused and rubbed at the side of my head with my wing. “Lily finally said that she’d tell me stuff ‘bout th’ past… and stuff… but she wants you t’ be there too.”

High blinked. “Oh! Well then, let’s not keep either of you waiting.”

I gave him a small smile then stepped around him, leading the way back to Lily’s tent. When we got there, Lily had finally sat up and was finishing downing a bottle of water. I entered first and High followed right behind me.

“Hey, Lily.”

“Hey, High.

“How’s it going?”

Lily licked her lips and looked right at High for a couple of seconds. “We still got booze left over?”

My ears drooped, but High only looked slightly surprised. “That bad?”

She nodded. “Yeah.”

“I’ll get a bottle later then.”

She gave a half smile at him. “Thanks.” She took a deep breath then looked down to me. “Alright… I did promise. Where do you want me to start?”

I gulped and glanced up at High before looking back at Lily. I didn’t want her to have to drink… but I really wanted to know. “Um… th’ beginnin’?”

Lily gave a slow nod. “Alright… Beginning, beginning... um... Let's see. Well, I guess... In the beginning, there was a pegasus mare named Daffodil. She was smart, sweet… I’d tell you her life story, but honestly… I don’t remember it anymore, Buck. The important part, though, is she ended up getting captured by slavers, then sold from master to master around the wasteland.

“Eventually… she ended up being the property of one slaver named Moonshine.” Lily paused and took another breath. “Moonshine fell in love with her. He kept her as a slave, didn’t free her… but he was in love with her. She never did love him back. I’m pretty sure that she only put up with it because it got her preferential treatment. She was better off as a favored personal slave than just as some random one.

“Anyway… eventually she got pregnant and had a daughter.” Lily paused again and put on a little cheeky smile and raised her forehoof. “That’d be me. My mother… had wanted her daughter’s name to be Lily, but Moonshine wasn’t about to let her name his daughter… so I became Absinthe.”

High Times blinked. “You’d never told me that part…”

Lily blew a small puff of air and glanced at him. “I never told you a lot of stuff that happened back then, High.”

High gave a small shrug and a nod. “That’s true.”

I glanced over at High then looked back at Lily. “But why not? Why not tell him? Or me?”

Lily sighed and looked back at me. “Because, Buck… I thought…” She paused again then shook her head. “Anyway… I was in a weird place. My mother was a slave, and that meant I was a slave. My father was a slave master, and rapidly rising through the ranks in Rainbow Falls, so that meant I wasn’t a slave… I was free, but not free at the same time. But Dad was okay then. He wasn’t… well I mean he was a slaver, but he wasn’t... insane yet…

“Then, when I turned six, Mom’s health started… well she wasn’t in good shape. When I turned seven, she got pregnant again. And… she got sicker and sicker.” Lily started to chew on her lip and looked me over. “She gave birth when I was eight. To you. But… she was too sick, and giving birth was too hard. She died in the process. Moonshine got… angry.”

I blinked a few times as that information sunk into my head. Was that… what he thought I had owed him? He wanted to make me a slave for life because… I’d killed his wife?

Lily coughed into her hoof then continued. “I guess angry is an understatement. He completely flipped… and the fact that you looked so much like her… well… it’s like it added insult to injury. Whenever he got mad… he started to take it out on you. Starting nearly with the day you were born.”

She pursed her lips then shifted her gaze from my face to my left shoulder, where the leg was missing. “I never told you because I didn’t want you to know. I told you the stories because… I thought if you believed them, maybe you’d believe you had some cool past, or… Well, I thought that if I told you stories of me saving you from monsters, you’d like me more. And think I’d fought a monster, so maybe you’d listen to me more.” She snorted and looked a little sheepish. “So sorry about that…

“The truth is you really were born with four legs. But… well it wasn’t even quite a year, I don’t think… Dad got particularly violent. Things… happened, and at the end of it, your leg was beyond destroyed. That night… was… the last straw for me, though. After he went to bed and just left you… like you were… I decided that we had to go. I got some of my things, a bit of food, picked you up onto my back, then ran.

“There was a section in the wall where the sewage went out, so there was a hole there for it to flow. Not nearly big enough for any normal ponies to get through, but I had used it before to sneak around in the middle of the night to go and pick flowers from outside the wall for Mom. I was just barely able to squeeze both of us through it, and once I was out, I just ran.”

I sat there for a few seconds after Lily stopped talking that time. That was… I had daydreamed about what the truth was for a very long time. The story she’d just told… was not even close to any of the scenarios I’d come up with.

My eyes wandered as I processed all of it. Eventually, one thing stood out to me, and I spoke it quietly, “Ya coulda jus’ told that one…”

Lily stopped rubbing her muzzle with her hoof when I spoke. “Huh?”

I sniffed then cleared my throat. “That one… ‘bout th’ monster… an’ savin’ me. ‘Cause… ya did. Save me. From th’ monster.”

Lily blinked a few times before a faint smile started to creep onto her face. A genuine one, this time. “I guess… I just wanted to give you some cool stories, not one so… depressing.”

I gave my head a shake, then stepped forwards towards Lily. I leaned in and nuzzled her muzzle, then turned and plopped down, using her body to support my weight. “I guess it’s fine… Ya still shoulda told me once I figured out you were always lyin’, though… And… I’m sorry.”

Lily nuzzled back at me, then turned and kissed the top of my head after I sat down against her. “You’re sorry? For what?”

“Fer killin’ yer mom…”

“What? Hey! No.” She shifted and slipped a forehoof around me. “I don’t want to hear you ever think that, okay? You didn’t do it. If anything, it’s the idiot’s fault that got her pregnant while she was sick. You had nothing to do with it.”

I gulped then gave a little nod. “Okay… um… sorry.”

She let out a little sigh then kissed my head again. “It’s fine…” She rested her nose against the top of my muzzle for a minute before lifting her head again. “That’s not the end of the story, anyway.”

I blinked and looked up at her. “It’s not?”

She hook her head. “No… but that’s why I had you get High. He remembers more of it than I do.”

High had been keeping quiet and out of our way, at least until now. He let out a soft laugh then cleared his throat. “I suppose that’s true… Um… well… See, I used to be just a scavenger. And I liked it that way. I had a home, but I wasn’t there very often. I liked being out on my own, just searching and trying to look for hidden treasures in the ruins of the past, you know?

“One day that led me to an old factory. Uh… it… was fairly intact, but there were holes in the roof, holes in the walls… terrible condition, really, but intact and standing. First place I headed was for the break room. That’s where personal effects usually are in buildings like that, so… it’s the best first place to go.

“So, I go in there, and it’s a messed up as I expected it to be. There’s a couple vending machines, I see some bones, some other things, but there’s this one section that’s got a tarp laid over it. And that was unusual. So what’s the first thing I do? I go and pull the tarp off this pile of… something.”

High Times paused to laugh softly. “It wasn’t the something that caught my eye, though. When I pulled that tarp off, I had my life threatened. By the meanest looking, most pissed off, ready to kick my rump if I even looked at her the wrong way, little eight year old filly. Hehe, the glare she had…”

I blinked and looked from High up at Lily. I could tell she was listening… but it almost looked like she was playing out the same thing in her head, only from her perspective.

High Times continued, “So I back off. But then I notice what she was standing over. A tiny colt. I couldn’t tell how old, but it looked like he was still drinking mother’s milk. And his leg was mangled beyond recognition… First thing I did was go over to the vending machine, get some old food, and offer it to the filly. Icky as it is, it’s still food. She didn’t go for it, though. Didn’t trust me.

“I tried reasoning with her, offering other food, water, but nothing was able to get her to trust me. Eventually… I noticed that the colt’s leg was infected. It looked like there had been attempts to stitch it up, maybe make it okay again, but whoever did it had no clue what they were doing. And it was infected.

“So, I brought that up to her. Informed her that the little colt she was protecting was going to die unless she got that leg fixed up and the infection taken care of. It was only going to be a matter of time. But… that I also knew a doctor that I could take the both of them to who would be able to fix the leg up perfectly and save the colt’s life. That… that is what got her to listen to me. She finally let me get close, let me offer food and a drink.”

High laughed softly then let out a sigh. He looked up at Lily, gave his head a little shake, then looked back at me. “So what we did is we grabbed the tarp and used it like a sled. Put the two of you on it, I tied the other end to me, and I pulled the two of you as quick as I could to the nearest town. The doctor… had to amputate the leg, but she saved your life and got rid of the infection.”

I looked back up at Lily, and this time her eyes were closed. I tilted my head up and nuzzled at her jaw then looked back to High Times.

High lifted a forehoof up and used it to motion as he spoke, “After that, though, the two of you didn’t really have anywhere to go. So… I… eventually… came up with the idea of you two staying at my house until you did have somewhere to go. I couldn’t take an eight year old and a one year old out scavenging with me. But you could stay in my house. Heh, over time, though, the two of you started to grow on me a little, and it turned into being bothersome that I had to provide food for two more mouths to being… well… kind of fun.”

High smirked. “Skip forward a few years, though, and Lily was getting… antsy. She didn’t like being cooped up all day. She wanted to go out and travel with me. But we couldn’t take you with us, and we couldn’t leave you home alone. Doing scavenging trips like that just wasn’t going to be possible. But then… we came up with another idea. I’d ended up really enjoying helping you guys… and I was sorta okay with the idea of helping more foals. Lily… well it was Lily’s idea in the first place, I just went with it because I actually liked the sound of it. She wanted to go out and help foals who were in bad situations or didn’t have parents or something…”

High paused and waved his hoof around, indicating… basically everything around us, “And thus Asylum was born. It was slow going at first. We had to collect everything that we’d need, go find a place to set it up… took years. But we started gathering more foals as time went on, and that really helped us out. Inkblot was the first, then Paper Weight and Paper Scroll not too long after. And then… skip another ten years or so, and here we are.”

“Wow…” I gave my head a little shake… That was also a lot of information to take in… I blinked then looked up at Lily. “Wait, Asylum was yer idea? An’ ya got it ‘cause ya saved me an’ ya wanted t’ do it again?”

Lily finally opened her eyes again to look back at me. “Yeah, basically…”

I started to grin and looked between her and High. “So what yer sayin’... is that without me, Asylum wouldn’t be a thing?”

High blinked rapidly. “Uh… I… suppose not, no.”

“Haha! Yeah, awesome!” I hopped up and flared my wings. “I wasn’t born in Asylum, I borned it!” Wait, that’s not right. “Uh… gave birth… uh… created. I created it! Yeah!”

Lily was stunned at first, but just laughed after a few seconds. She reached out a forehoof to give me a little shove. “Yeah yeah, take all the credit…”

I pfft’d at her. “Well I practically run th’ place!”

Lily laughed and smirked. “You do a fair amount… oh, and you might get a kick out of this… You know the tarp that you use to cover up your stuff on top of the General Store?”

I nodded. “Yeah, what ‘bout it?”

Lily motioned to High, “It’s the same one that he mentioned, the one from the factory break room.”

“Woah, really?” I looked back at High, only for him to nod and confirm what she said. “... Cool! Never actually wondered where that came from.”

“Well now you know.” Lily leaned over and pulled me in for another hug. “Now, I love you, Buck. I spent the last two nights searching for and getting you back… can you be a good little brother and let your sister go back to sleep?”

I bit my lip, a little embarrassed by what she said, but I quickly gave her a hug with my wings before pulling away. “Yeah, sis… Love you, goodnight. An’ thanks.”

She gave me a smile. “No problem… now leave.”

I gave a quick nod and ducked out of her tent. I stopped once I was outside and took a deep breath. Okay… that was… big.

I had to go tell Inkblot.

Author's Notes:

Big thanks to No One, Kibu, and Scrap Metal for helping with spelling, grammar, and plot. Not titles this time. Mostly because I forgot to ask them and that's why I got stuck with this one.